New e-commerce trends pop up at a dizzying pace, in large part to e-commerce’s growing popularity. Consumers are becoming more and more accustomed to and comfortable with doing their shopping online. Powerhouses like Amazon and Alibaba are changing how we shop, and traditional retailers are getting into the act with more offerings online and curbside pickup. All this growth means that distributors and warehouses must keep up with the demands of shipping and receiving. Keeping pace means, for instance, having well-trained forklift operators that
don’t make common mistakes, changing warehouse layouts, digitizing operations, and creating as lean an environment as possible. Below are just a few examples of the e-commerce trends you can expect to see in 2020.
Chatbots
You know that little dialog box that pops up on your screen and looks like a customer service rep waiting to help you? That’s a chatbot. It’s an automated customer service tool that helps funnel your choices down and find what you are looking for on the site. It will also direct you to an actual person if it’s not able to find what you want.
Machine Learning and AI
AI and machine learning remain the hottest trend in e-commerce. Before modern algorithms came about, product recommendations came about mostly manually. That was usually inaccurate and wildly inefficient. Now, recommendations can come automatically, in an instant, and more closely match the customer’s preferences.
Customer Personalization
E-commerce personalization is creating personal shopping experiences that cater to a customer’s individual tastes and preferences, not an all-encompassing experience. Instead of a one-size-fits-all campaign, retailers will ensure key elements of the customer journey, such as on-site browsing, social media activity, and paid ads, change based on the customer’s wants and past behaviors.
Conversion Optimization
Across almost all markets, competition for customers is fierce. Because of the competition, e-commerce optimization is key to winning those customers. It helps you stand out from the rest. This concept means looking at the conversions on your site instead of overall sales. Getting conversions once a customer finds your site is all that matters. Constant evolution of the site and tweaking things based on customer habits is a good start.
Headless e-Commerce
Customers are seldom aware of their favorite site’s technical side. Headless e-commerce is a hot topic right now, as it allows the presentation layer of a site to be separated from the functionality. Because of that, services can provide a more personalized experience for the customer and have richer site content. It allows retailers to alter their storefront at will, changing the look of the site and the overall aesthetics. Sites like Shopify or Magento are good examples of headless e-commerce.