Ecommerce Technology Trends: Digital commerce has exponentially grown in the past years as it enables to meet the changing needs of people and makes online shopping easier for the modern-day customer. It benefits both the merchants and customers. As the expenses of Digital commerce are much lower than the traditional businesses and the direct reach to the customers. That makes it more adaptable for merchants. This makes the products more affordable for the customers which results in a win-win situation for the merchants and the customers
Being a technology-driven industry Digital commerce has been constantly evolving. Technologies in Digital commerce are upgrading and improving Digital commerce businesses to provide the highest quality digital shopping experience. We have listed down the top 6 Digital commerce trends that will play a vital role in making Digital commerce revolutionary in the coming years.
1. Headless commerce
Headless commerce is becoming popular amongst Shop operators as the shop can be designed as per the individual requirement and it can be connected to any Digital commerce platform via the API. It enables you to change the Digital commerce platform anytime with no change in the design. There are no limitations for the design as per your backend platform. So customer experience remains uniform irrespective of the backend platform. The design of the store can be frequently updated as per the trending customer shopping experiences so it is highly customizable.
Headless enables true Omnichannel experience, as sales are possible regardless of whether a customer is shopping on a Website or an app. As an owner of a Digital commerce store, it is important that you can move fast in order to outpace the competition. You can easily deliver a quality shopping experience to your customers by using headless. Go headless 🙂
2. PWA Digital commerce
PWA technology is the newly popular and trending technology for headless commerce. By using a PWA on the frontend, the brand can get the fast, responsive, app-like experience they want, while connecting it through APIs to the commerce features it is closely connected with the headless commerce mentioned above. It enables functions such as push notifications, offline capability such that even if the user doesn’t have internet connectivity or has lower connectivity they can browse the products which leads to an increase in engagement and ultimately increase the revenue generation of the store.
PWA is faster than native mobile apps and provides a better user experience. Users have to access PWAs in the browser, you can let them add the site to their home screen with just two taps, making it easier by “Add to Home Screen” to access the PWA same as the native mobile app. It can work across all browsers Google Chrome, UC Browser, Opera Mini, Mozilla Firefox, etc.
Top Digital commerce companies such as AliExpress, Alibaba, 5miles, Flipkart & many more have started adapting PWA Digital commerce. With the report of Google Developers, the average PWA increases conversions by 52%. which gives one more reason to adopt PWA for Digital commerce.
3. Social Commerce
Most famous social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, and Twitter offer reach to potential customers globally. It’s quite common that Shop operators to connect their social media channels to their online shop in order to add products directly from their shop system, allowing them to ultimately get visitors for their Digital commerce store. It increases traffic to your website which will eventually influence your ranking on search engine results. It helps people to connect with a business through two-way communication. This allows customers to not only engage with your business but also use social media as an efficient customer service channel where it’s possible to solve problems.
The majority of customers (74%) purchase relying on social media for information about how a product looks or performs and 43% of customers are more likely to purchase a product after learning about it on social media. Social commerce is the best when it comes to reach as every day thousands of new users join social media sites around the world and millions are active on it. Social commerce can never be outdated; it’s a go-to way for any Digital commerce.
4. Live Commerce
A Live shopping experience is highly preferable for the users as it is highly interactive. It provides a demo of the product, answers to the questions about the product, and price can also be discussed so it results in high conversion rates as the user can be very fast with the decision of the buying. It can be hosted with a live video, presenting products, and streaming live. The event can take place on a third-party platform, such as social media, on a mobile app, or on a designated online store. It almost provides the user experience same as the brick-and-mortar shopping.
Platforms like Facebook, Amazon, and TikTok are already giving live shopping a try, and the trend’s popularity is growing fast amongst the people.
5. Augmented reality and virtual reality
Immersion, engagement, and impact are the reasons why AR and VR are becoming popular in the e-commerce industry. These technologies are bringing a breakthrough in the e-commerce industry as VR is fully immersive, while AR augments the real world. By integrating into Digital commerce stores the shopping experience of the users becomes more satisfying.
By using these technologies consumers are more likely to buy as AR and VR can enable customers to explore virtual showrooms, feel, and experience products, and give a complete shopping experience like the brick-and-mortar store. AR and VR will enable shoppers into the immersive e-commerce experience and enable the potential for fast growth, accelerated sales for shop owners, and reduced returns.
Organizations and some of the world’s leading e-commerce giants are leveraging the power of AR and VR to deliver amazing experiences and achieve a competitive edge.
6. Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence in online shopping is transforming the Digital commerce industry by automating processes, giving a personalized experience to users, and increasing conversion rates for shop owners. It helps Track and predict the shopping patterns of customers which enables the shop owners to do targeted advertising and provide recommendations of the product accordingly resulting in increased conversion rates. It also automates stock management by gathering data on the sales it helps in automatically placing orders to the suppliers/manufacturers to re-stock the product to meet the increasing demand of the customer which ensures delivery of the products to the customers at all times.
Its estimated that by 2023, the majority of organizations using AI for digital commerce will achieve at least 25% improvement in customer satisfaction, revenue, or cost reduction.
Bhavya Shah
Bhavya Shah is a Business Analyst at iCreative Technologies. He specializes in the eCommerce consulting for all business domains. He is working hand-in-hand with developers and clients to produce requirements and specifications that accurately reflect business needs and are technologically achievable.