Consumer Study found. The Unbox Therapy channel on YouTube boasts 18.2 million subscribers. At a minimum, consumers’ packages should arrive intact. The packaging should accurately represent the brand. It should also include the packing slip and return label. Nearly half of consumers also want surprise giveaways included with their orders, the Dotcom survey found, while about 40% would like coupons. 8 LEVERAGE ORDER AND SALES DATA. E-commerce retailers that implement solutions to leverage order, sales, and other data can ensure they’re carrying the products consumers want and locating them where they’re in the greatest demand. They also reduce the risk and cost of carrying products that aren’t selling, says Mike Graziano, consumer products senior analyst with RSM US LLP. This insight can boost both customer service and performance. 9 INVEST IN SUSTAINABILITY. More than half of 18- to 29-year-olds, along with 45% of 30- to 44-year-olds, support the circular economy, the DotCom survey found. What’s more, businesses that invest in sustainability can benefit; IBM research found that companies that have invested in digitization and sustainability enjoy stronger performance than their peers. Consumers’ growing interest in sustainability means retailers and manufacturers need to begin considering the complete lifecycle of the products they offer. “Offering this level of circularity to consumers can help differentiate your offering in a heavily commoditized market,” Wright says. Organizations that can provide a seamless, enjoyable online customer experience can set themselves apart in an increasingly crowded e-commerce retail landscape. “You have to do something to make the customer experience more worthwhile,” says Graziano. n
AMAZON vs WALMART: WHO OWNS THE MARKET?
Nearly 60% of all online retail purchases in the United States were done on Amazon in 2021, according to new PYMNTS data. This reflects the company’s tightening grip on e-commerce sales and continues the stair step market share advance it has made over the past 20 years. In fact, the new findings defy the logic that says it gets harder to grow a large business: Amazon doubled its share of the domestic retail market to 56.7% in 2021 from 28.1% in 2014. To calculate Amazon and Walmart’s respective slice of the overall and digital retail sales pies, PYMNTS uses a gross merchandise value method which backs out things like revenue from Amazon Web Services, but includes the full dollar value of everything sold, even when an item is sold and fulfilled for a third party for a 10-15% selling commission. The findings also show how much Amazon dominates Walmart when it comes to online-only sales, having added more than 3.5 percentage points to its share of digital sales last year, completing a 10-percentage point COVID-era jump since 2019. By comparison, during that same two-year pandemic period, Walmart’s share of domestic digital retail sales has grown nearly 50%— albeit off a much smaller base—ending 2021 with a 6.2% portion. What does it all mean? Despite Walmart’s efforts and the investments it has made to grow e-commerce sales and diversify its traditional reliance on the 5,000 physical store locations that dot the country, the digitally native Amazon still holds nearly a 10- time lead over its rival on this front.
% SHARE OF U.S. E-COMMERCE SALES
Source: PYMNTS
December 2022 • Inbound Logistics 41
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