Cross-US e-commerce sales will exceed one trillion US dollars! Amazon's business is growing strongly

Recently, the famous data agency Adobe Analytics released the 2020 US Digital Economy Index Report during the epidemic. The data showed that US online sales in 2020 reached 813 billion US dollars, an increase of more than 42% over 2019! Adobe said that at this growth rate, US e-commerce sales are expected to exceed the trillion US dollar mark in 2022.

At the same time, the data also counted the sales data for the first two months of this year. In these two months alone, the online sales in the United States reached 121 billion US dollars, an increase of 34% over the same period last year. Among them, consumers who bought groceries, home decoration products and sporting goods online accounted for the majority.

Secondly, Adobe’s research report also discovered several changes in consumption trends in e-commerce shopping in the post-epidemic era.

1. Increased demand for in-store and curbside pickup

In the first two months of this year, the volume of packages purchased online and picked up in stores and at curbside increased 67% year-on-year. Adobe's survey found that 30% of American consumers prefer curbside purchases and in-store pickup to standard delivery methods.

2. “Buy now, pay later” becomes the mainstream trend

In January and February 2021, the use of the "buy now, pay later" option increased by 215% year-on-year, and the number of consumers placing orders using this option increased by 18%.

3. Product out-of-stock situations are getting worse

During the outbreak, online shopping demand increased dramatically. At the same time, the epidemic led to a decrease in port and warehouse processing capacity, and a large number of goods on e-commerce platforms were out of stock. In January 2021, the number of out-of-stock goods was more than four times that of the same period last year, and the average out-of-stock time was longer. The short supply of goods also led to a slight increase of about 1%-2% in prices on the overall e-commerce platform, including some categories that often reduce prices, such as groceries and home and garden categories, which also saw increases.

The report also mentioned that the effects of various e-commerce promotions have been significantly weakened, because the frequency and number of online shopping have increased sharply, and sellers have launched more and more activities for this purpose. In addition, e-commerce platforms are more inclined to divert the traffic originally concentrated on the big promotion day to the time period before and after the big promotion, avoiding the delivery and order peak. These factors directly reduce the positive impact of e-commerce promotions on order volume.

These trends are very valuable for sellers to refer to, such as more diversified payment methods, reducing daily promotional activities and adding other methods of traffic and conversion (you can consult me ​​at the end of the article). In general, after experiencing a wave of epidemics last year, online e-commerce has completely taken off! Adobe predicts that the total online sales in the United States this year will be between US$850 billion and US$930 billion. By 2022, the online sales in the United States will exceed one trillion US dollars for the first time!

Most of these sales are made through smartphones. Even by 2022, sales through smartphone devices will account for more than half of total US e-commerce sales. Focusing on the layout of mobile terminals and the transformation of promotional methods and payment methods will be the top priority for sellers in the future.

Amazon also released its sales outlook for Amazon Business, giving sellers more reference options.

According to a recent report released by Amazon, Amazon Business currently serves more than 5 million corporate and institutional customers worldwide, with global annual sales estimated to reach US$25 billion in 2021, of which third-party sellers account for more than 50% of sales.

By providing a business purchasing experience similar to "personal consumer shopping", providing diversified purchasing for various enterprises around the world (more than 80% of the Fortune 500 are customers of Amazon Business), customizing business purchasing tools and simplifying the business purchasing process and assisting local Chinese sellers, and introducing continuous and optimal management models for categories and supply chains, Amazon Business is continuously expanding its supply and purchasing ends, bringing more corporate orders to third-party sellers.

Amazon Business is also an additional source of orders and traffic for sellers in non-European sites. Even if there is no promotion and maintenance, there will be occasional orders. This business is now one of Amazon’s key development areas. In the future, there may be more activities to attract sellers and buyers. It is recommended that you pay close attention to it.

European sellers should be aware that corporate orders must upload invoices. The recent invoice incident was caused by this. All corporate orders must be uploaded. If the VCS service is not enabled, you have to upload it manually. If Amazon Business orders increase in the future, the workload of uploading will be even greater. If you declare all tax rates according to the standard rate, you may want to try Amazon's own VCS calculation service.