The climate impact of Ecommerce is difficult to measure, but it can be curbed

Like Jingle Bells Inextricably linked to the past Christmas season, trend lists are a regular fixture around the turn of the year. The internet is full of them. And as an industry that is largely driven by technological innovations and dynamic customer behaviour, Ecommerce is ideally suited for reflection. What will 2022 bring? Ecommerce selects the most mentioned Ecommerce trends 2022.

2022 is the third year in a row with a dominant role for the corona virus. We have to wait and see to what extent our daily lives are redefined by this. After all, it can still go either way with the new Omikron variant. However, the umpteenth mutation ensured that we started the new year in the Netherlands without fireworks, catering and physical shopping pleasure. Outside the essential stores, the Dutch consumer was once again dependent on click & collect and online shopping. In addition, a large group of Dutch people joined the traffic to Antwerp.

Unwillingly, Covid-19 gave the already booming Ecommerce industry an insane boost. Worldwide. Forced by lockdowns, webshops and platforms saw their revenue potential grow to unprecedented heights. According to Shopify, in 2020, more than 150 million people make their first online purchaseprompted by the pandemic. The largest growth occurred in France, Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom. But even the Netherlands, traditionally European leader in online shopping, recorded record after record. Inveterate anti-E shoppers have been converting to online shopping for the past two years. And they are stayers. And like all online consumers, they are looking for the ultimate, personalized customer experience.

Opportunities and challenges in Ecommerce

With the increase in online shoppers, orders and turnover, new challenges are also present. The competition is fiercer than ever before. New players are demanding a piece of the pie, new formulas and technologies are putting the business on edge. Due to the pandemic, production processes came to a standstill and the scarcity of transport capacity became apparent. The production and distribution chain appears to be completely disrupted. With a negative impact on Ecommerce. After all, late deliveries damage reputations, result in disappointed customers, and lead to many returns. These are putting pressure on turnover and profit margins and are fueling criticism of the sector's unsustainable character.

Always mentioned as one of the Ecommerce trends 2022

Given the cutthroat competition and congestion in the supply chain, one trend remains head and shoulders above the Ecommerce trends 2022. Ecommerce initiatives without the added value of a hyper-personal Customer Experience have little future prospects. Keywords are: customer knowledge, consistency and customer value. The CTR – Click-Through-Ratio – determines success and every investment in optimizing it is an investment in continuity.

1 Hyper Personalization

Hyper-personalization of the purchasing experience is in the Top 3 in all trend lists. Brands that take account of who their customers are in their online contacts are the winners. Customer Data are the holy grail. These provide the information to optimally serve individual customers with a unique, personalized proposition.

2 Acceleration Social Commerce

At the beginning of October 2021, the world stood still. Not because of corona, but because of a disastrous malfunction at Facebook. All systems went down, including for our own employees. The 'friends platform' and related services such as WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger were unusable. For more than five hours. A significant loss for Ecommerce entrepreneurs who do business via Facebook. Lesson learned: always use multiple channels. Yet Social Commerce remains extremely popular with consumers and scores high in the Ecommerce trends 2022. And Facebook is slowly but surely losing out on other channels. Instagram has been popular for a while and the new kid on the block, TikTok, is conquering more and more (young) hearts.

3 Ecommerce Platform Innovations

Those who want to be visible and want to score decently in the Google ranking cannot avoid taking a serious look at innovative Ecommerce software solutions. Technological developments thunder over each other. The adage is: fast, faster, fastest. Speed and ease of use determine your visibility and conversion. Optimization of existing applications or replatforming? Whatever the choice, the performance of your platform is vital.

4 Internationalization

Internet made the world smaller, Ecommerce is literally limitless. The number of online entrepreneurs that see cross-border opportunities is growing. Dutch consumers are increasingly shopping at non-Dutch web shops and platforms. So why not vice versa? As a Dutch provider, why should you not look further than your nose is long? Take measures in 2022 to internationalize your platform and offer. nothing stands Cross Border Commerce in the way.

