While ChannelAdvisor‘s Catalyst Connect conference is just a week away on the 20th April in London, the Catalyst Americas conference is in full swing in Las Vegas.
Jodi Gaines Pereira, co-founder of ReplyManager which was acquired by XSellco early in 2015, is at Catalyst US and exclusively reporting back on some of the sessions for Tamebay, perhaps a preview of what to expect at Catalyst Connect in London next week:
2016 Ecommerce Predictions and Insights
My favorite part of the ChannelAdvisor Catalyst event is always the CEO keynote, which is packed full of interesting predictions and data for the e-commerce industry. This was David Spitz’s first year as presenter since he took over for Scott Wingo last year. Here are 4 key predictions:
Prediction 1
Amazon captured 51% of all retail dollars in Q4 2015. They are getting bigger and growing faster than you think. If you’re not selling on Amazon, you should be.
Prediction 2
Think mobile first, desktop second. Building a responsive website may not cut it. Apps are used more often than browsers on phones, especially when shopping. The notion of a mobile wallet will be a strategic entry point to mobile commerce. Apple Pay is going to be enabled for mobile websites before the end of Q4 2016. Chat services like WeChat are quickly becoming both customer service tools and integrated wallet systems.
Prediction 3
Develop operational excellence in logistics through partnerships for faster service. Amazon Prime reaches more than 34M shoppers and concepts like predictive shipping could be a reality in the very near future.
Prediction 4
Brands and retailers must work more closely to capitalize on these opportunities. Retailers must be serious about digital disruption and selling on marketplaces can no longer be avoided. Maintaining brand integrity will be more important than ever with content syndication and high quality product information.
