Last year, we capped off the fourth quarter by giving our take on the most prominent 2021 ecommerce trends. Today, about halfway through 2022, we’re back at it again with a new list of 10 ecommerce trends for 2022 that aren’t going anywhere, any time soon. Read on to learn more.
Quick Overview
Despite expectations, global retail rose to 25% during the pandemic. More than two billion people bought necessities online in 2020, resulting in a record $4.2 trillion in global ecommerce sales.
This has encouraged online retailers to provide customers with better shopping experiences customized to their needs. If you have similar ambitions, it is essential to keep up with the current ecommerce trends to succeed.
Business owners are always looking for better, more innovative ways to increase sales and conversions and ensure profitability.
Here are a few key ecommerce developments to watch out for this year.
One: Product Visualization with Augmented Reality
Your ecommerce store can benefit from new technologies like augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR). These technologies enable customers to experience the products they’re buying up close. AR/VR is becoming increasingly popular, particularly in the fashion and home furnishings industries.
You can bet your bottom dollar that virtual shopping is the future of ecommerce, and it’s becoming more apparent with each passing day.
For example, Ikea’s app uses the phone’s camera to allow users to see how furniture might look in their own homes.
In recent years, there has been an uptick in augmented reality for product visualization. Apple’s iOS 11 came with an augmented reality toolkit. In reaction to this, Google introduced AR Core for devices using the Android operating system.
Two: Voice Search Becomes Increasingly Popular
More and more individuals use voice assistants to conduct daily tasks and own smart speakers. 75% of American households will have a smart speaker by 2025.
Research and statistics concur: people already use voice search to do online shopping, food delivery, and other day-to-day tasks as smart speakers become more widely available. For ecommerce businesses, the advent of voice search presents an opportunity for keywords and content.
Three: Shop With A Snap
Image shopping has become a new ecommerce trend. A user can take a picture of a product they want to buy and then order it from an internet retailer.
Many photo apps like CamFinder are already on the market, and more will be launched this year to fuel this phenomenon. As a result of this trend, affiliate products are already being sold through photo shopping.
Four: The Mcommerce Revolution
Online businesses worldwide agree that mobile transactions are on the rise, especially in the run-up to the holiday shopping season. In fact, we just recently published a related guide delivering 50 facts about mobile commerce for 2022 (read it to get a better idea of just how hot this ecommerce trend for 2022 is). There’s no better time to make your website mobile-friendly than right now.
Mobile devices have overtaken desktops as the primary mode of communication for most people. Mobile ecommerce has surpassed desktop sales on various sale days in recent years.
Mobile retail e-commerce sales in the United States from 2019 to 2025
Five: Artificial Intelligence (AI)
It’s a massive challenge for online retailers to automate and personalize their stores depending on client segmentation and browsing behavior. A study by Business Insider shows retailers that personalization methods increase sales by 6-10%. There has been a recent shift towards more intelligent algorithms.
This suggests that more businesses are gearing up to use ecommerce AI-powered products in the future to tailor each user’s experience.
Six: Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL)
As people scramble to make ends meet in the wake of a deadly pandemic, an old business model known as Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) has seen a surge in popularity. BNPL became a popular choice for youthful customers.
Payment model BNPL allows clients to pay for things they buy in installments rather than the total amount. BNPL transactions are favored above credit card payments since they are interest-free.
Seven: Using Chatbots Enhances The User Experience
Online customers can talk to chatbots in the same way as an in-store sales representative. Customers today expect to find and purchase a product within a few mouse clicks, and if they are unable to, they become irritated. That’s where a chatbot marketing can save the day.
Chatbots are predicted to be used by 80% of organizations by 2020.
Eight: A Rise In Subscription-Based Business Models
The convenience of digital payments is growing. For that reason, 2022 is the year of the subscription economy. Customers flock to subscription boxes like Loot Crate and BirchBox because of the increased personalization they provide.
New ecommerce retailers can also get in on this lucrative market if they use a subscription-based model as Amazon does. They can receive monthly or yearly recurring sales.
Take a look at the chart below, you’ll see that recent subscription box statistics for 2021 find that the industry is attracting more than 44 million visits per quarter, an astounding number that continues to grow.
Nine: Various Payment Options, Including Cryptography
There’s no way you haven’t heard of cryptocurrencies unless you’ve been living under a rock. Tokens and NFTs ruled the year 2021. This is likely to continue through 2022. It is estimated that the worldwide cryptocurrency market will be worth $4.94 billion by 2030.
As a result, it is only natural that crypto makes its way into ecommerce. Customers want the ability to pay in a convenient way for them. Thus they anticipate a wide range of payment alternatives. In 2022, numerous online retailers are priming up to accept payments in bitcoin.
Ten: Programmatic & Contextual Advertising
Programmatic advertising relies on data to determine the target audience. Certain ads are shown to a specific group of people based on their purchases. Retargeting occurs every once in a while to increase the return on investment.
Getting the right people to see a relevant ad at the right time is the goal. Programmatic advertising gives ecommerce store owners a better chance of achieving a broader audience than traditional retargeting methods.
The newest ecommerce trend is AI-powered context adverts that mix in seamlessly with the content, even in videos. For instance, a pre-roll ad for an Economics Masterclass video that plays at the opening of a documentary about Nobel Prize winners is less intrusive and encourages more people to sign up for the Masterclass.
Conclusion
The continuous evolution in technology like AI, wearables, autonomous vehicles, drones, etc., directly impacts retail. With the shifting paradigms of the world, the e-commerce industry is all set to grow and get bigger and better. You, being e-commerce owners, should keep embracing the new ecommerce trends that best suit the needs of your business. Remember that providing value to your users should be your only aim.
Your sales automatically increase as you create a better user experience for your customers. To successfully implement these trends in your business, your foundation needs to be strong in terms of performance, reliability, and infrastructure.
Need Even More Tips?
We leave you with this illustrated infographic to better help you understand some of the most pertinent statistics you should know about mobile commerce in 2022 and beyond.
We’ve also got you covered with a few awesome and related guides you’ll want to read sooner than later.
