E-commerce today and its perspectives
Retail has undergone many changes in recent years. Indeed, the development of new technologies and the advancement of communication information have led to the creation of a new distribution channel: e-commerce. This new arrival has profoundly transformed the behavior of both distributors and consumers alike. While some had to change the way they produced the commercial service, others reviewed their buying process. The other change has also been made internationally: the inevitable opening to the world, accompanied by the establishment of foreign distributors, has not been without consequences. Often, this new competition challenges innovation, and disrupts the market.
Also, consumer behavior is due to the country’s current economic situation. Thus, with the decline in purchasing power, consumers have naturally moved to a system where it is possible to find the best value for money. Moreover, before the 2000s, e-commerce in France was unknown. We did not really know what it was, or we were suspicious. A few years later, rare are those who imagine living without. The Internet has turned consumer behavior upside down, and now we pay online like we do in a physical store and we even go through our smartphone if the opportunity lends itself. We can therefore say that e-commerce has presented itself as obvious. Real life and virtual life have come together, and every consumer can go from one side to the other. In addition, the constant evolution of new technologies has increased opportunities for online payment and e-shopping. Today, 21.4 million homes have at least one PC, according to Médiamétrie and GKF: computer and internet equipment has become commonplace, but also the use of smartphones, tablets, which accompany potential and current consumers permanently. As a result, additional buying opportunities are multiplied. that accompany potential and current consumers constantly. As a result, additional buying opportunities are multiplied. that accompany potential and current consumers constantly. As a result, additional buying opportunities are multiplied.
It is in 2011 that e-commerce starts a real ancestry: sale-private exports to the United States, Price Minister becomes Japanese and Amazon makes its private sales. All brands and brands come in crowds on the web. It is obvious, this phenomenon will only increase over the years, the rise of e-commerce is undeniable.
But in this turmoil and meteoric evolution, where does e-commerce go, what are its prospects? What is certain is that we are only at the beginning of a revolution: the coming century is full of services that it is impossible at the moment to imagine or hope for. We can not know what new inventions will change our behavior. As a result, this study will reflect on the future prospects and challenges of e-commerce in the future, and not on possible innovations and assumptions about what might happen.
Current e-commerce
Consumers increasingly connected
8 out of 10 French households equipped with a computer
46 million Internet users
27.7 million Smartphone holders
A third of homes equipped with a touch pad
More cyber shoppers and who spend more often
33.8 million online shoppers
Increasing frequency of purchase: 18 transactions per buyer per year
With the arrival of e-commerce, relations between sellers and buyers have undergone major changes. Thus, relations are directly opposed depending on whether the trade is physical or not:
Despite the fact that the customer serves himself e-merchants and consumers continue to get closer over the years. Indeed, time passes and settles a trust that wants to be stronger and stronger. Moreover, consuming and spending online has become a reflex for many of us, consumers and businesses. The e-commerce sector has been undergoing radical and important changes for decades, marked by several points: the arrival of brands and physical signs on the web, consumer change, and new technologies. It is interesting to look more closely at this phenomenon and to ask questions. What is the current e-commerce landscape? How to define it?
First of all, there are several kinds of e-commerce. The most popular is the B2C form, “Business to Consumers”, which is consumer-oriented e-commerce. This type of site can therefore sell any good and service. In this business we also find the sale of digital content such as downloading music, or video on demand.
The other form of e-commerce is C2C, “Consumer to Consumer”: the trade is only between individuals via platforms like Ebay or PriceMinister. With such sites, consumers can place and sell their goods or services on a dedicated platform.
There is also B2B e-commerce: “Business to Business”, where only businesses communicate with each other.
The market also offers online service sites: we think of online banking, but also insurance and the press.
The last type of online commerce that we can cite is the one that occurs between business and government. We are talking about B2G (Business to Government).
Who says online business, also says e-buyer. Here again, we can distinguish several types of visitors:
Visitors who are content to pass
Visitors who sign up for a newsletter
Visitors who fill a shopping basket, decide to buy, create customer account but do not go after the act of purchase, so do not become a customer
Visitors who go after an order
With the advent of e-commerce, the customer has become over-informed, over-solicited and also zapper. He does not hesitate to change site or even support if the desired product or service does not suit him (something that is of course much more difficult to perform in physical stores).
E-commerce has been accompanied by the birth and dazzling success of tablets and smartphones. E-shoppers have had to adapt to new forms of cross-channel online shopping. Thus, they had to review the buying process of consumers: although many potential customers hold smartphones and / or tablets, they still use them often only to obtain information on the product of their choice, or get opinions or comparisons on other signs. Indeed, sales are still more numerous via computers than other consumption modes. Consumers are hyper connected, and do not hesitate to change the type of support and screen to get information on what they want. There are more than one billion people in the world connected to the Internet and more than 4 billion mobile phones. Thus, we spend more time on his mobile day by day.
