Shopify is an e-commerce platform that provides an opportunity for everyone to create their own wealth in the eCommerce market and allows them to make a profit. But, is profit-making that much easy on Shopify or any e-Commerce platform? No, it’s not.
The e-commerce platform is fully crowded and it will increase year by year, which ultimately creates big challenges for businesses to survive and make a profit. What can you do in this situation so that you can not only maintain your business position but also grow?
This is all about what we will talk about in this article. Read on to find out what strategies you can implement and what challenges you should be prepared for to stay competitive in the market.
An Overview of Shopify
Shopify is a large e-commerce platform that allows anyone to create their own store and sell their products online. This platform is for everyone; even merchants can deal with it. Shopify also allows you to sell your products even without creating a Shopify store (with some limitations).
To make it a more worthy decision for you, Shopify offers a free 14-day trial period so that you have experience of selling products on Shopify without any spending.
If you want to know more about Shopify, read our complete guide to Shopify here: What Is Shopify And How Does It Work?
Following Trends is the Most Powerful Strategy to Grow Your Shopify Business
There are various strategies you can make to be competitive and grow your business, but if you do not follow the trends, you will be kicked out of the market by your competitors. Therefore, it is crucial that you keep up with the trend and implement it in your business.
Generations are becoming more digital, and innovative, they want everything quick in their hands. And this is only possible by following the trends. Demands are high and different for users, and it’s really difficult for a conventional business to fulfill users’ demands.
For example, the conventional banking market is going down with the advent of Fintech. Fintech is grabbing attention by providing various services. Fintech is a new way of banking and finance that follows trends.
According to a recent report, e-commerce platforms will account for 20.4% of global retail sales in 2022, up from only 10% five years ago. As we said, eCommerce is becoming more crowded. Therefore, it’s important to take some essential steps.
Trends are nothing but the development of technology loved by people. It helps you provide customers with what they want and ultimately increases customer satisfaction. With the help of trends, you can follow the generation and their interest, and you can also attract customers from across the world.
If you haven’t started your Shopify journey yet, visit enAct eServices, the best Shopify web & app development company for your business.
Here are the following e-Commerce trends you can implement in your Shopify business to stay competitive and expand your market share.
Everyone is talking about Artificial Intelligence in business, and that’s why we list it at the top of the list.
In business, it is essential to study consumer behavior so that you can provide them with exactly what they want. AI in business can help identify and segment your customers based on their behavior. With AI, businesses can better understand consumers’ needs and interests that drive them to buy and can create targeted messages that are more likely to persuade and motivate them.
For example, Amazon integrated a machine learning algorithm into the platform to recommend products based on previous purchases. You may have noticed that when you buy a product, there is a recommended products section or products related to the item (see image below) that helps you to find new and similar items.
AI will also help you provide a personalized customer experience. Generations are moving to a personalized experience, and they find it more appealing and preferable.
Last but not the least, chatbots are an AI development that provides consumers with the best way to interact with businesses. Chatbots provide 24×7 customer support by replying to answers to their questions immediately.
mCommerce refers to mobile commerce. By adopting mobile commerce, you’re allowing your customers to shop using their mobile phones.
More than 80% of people shop using their mobile phones. This is in trend, and it allows them to shop from everywhere and anytime without any hassle-making this trend a must-follow.
mCommerce’s share of all eCommerce is projected to touch around 72% by 2021. Mobile push notifications and SMS-like marketing tactics in mobile commerce provide tons of opportunities to scale your business.
Many businesses have already invested in mCommerce app development for their businesses. You can start too!
Shopify web development allows you to create a mobile commerce experience on Shopify. Give your Shopify stores into your customers’ hands. It means your customers can buy products on Shopify using their phones. To start, you can read here.
This is another current trend in the corporate world that helps your business to become competitive and grow. Social commerce is about selling products via social media platforms. More than 90% of people use mobile phones to access social media channels. And more than 80% of users shop from their phones.
In the United States, 36 percent of internet users use social commerce.
Social media channels create a new way of creating, selling, and buying. You can create your own online store and sell your products on social media channels where consumers can buy them.
