Future Trends in eCommerce

Sales through the internet, has changed the pre existed business patterns despite the geographical barriers. Whether it is C2C, B2B or B2C, eCommerce is flourishing day by day and gives a promising outlook in the coming years. The eCommerce wave is stronger than when they had started in 1995, gained much base by overcoming the IT downturn in 2000. From mere online travel booking and matrimonial sites, eCommerce has grown tremendously with refined methodologies making eCommerce more and more attractive.

Trends in eCommerce industry are changing and competitors are looking for any method which makes their business more profitable and practical for the consumers. Below listed are the few trends which will dominate the eCommerce industry in 2014


Big Data Analytics

Next time when you take part in a survey and mark your responses, your personal traits may get recorded at the backend, by which the surveyor company can use this data either for their existing promotion or to create a new product. Facebook is an ideal example for Big Data, which could uncover hidden patterns from the timeline posts and identify the status of the relationship.! Netflix and Comcast have entered into a partnership agreement where Netflix subscribers opting for Comcast Internet services gets better quality video.


In eCommerce, the structured data and unstructured data are both taken for increasing conversions. Structured data are mainly with fields of data such as name, address, preferences, gender and age and unstructured data are likes, tweets, clicks, videos etc. Walmart collects more than 2.5 pet bytes of data every hour from its customer transactions. A pet byte is one quadrillion bytes, or equal to 20 million, worth of text. An exabyte is 1,000 times of that, or equal to one billion gigabytes. The data ican be used for pricing, predictive analytics, better customer service, and to manage the supply chain.

Multichannel Shopping

Advanced technology paved the way for multi channel shopping through various devices like, Smart phones, PCs, tablets, laptops and iPad. In India the number of internet users is expected to increase by 300 million, which in turn look very promising for the business. The expected growth in online transaction is 40 million by 2016.


Innovative Customer Service Methods


Most of the e commerce sites are providing 24*7 supports via chat, mail and call; it was not a multi dimensional customer service earlier. COD, a recent technique adopted by the Indian online retailers helped them in getting more returns than the old method of payment at the time of buying. Some eCommerce retailers even give online guidance for the purchase. There will be more deals and offers in the coming days.


New Shipping Solutions


Shipping is critical for any online retailers and they are bringing up innovative ideas to ensure fast delivery. Online retailers like Jabong and Flipkart have their own logistics services that have definitely increased their acceptance. Many local stores are offering next day delivery in the US and UK.


Advertisements Through Mobiles

Mobile advertising shall increase, as the online retailers are spending more on mobile ads. Video ads, SMS are mainly used by large retailers where small retailers stick on to traditional ads. Most online retailers are trying PPC and CPC. Ads are also possible as blogs, tweets and communities.

Personalized Products

In 2014, 3D display of the products shall take over the traditional photo display, through that customers can identify what they exactly want in the product. GiantSlike Nike, BMW's mini cooper has generated business from allowing their customers to design their product online. Online retailers have already plugged into this technology where small retailers may find difficult to get resources to venture into this.