E-shopping has also changed all modes of remuneration and expenses within a company. Today, we talk about affiliation. It’s a mechanism that consists of 3 major steps:
The affiliate realizes with his audience an advertisement that points to the site of the affiliator
A user visits an affiliate site, clicks on a message and then performs a specific and defined action on the affiliate’s site
A posteriori and in return for this action, the affiliator pays the affiliate
Thus, the affiliate receives a sum of money when he brings business to the affiliator (the merchant).
The modes of remuneration are also multiple:
Pay per click that is to say, pay a fixed sum for each user he brings to his site, whatever it is
Simplified contact payment: by qualified contact, we mean a completed form. This system is well suited in cases where the sale can not be done directly online
Pay-for-sale: the most used form of compensation for affiliation, especially e-commerce sites. The affiliate then receives a proportion of the amount of the sale or the basket of the user he has sent to the affiliator.
As said above, the rate of confidence but also of satisfaction among Internet users are years in years more important. Each cyber buyer gives his opinion on his purchases, which is perceived as a pledge of trust for everyone. In addition, the user today has acquired that with e-commerce, he had the choice. Previously, he was geographically limited to buy what he wanted, and was therefore “forced” to buy near his home. With e-commerce, distances no longer exist, and a few clicks allow the user to access thousands of products and shops. Also, the surfer today may know more than sellers in physical stores. The cyber consumer has become agile, and can find all the necessary information quickly. He knows himself what will be the best value for money he is looking for. It has become a reflex for eight in ten French to inquire online before buying: 81% of Internet users who bought in stores have at least once prepared their purchase on the Internet.
For most of the players in physical sales, the design and construction of an e-shop is one of the priority development projects. The years 2011 and 2012 are marked by a rise in the presence of brands and physical signs on e-commerce.
In fact, each seller must now think differently and find the best way to be visible and as accessible as possible. That’s why each distribution channel is used: a sales site, social networks, the mobile and its applications that result, etc.
What e-commerce for tomorrow
How to imagine the e-commerce of tomorrow? What landscape will be the sale in twenty years? There are many questions and perspectives that we can establish. Indeed, with a technology in perpetual evolution, it is obvious that electronic commerce will know mutations. In present world that you have to see in future most 70 to 80% of buying people daily needs like, Baby & Kids equipments, Furinture, Home And Garden, Appliances and etc depends on e-commercs store.
According to a study by Xerfi (“E-commerce in France by 2024 – Marketplaces, cross-channel, collaborative consumption platforms … what will be the e-commerce of tomorrow?”), Online sales should increase by almost 60% between 2014 and 2024 to reach 90 billion euros and thus represent 6.5% of total household consumption.
In addition, the expected annual growth rate is + 11% in 2014 and + 10% in 2015, but it would fall below the 10% mark in 2016 and finish at + 6% in 2024. Indeed, the average basket will weaken again and eventually stabilize; the growth of the number of transactions by cyber-buyer will slow down and the population of cyber-shoppers could reach its limit as of 2024-2024 (about 44 million people).
In a few years, consumers will not perceive this net division between online and in-store purchases. The purchase on the internet will be for them a set of good sides (saving time, availability of permanent products, ease, etc.). But the purchase of proximity will remain essential and again the only positive points stand out: the social link, contact and advice, the ability to see and test the product directly, purchase and immediate possession, etc. Physical stores can not disappear.
To have a link with the web, the physical stores will have to be digitized, and offer multi-connected tools like augmented reality terminals. In short, the store will have to interact directly with customers. Online, they are alone: the human and non-fictional relationship via the web is therefore very important and the brands will have to redouble their efforts on the techniques to better approach the customers.
So it’s the in-store experience that will turn the tide against e-commerce. It will be the creative side and directly related to the new technology that will push customers and consumers to visit physical stores. It will also follow the news and demonstrate ecological behavior. For example, already in China right now, Carrefour is charting buses so its customers do not use their cars.
In terms of communication channels, it seems that the smartphone remains the most used tool in the coming years by e-shoppers to directly reach consumers. How to imagine the opposite after the ergonomic and technological advances of this means of communication? The smartphone will become a means of purchase present in all pockets of consumers.
The e-commerce has all the more interest to accentuate its power on the smart phones when one knows that this support pushes more easily to the purchase than a computer for example. According to Accenture, 8 out of 10 smartphones owners would like to download discounts and three out of four would like to receive them in real time at their place of purchase, just by passing a product.
