Are you not able to cope up with customers’ needs? Is your retail business lagging behind your competitors? If your answer to any of these questions is a yes, you have reached the right page. The retail industry is going through significant changes with the introduction of the latest technology and advanced operations techniques.
If you own a retail business, you must remain updated with the latest retail industry trends to bring the desired changes in your organization that will ultimately help you achieve your goals. We have got you a list of innovative retail trends to watch in 2021.
1. Social Media Commerce gaining popularity
The pandemic has resulted in the rise of online shopping, and social media commerce is one of the most popular online shopping destinations.
According to a study, nearly 41% of people have shifted their interests from traditional brick-and-mortar stores to online stores for shopping needs. Social media has gained immense popularity in many aspects. One of the crucial parts of a social media platform is its commercial departments.
People can make use of Facebook Marketplace, Instagram marketing, and other valuable tools to add their products to the social media platforms and expect overwhelming responses from the audience. Personalized gifts are in high demand over social media commerce.
2. Faster delivery options
With the development in technology and AI-powered systems, people expect faster delivery of their favorite products. People tend to lose patience with the delivery of products at their homes.
It all started with the Amazon 2-day delivery option when Amazon Prime was launched. A few days later, Amazon came up with one-day delivery. Nowadays, same-day delivery options are trending in the online world, which means customers can get their products delivered the same day they order them.
Although 51% of E-commerce retailers already offered same-day delivery options in 2018, we can expect a significant rise in these numbers in 2021 with the technology advancements and modified techniques.
3. Smart Speakers are in trend
Smart speakers are one of the best devices to have in your home. It lets you manage almost everything, from playing a song to switching off the lights.
Amazon Echo and Google Home smart speakers have seen a tremendous rise in their demand during the pandemic as everyone was stuck in their homes. You can ask any personalized questions to these smart speakers, and they tend to answer your query using their AI abilities.
According to a study, intelligent speakers showed a tremendous rise in their demand up to 70% in the year 2019 as compared to 2018. The smart speakers market is expected to cross the mark of 35.5 billion U.S. dollars by the year 2025.
4. Online stores in offline spaces
Online stores are now preferring to open their stores in offline spaces. It is estimated that within five years, digitally native brands would extend about 850 brick-and-mortar stores.
Most companies have shown their interest in operating their stores in New York City. Although the pace of building traditional brick-and-mortar online stores got impacted due to the pandemic, we expect it to rise again in 2021.
These stores allow the customers to enjoy a seamless shopping experience, whether they prefer online or traditional shopping methods. Amazon launched its Fresh grocery store in September last year. These offline stores allow the E-commerce owners to build a reputation among both online as well as offline shoppers.
5. Chatbots add growth to your value
After the pandemic started, people became frustrated about unsolved issues while shopping online. E-commerce giants were not able to provide customer support due to the imposed lockdown.
Customer care executives were not allowed to gather in the offices, and it was necessary to direct customers and solve their issues. Although chatbots were a part of many E-commerce websites before the pandemic, this technology became popular during the pandemic.
Chatbots provide both the customers as well as the seller with a lot of benefits, including shorter response time, 24X7 availability and reduced customer support queue. You can make use of these chatbots for personalized recommendations of products on your website, as was perfectly organized by Lego.
Conclusion
You can expect a significant impact of technology in the E-commerce world. Retailers will focus more upon providing quality services to their customers and prefer offline space stores representing their online business.
More and more companies will be initiating faster and within a day delivery options for customer satisfaction. Social media marketing has seen a tremendous rise after the pandemic, and we can expect it to grow further in 2021.
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