I think you can agree, more and more people are getting into the e-commerce world. In the year 2020 where everyone was shifting to work from home, e-commerce has grown tremendously. E-commerce is here to stay, and it’s not going anywhere even in the near future. So, you either have to continue to really brush against it and fall behind, or you can embrace it and allow it to fuel your business.
While there is more competition, you can still get more customers, increase sales and satisfy your existing customers. If you can think ahead about what will happen, you can start making the changes ahead of time and be ahead of the curve once these things become a reality.
According to Forbes, e-commerce has experienced over 129% year-over-year growth in 2020. E-commerce mainly consists of transactions that are not restricted within the physical boundaries. I’m sure you are aware, there is a need to apply digital technologies to business operations. However, you do not need a sophisticated website. What you need is just a website that can fully meet your goals and efficiently interact with the customers. For instance, if your customers want to order your services and goods at their comfort, maybe in pajamas? One click of the website, they can get what they need; that is precisely what you need to embrace.
Most website designers want to design a website that attracts the customers to see how great my website is, which is contrary to the website’s sole purpose. An analogy of just a great website is a storefront that has been structured to capture the customers’ attention. In this case, the customers will indeed show up, but will they find what they are searching for? For such a store, you will have to do extra work, marketing. The same goes for the website, and you will have to do extra work to get people to your website.
Additionally, you also need to know your website’s objective (the task it needs to perform for you). Designing a website to attract new customers and expect them to show up does not work. There has been an exponential growth of websites (about 129% annually): most of the entrepreneurs have their websites, so what will make your website stand out?
In making your website stand out, you need to address the following questions. How are you lure in your ideal customers? What are you going to tell them? For example, will you use social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram and go live to talk about it? Unless the people are aware of your website, they will not visit your website. Honestly, people will never waste their entire day searching for websites to buy; they will buy from websites they have purchased before or have been referred to by a close friend. The main reason is that in both cases, they are aware of the purchasing processes. Therefore, the only way to increase purchases over your website is to ensure that more people are aware of your website; you have unique content that causes people to go to your websites and talk about it to their friends and family.
Let’s talk about predictions so you can plan accordingly :
Prediction 1: Continued Personalization
The idea of personalization includes custom-made garments, custom-designed t-shirts, to name a few. Customized items increase purchases over the website. The customer will easily pick an item without visiting your physical location, can feel your creativity, and can choose the input elements along with the texts and alter the specifications and press the button for the items to show up. The strategies mentioned above are typical. Some of the unique strategies include; make sure that the customers can personalize your product, make it their own, help them understand how special it is. Second, make sure your website is designed so that the customers are not overloaded in their searches for an item. For instance, creating a website where the customer has searched all over becomes a tedious task. An excellent example of an ideal website is Amazon; if you are looking for personalized red coffee mugs, guess what shows up red mugs that are personalized. Including a search bar is very important.
Prediction 2: Hybrid Workstations
In the future, there will be no need to go to the offices. Employers will have specific work areas to sign up for a conference room in a personal meeting. Since the COVID-19 outbreak, a trend of employees working from home has been on the rise. When employees are allowed at their comfort, there is projected productivity. Moreover, the employees will have time to focus on their families and engage in productive hobbies. The employers have the advantage of the channel the expenditures of maintaining offices to other production factors that increase.
On the contrary, employers are being exhausted from virtual stuff, and they will look for a hybrid approach. However, I think comfort and acceptance are the main factors. For instance, people are going to require more comfortable items such as branded sweatshirts. We need to keep up with the trend of comfort and casual. We also need to help the employers build that employee engagement through branded products and team unity.
Prediction 3: Sustainability
More people will embrace and emphasize the need for sustainability. No longer will it just be a buzzword that might sell more products, but instead it will become a deciding factor in purchasing decisions. I assume that you will have more potential customers conversant with the environment and only recommend sustainable solutions. For example, if you’re in digital printing, you will have cover sheets and parchment paper waste. Generally, there will be waste boxes that exceed the recycled boxes daily. How can you show your potential customers that sustainability is important to you as well?
Final Thoughts
The increased growth of e-commerce will continue in the year 2021 and beyond. With the growth rate of 129%, Year-Over-Year e-commerce businesses need to prepare themselves to adopt these tactics to stand out. In 2021, product personalization, casual performance wear, and sustainable solutions will prevail.