E-Tail grows at a steady pace
Forrester research released the results of its 2010 survey on online retail. No surprises, but only a confirmation of trends…sounds familiar doesn’t it! US and EU 17 will see a steady increase in online sales each year of 10%, topping of at 279 billion $ in the US and 134 billion EUR in Eu17 in 2015. By 2015 online sales will represent approx. 8% of the total retail sales.
In the last year US has seen a growth of 18% (and EU 13%) in online sales, but a lot more offline sales are also “web influenced”. The adjusted e-commerce model is different from the 1.0 web commerce model. Business drive on 3 basic idea’s to connect with customers:
- act local
- think social
- be mobile
Look at Groupon (f.i.), who sells with the social leverage products of a local market, and can be reached 24/7 thanks to (mobile) social media. This is off course only one small example…but many others are out there!
Computers, apparel and consumer electronics are hot items to sell online, besides cars, travel and prescription drugs….
It’s needless to say, classical brick-and-mortar stores are looking at a challenge because online and “web influenced” shopping in the mobile world will suppress 0.0 retail…some offline retailers are already getting trouble like Borders bookstores who filed a chapter 11 in the US to be protected against creditors. Check out the business modeling page, on more insights how to deal with this shift!
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