Global Client Leader Ian Thomas explores the ever-increasing digitization of the whole shopping experience, including the need for brands to go beyond transactional commerce and put people at the centre to remain competitive.
"In order for brands to compete they need to go beyond transactional commerce and put people at the centre, getting a better understanding of how why and when they buy so they can be more relevant at those moments, in the form of meaningful and valuable commerce experiences."
As the digitization of the whole shopping experience continues at pace, the implications are significant and relevant to the whole organisation – not just a few functional ‘shopper’ specialists.
The line between living and shopping has all but disappeared – people have the ability to buy whatever they want, wherever and whenever they want. Commerce is now part of life; everywhere and always on, transforming lives and businesses.
Retailers are disrupting brands (look at Amazon basics private label growth), brands are disrupting retailers (D2C fashion retailer, boohoo’s collaboration with reality TV sensation, Love Island, surpassed £1bn in annual sales) and even the disruptors are being disrupted (Nomad Rides subscription model charges 20% less than Uber and Lyft while paying drivers 20% more).
Shopping is now more mobile…
45% of all shopping journeys contain mobile regardless of where people convert; for Millennials that number jumps to 57% (GfK “Omni-channel Shoppers” study commissioned by Facebook).
Adobe data in the US shows that 39% of all purchases in this year’s recent Black Friday event were made on smartphones, a 21% increase yoy. The same can be seen in China, with sales on Singles Day 2019 exceeding the 2016 total after only an hour and a half, with a remarkable 90% of sales coming from smartphones.
… and more social.
People are the new point of sale. 48% of shoppers who discover beauty content on Facebook say they trust the people who provide information because they have a personal connection.
30% of e-commerce sales across South East Asia are the result of consumer journeys which begin on social media like Facebook and Instagram, and end on messaging apps like Messenger or WhatsApp.
Despite the parlous state of the high street in many developed markets, physical retail is far from dead – according to Forrester, physical stores will still account for 85% of all US retail sales in 2025 as well as generating half of the growth. But physical and digital channels shouldn’t be seen isolation – 73% of consumers use multiple channels to shop (Harvard Business Review) and Google reports a 200% increase in mobile searches for ‘open now’ + ‘near me’ in the last 2 years.
In order for brands to compete they need to go beyond transactional commerce and put people at the centre, getting a better understanding of how why and when they buy so they can be more relevant at those moments, in the form of meaningful and valuable commerce experiences. At Geometry we call this creative commerce – end to end. Where commerce is naturally embedded in experiences where the physical, digital and social worlds converge.
Click here to view the article at WPP's The Dose.