As time goes on, these trends are driving businesses to adopt changes in order to survive in the retail landscape and stand out in an increasingly competitive world.

Online shopping will continue to be influenced by new technologies, new consumer demands, and the ongoing shift from desktop to mobile devices. That is why it is so important to stay on top of the latest e-commerce trends.

Here are five key e-commerce technology trends that will shape the future of the industry: 

 

1.       PWAs

 

A progressive web application or PWA is a software application that is built using technologies such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. PWAs are websites that can be accessed directly from a browser and offer conversion features as high as a native application. These applications are not downloadable from an application store platform.

While websites are optimized for users to get informative content, PWAs are designed to help shoppers accomplish tasks quickly. They have fast and reliable features and functionality that create a highly engaging shopping experience.

PWAs in favor of E-commerce:

1. Deity: This is a PWA and micro services-oriented platform. Deity takes a modular approach to meet the PWA needs of businesses and can be operated with different front-ends. Their DEITY Falcon is one such PWA front-end that enables businesses of all sizes to deliver scalable web and mobile experiences to their users.

2. Gatsby: is an infrastructure used for building static PWA sites with React. It allows you to build websites and apps at lightning speed. Third and Grove Agency helped develop a Gatsby-BigCommerce source plugin that makes it easy to build a PWA e-commerce storefront using Gatsby on the frontend and BigCommerce on the backend.

3. Vue Storefront: is one of the fastest-growing platform-agnostic PWAs, which means it can be used with most e-commerce platforms. Vue Storefront has rapidly increased the number of stars on Github and the Vue Storefront Slack channel has over 1,200 members.

  

2.       Gamification or gamification

 

Gamification is poised to penetrate e-commerce as one of the most compelling trends that promise business owners to increase customer engagement and drive sales.

Gamification elements are widely implemented in some e-commerce sites or app features, as well as in emailing and sales management techniques.

However, Gamification is a strategy of incorporating game elements into a non-game environment to engage customers and hold their attention. According to the survey conducted by ReflectDigital, 93% of people find this form of marketing very engaging. In fact, 60% of those surveyed admitted that they would be more interested in buying from a brand if it offered entertainment on its website or app.

Gamification in e-commerce is designed to make the buying process more entertaining and add hidden incentives for customers to visit the website more often and, therefore, spend more.

The use of gamification techniques and mechanisms provides a favorable environment to build customer loyalty, which is a goldmine for any online marketer.

 

 3.      ROPO / ROBO

 

The term ROPO (Research Online, Purchase Offline) or ROBO (Research Online, Buy Offline) is used to designate purchasing acts that are initiated on the Internet and finalized in a physical store. ROPO is a remarkable trend in recent years. However, it cannot be considered as the evolution of the e-commerce world, it is seen as the peak of the online shopping technologies of the last decade.

On one hand, with ROBO or ROPO, customers find it more convenient to search for products/services at the best prices. On the other hand, ROPO helps e-commerce business owners to track their offline conversions.

In this context, the Web aims to guide consumers to physical sales locations and web-to-store becomes a central concern in the communication strategy of retailers.

Thanks to several measures and techniques such as CRM, consumer purchase history, mobile payment, and social integration, the needs of ROBO buyers will be met.

 

4.       Product Visualization, Augmented Reality, and Virtual Reality

 

One of the biggest global trends in e-commerce is product visualization or AI and AR experiences. Augmented reality, a technology that overlays digital images onto the user's mobile device view of the real world, is poised to change the way consumers shop, offering them the opportunity to have an unprecedented interactive digital experience.

This personalized and interactive online shopping experience has predicted that the augmented reality market will generate $70-75 billion in revenue worldwide by 2023.

Augmented reality is set to be a game-changer in the e-commerce space. It will help online shoppers visualize the products they would like to buy, whether it's furniture or ready-to-wear. Consumers using AR can see how they would look wearing a certain item or how a sofa would fit in their homes, without having to go to the store.

In this way, shoppers are increasingly confident in purchasing products online and retailers will benefit from a reduced return rate. Naturally, AR takes the entire shopping experience to a new level.

 

5.       Headless e-commerce

 

In its simplest form, headless e-commerce is a separation between the front-end and back-end of an e-commerce application. This architecture gives brands the freedom to build what they want and how they want. More importantly, it allows brands to enrich the customer experience.

E-commerce platforms in this model serve PCI compliance, security, fraud management, and inventory management that can also connect to larger key infrastructure points such as ERP, PIM, OMS, and POS.

One of the hallmarks of headless e-commerce is the use of APIs, experienced managers, and tools such as Heroku and Mulesoft, as well as the importance of IT partners. These resources are an essential part of any company's innovation strategy, as they bring new features and experiences that engage customers and stay ahead of their expectations.

Headless e-commerce adopters are typically large enterprises with development and IT teams. This makes sense, as the custom programming required to reliably produce and build a separate front end and back end can require a significant investment in development hours.

Today, with the health crisis forcing the pace of change in businesses, brands must embrace innovation like never before. Every developer hour is valuable, as speed to market is often tied to increased cash flow.

 

6.       Social e-commerce

 

Social e-commerce is the process of buying or selling products via social media. In other words, it is a more revolutionary, convenient way for the customer to make online purchases. Therefore, users do not need to go to the store and can buy goods and services directly on social media platforms. In addition, sellers will benefit from additional sales channels that can generate more traffic and conversions.

Social commerce is different from social shopping. While social shopping is a collaboration of online shoppers networking, social commerce collaborates with online sellers.

Here are four business benefits of social e-commerce:

 

1. Constant audience growth

Every day, thousands of new users join social media sites around the world. One of the most important considerations for any business is how to reach and sell to their target audience.

 

2. Higher search engine rankings

Engagement on social media can lead to more than just direct transactions. It has been proven that trading on social networks increases traffic to websites, which will eventually influence search engine rankings.

 

3. More genuine engagement and traffic

One of the most significant benefits of social commerce is the engagement and reach that businesses can get when they share content. Social commerce encourages people to connect with a business through two-way communication.

Social media word-of-mouth also contributes to building an audience, as well as increasing engagement and website traffic.

 

4. Customer loyalty and retention

By using Social e-commerce to connect with prospects, a company can build and maintain relationships that build trust and loyalty with its customers.