In Part 1 in this series, we talked about fragmented e-commerce shopping behaviors generally, and how e-merchants have to flow with the ongoing and emerging preferences of online shoppers, and must be present in the virtual places where they shop.
The subject of this second article is to analyze whether the fragmentation of online shopping behaviors is a threat or an opportunity for retailers and e-commerce managers.
Losers don’t see the status quo as a threat. Winners see the opportunities that arise from change.
If fragmented e-commerce shopping behaviors opens a new era in e-commerce, who will be the new losers and who will be the new winners?
Without being a zero-sum game (see the speed of money for those who wish to delve deeper into the subject), the capitalist economy, our current model, exerts a constant force of redistribution of values.
Thus, for some, the fragmentation of online shopping behaviors will be a threat and, for others, an opportunity. Nothing is lost, nothing is created, everything is transformed.
As we mentioned in the previous article, we don’t decide where or how shoppers behave or change their behavior. Resistance is futile. Period.
Were the good old days good for everyone?
Of course, as we said, many e-merchants miss the days when Google was the only gateway for online shoppers: it was enough to optimize its natural SEO to capture the demand.
Except that… perhaps some miss those days more than others.
WHAT about those who didn’t have, precisely, a good natural referencing on Google? All of those who stumbled upon the wrong SEO agency? What of those who, after all, had better products to sell, but not the visibility on Google to be found?
The status quo is a threat. Any change is an opportunity.
These e-merchants who fell short in those early rounds are determined not to miss this second train. The ones who are winning are recognizing where the shopping action is headed, and they’re heading that way themselves.
Business is like that, and you signed up for it: an opportunity becomes a convenience over time, and then the competition becomes too strong. (At that point, it is probably time for some Blue Ocean Strategy.)
“Because it causes a redistribution of the playing field, fragmentation of online shopping is, by definition, an opportunity.”
Olivier Levy, Shopping Feed CEO
Let’s focus on the opportunities that this fragmentation could create for retailers and e-commerce managers.
Since everything is moving, opportunities are possible. Each opportunity has a limited life cycle, but it will be followed by another opportunity, and so on.
Remember, the capitalist economy is an economy of redistribution of values. If we decide to embrace this state of affairs, instead of resisting it, we can capitalize on the changes. For example, we can try for greater efficiency than competitors, to better adapt to what’s ahead. And, we need to be nimble because, in this industry, changes come fast.
So what should that future look like?
What should that future look like? Is it already written down and just waiting to be read?
It would seem that part of that future is inevitable.
As we noted in Part 1 of this series, the future of E-commerce is in fact very close to the past of physical commerce A future becomes highly probable as soon as it responds to the pragmatisms of the past.
Finally, to understand the future of E-commerce, it is important to adjust your definition of what is a Marketplace. That’s the topic for the final article in this series.
Shoppingfeed syndicates search-optimized product listings on all of the world’s most powerful marketplaces, syncs and refines inventory data, perfects your listings, and automates your fulfillment workflow.
