华交会|Global e-commerce development trends in 2018

What did you gain from the year of 2017? Have you started making new strategies for the New Year? E-commerce is a strong driving force for marketing. Knowing the development trends of e-commerce industry is the key to the success of a company in 2018.

Trend One: Email will be a useful channel and the key factor for brand promotion

The practices of companies such as Rebel prove the charm of e-commerce brands marketing via emails. Statistics showed that e-commerce brands’ revenue brought by emails have exceeded the total amount brought by social media. Email is also highly effective in taking visitors to a website. The strength of those companies in email marketing is that receivers (potential clients) are allowed to directly place orders in the mail. This makes email a useful brand promotion channel.

Trend Two: E-commerce will focus more on persistent participation and interaction

The advertising costs of e-commerce will continue to rise in 2018. Being a platform with media feature becomes more important. Leaders of Hawke Media said that the brands that can not only sell products but also continue attracting consumers will grow faster. Companies that don’t do so will find that it costs too much to bring back customers, which will then lead to them  completely losing theirn competitiveness.

Trend Three: E-commerce’s demands for expertise is enlarging

Excellent e-commerce teams have one thing in common – they are composed of professional personnel. Now, the industry is in need of various professional skills, including HR, PR, and searching technologies, to develop further. The world of e-commerce is changing, and the mutual influence of different departments is increasing. Therefore, a team needs different skills to achieve the maximum value.

Trend Four: The importance of voice search rises unprecedentedly

The change of consumption habit makes voice search even more important. A study predicted that 50 percent of search operations will be done via voice by 2020. Indeed, the number is currently rising. It is definitely convenient when you can tell Siri “please help me order a power line used at the office” while driving.

Trend Five: collecting customer data to provide individualized services

According to UK’s Interactive Media in Retail Group, although the collection of consumer data is still in the early stage of development, more and more e-commerce players have started launching this strategy, allowing the players to send consumers corresponding messages based on their needs. With this, the brands can respond in real-time and improve consumer services. Data collection also enables brands to give consumers the most suitable information. Sending right information to the right person in the right time helps get twice the result with half the effort. The brands can also use data analysis to provide consumers with the most suitable products to reduce refund rates.