According to the report, approx. 55 percent of online shoppers across the world aged between 24 to 34 had made purchases through social media.
Thanks to the Shopify feature that allows you to sell your product via social media channels. Shopify is mobile-friendly, so your consumers can easily access your Shopify stores from their phones.
AR (Augmented Reality) is one of the best trends to enhance your consumer’s shopping experience. It can help in many ways; here are some of them you can follow in your Shopify business.
With AR, you can give your customers a “try” option so that they can try your product before buying it. This option may be best suited to clothing and accessories retailers because it allows their customers to see how a specific outfit or accessory will look on them.
Through AR, you can give your customers a close view of your product. It means your customers can check the product’s size, dimension, and specifications. And they can also use AR technology to manipulate the product, and move it sideways or around.
Thanks to Shopify, it lets you implement AR on your storefront so that you can provide an immersive experience for your shoppers.
Usually, an influencer, brand, or celebrity promotes a product through a live video. This is called “Livestream shopping” because viewers watch the Livestream and can ask any questions regarding products and make purchases at the same time.
Livestream commerce is another big eCommerce trend for all businesses. Influencers or brands conduct live streams on different channels and show the different products to the viewers, offering a link in the description to buy the product.
Primarily Livestream shopping was popular in China, but not the US is also in Livestream shopping. According to a study, the live streaming market is projected to be worth $35 billion in the US by 2024.
Livestream shopping gives consumers a closer way to analyze the product because they can ask for a tutorial, so it attracts more consumers. Companies report that live shopping conversion rates are up to 10 times higher than conventional eCommerce.
If you’re running your business on Shopify, you can read the guide on how to launch a live event.
Eco-friendly businesses are a new trend to empower sustainability. More and more consumers rely on eco-friendly products, and these products are always in demand. Eco-friendly products are free from plastic, chemicals, etc.
According to the study, 45 percent of consumers find eco-friendly or sustainable brands.
With eco-friendly brands or products, it’s easy to attract more consumers and it also helps in saving the environment. It’s good if you adopt eco-friendly practices in your product line, from manufacturing to packaging.
Adopting eco-friendly practices in your business doesn’t mean you need to change everything in your business. You just need to start doing things in a way that supports global ecological balance and helps you grow.
Here are some eco-friendly practices you can follow.
Buy Now Pay Later was not a thing of conventional business, but now it has become the big trend for new eCommerce businesses. Big e-commerce companies are offering Buy Now Pay Later options for users to get products now and pay in easy installments.
This trend encourages users to buy a product without any financial burden. Different platforms offer different Buy Now Pay Later options via Mastercards, credit cards, etc. You can also use this trend in your business if you’re scaling well now.
However, this trend may not be useful for startups as there is a high possibility of defaults and to solve them you need a team, which ultimately increases your business costs.
If you are running an e-commerce business, whether, on Shopify or elsewhere, you may face the following challenges.
Reduced Return on Advertising
Advertising is a great way to expand your business, and that’s why every business is doing it. As a result, the advertising cost is increased and the return on ad spend (ROAS) is decreased.
Through this data from emarketer you can see how Facebook advertising growth was reduced after Apple’s privacy updates in iOS 14.5.
Business Expansion
More than 76 percent of online shoppers do shop on a site outside their own countries. As a result, it’s important for a business to have a global reach, but that also needs good financing. Inadequacy of funds will limit the opportunities for growth.
Financing
More businesses are now moving towards revenue-based financing compared to conventional bank loans. But this revenue-based financing has its own pros and cons. Because in RBF, you will not pay the funds in fixed installments, rather, you will have to share a fixed percentage of your company’s revenue with the RBF platform until the sum is fully paid.
Conclusion
Hey, guys! This was the guide on top Shopify development trends & challenges for 2022. There are more development trends than we have included in this article, but including everything in one basket isn’t a worthy book for you. We have outlined the best development trends that are current and successful.
However, we cannot ignore that everything comes with drawbacks. That’s why we have included some big challenges businesses have to face. But, it’s all about continuity and strategies.
The final speech is our favorite quote: “Know the enemy and know yourself; in a hundred battles you will never be in trouble.”
