Over the past few years, and especially in this pandemic period we went through, we had the opportunity to witness a significant increase in eCommerce in Portugal. We have all talked, written, and read about this concept.
About the impact of this context on our consumption habits, consumer behaviour, and the way consumers relate to brands, among so many others.
According to the Statista Digital Market Outlook, for example, there was a 15% increase in eCommerce in Portugal in 2021. This a very significant growth, but still below the average growth rate worldwide, which was 29%.
The prospects are that the revenues from online businesses will continue to grow in the next few years and are expected to reach 10% of global commerce by 2030. Another interesting indicator is the level of eCommerce penetration in Portugal, which stands at 47%. This means that practically half the Portuguese population has made at least one online purchase in the last year. These positive indicators give us a very optimistic perspective for the coming years of growth and consolidation of the digital channel.
Fundamentally, we begin to see digital commerce as an additional channel of a brand's interaction with its customers and should therefore be framed within an Integrated vision and an Omnichannel strategy. One should look at something other than eCommerce as an online shop. It is necessary to look at the entire business process transversally and frame it in that same process.
Consider the Supply Chain issues, consider the shop management and operations systems, ensure integrated analytics, and all issues related to customer service, Customer Experience, and even the Employer Experience. This integrated vision, which IDC calls "Retail Commerce Platform", is the way for the eCommerce channel to be successful.
According to the same IDC, in the Global Retail Core Business Survey (2021), 44% of retailers surveyed point to increasing profitability in the eCommerce channel as their main objective for the next two years. With this integrated vision, this objective is likely to be achieved.
This way, it is fundamental to ensure an integrated vision, where eCommerce is just another "piece" in the strategy. Today some several trends and challenges must be taken into account when adopting eCommerce:
- The diffusion of channels: The buyer is no longer limited to interacting with the brand on a single track. Nowadays, the experience is multichannel, and the combinations are countless - the consumer who researches online and buys in a physical shop; the one who buys online and picks up in the shop; the one who orders in the shop and receives at home; besides other possibilities such as the use of third-party platforms;
- Customization and personalization: The digital channel allows greater flexibility in how a brand promotes and presents its products. Nowadays, it is possible to adopt a much more granular segmentation strategy, betting on "niche" approaches and highly customized and personalized communication and offers for your customer.
- Customer experience: It is fundamental to guarantee a flawless customer experience throughout the process. From navigation (where Mobile is becoming more and more critical) to the purchasing process, the ease of searching for products, payment methods, the distribution chain, customer service, complaints, and returns management, knowledge of the customer, integration between the digital channel and the in-store experience, the suitability of the offer to the customer, promotion, and communication, loyalty, in other words, the entire purchasing journey. One of the most common mistakes when we talk about eCommerce, is related to the "siloed" approach, where the digital channel is independent of the physical medium, the systems do not communicate, the consumer and customer data are not shared, the logistics process is not integrated, agile and fast...this kind of approach, is halfway to disaster.
That said, we can understand that the future is digital, the digital transformation of business is a reality, and digital commerce will be more and more present and increasingly relevant in the consumer's life.
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