5 Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality – fixed factor in Ecommerce trends 2022

Was it a clever stunt to divert attention from an overdose of negative publicity? Or is it genius? At the end of October, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook was becoming a label under mothership meta. The CEO shifts the focus from a one-dimensional platform like Facebook to the three-dimensional one metaverse. Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) merge in this dreamed-up online environment. For those who don't know the difference: AR mixes the real world with holograms, VR is a completely virtual world, experienced through VR glasses. How long will it take before we start shopping online at virtual stores through such glasses and try on clothes in virtual fitting rooms? Not so long. We will see more of this in 2022.

6 Technology, technology, technology…

No industry that is so dependent on technology for successful business models and connections with customers as Ecommerce. We keep improving, we keep implementing. Everything for the ultimate User Experience. Everything for the smartest, automated marketing and retention processes. Everything is available in the cloud. No sooner has one groundbreaking Ecommerce tool been unpacked than the next is on the way. Also in 2022, the Tech industry will play generous Santa Claus. Choose the best knowing that too much can hurt and an overkill of tools can get in the way of your site's speed.

7 Differentiation in payment methods

Who cross border If you want to do business, you should at least think about the payment methods offered. Systems that are common in the Netherlands may be completely unknown in Brazil or China. But the use of innovative payment methods can also benefit your turnover and customer loyalty for your own domestic market. iDeal is still doing well in the Netherlands, but payment with PayPal and credit cards is also popular. New arrivals regularly Payment Service Providers. This trend will certainly continue in 2022. An important development: the option to pay in installments without interest. That could become an important marketing tool.

8 Ecommerce goes sustainable – with trial and error

In addition to virus news, the media worldwide was dominated by another theme. The climate. The effects of global warming are visible and felt all over the world, but effective measures are slow to take off. It's complicated matter. Also for the expanding Ecommerce industry. Because how does the urge for more conversion and orders relate to the desire to reduce CO2 emissions? How do we handle packaging and returns responsibly? And what about mega data centers? There are no ready-made answers. But it is certain that the number of initiatives around alternative delivery and collection services and sustainable packaging will increase. And the fight against expensive and climate-unfriendly returns continues tirelessly.

9 Privacy and compliance

Privacy and Ecommerce seem to be contradictory quantities. After all, to create the ultimate Customer Experience, you need to know your customers. To know your customers, you need to collect, store and analyze Customer Data. And that often conflicts with the law. Scandals surrounding the collection and use of personal data lead to heated debates. Meanwhile, online consumers seem unconcerned about the traces they leave on the internet. As an E-retailer you operate in a minefield. Privacy and compliance will continue to be high on the agenda in 2022. Anyone who pays little attention to the applicable laws and regulations can incur considerable reputational damage. And it's not just about the privacy issue. is at least as important decent business. Although… Amazon laps the decency rules around mental property regularly neglected, but remained the largest and most successful marketplace in the world in 2021. And that will not change in 2022.

10 Growth, growth, growth… but at what cost?

In 2019, the growth of the Dutch Ecommerce market seemed to level off slightly. But then corona came. The number of online purchases increased by 27% to 335 million in pandemic year 2020. Turnover increased by 7% to €26.5 billion. The first quarter of 2021 saw an increase in the number of online purchases of more than 30% compared to the first quarter of 2020. Part of the increase was at the expense of the 'non-essential' stores, which are still lagging behind at the beginning of 2022. to have. Is that an indication of more growth in 2022? In any case, there is a turning point. Is growth even one of the Ecommerce trends 2022?

According to a forecast by ING Economics Bureau, the Netherlands has in the course of this brand new year more web shops than brick shops. Supermarkets not included. According to the same forecast, growth will level off slightly in 2022, but Ecommerce will remain dominant in all respects. The question at the cost of what is inevitable this year and in the years to come. More vacancy in the shopping streets? More congestion in the cities due to delivery vans? More underpaid employees in distribution centers and delivery structures? More returned products that end up directly on the waste mountain? Or does the evolution of the Ecommerce industry lead to better and more responsible business models and sustainable solutions? Time will tell. In the meantime, it is important to distinguish yourself in 2022 with the best online offer and the best online performance.