We could rhapsodize about how far e-commerce has come in the last decade or two, but at the end of the day, wat you care about is where e-commerce is now and where we’re going. Many new technologies and trends are emerging every day, which changes the way people shop. As an e-commerce business owner, if you want to succeed in the retail industry, you have to acquaint yourself with new trends.

Emerging Trends in Ecommerce

1. Growing volume of voice search– In 2020, almost 50% of internet searches will be done using voice search. It is an alternative to using a keyboard or screen to purchase products online. It is not only finding the product that you want but also helps in ordering and buying the same product.

Features of the voice search are:

* Hands-free user interface for faster and easier shopping.
* Answer all the user queries instantly
* Paves the way to buy products while doing other things as well.

2. Augmented Reality– One of the main concerns that people have when shopping online is the inability to see the product firs than. AR technology helps bridge this gap and enable online shoppers to better visualize the products that they are interested in. Companies are using AR not only to enhance the customer experience but also to allow shoppers the ability to test and explore products in the way that they would do during an in-person shopping experience.

3. Chatbots– A chatbot is an artificial intelligence that simulates communication with a user in a natural language through websites, mobile apps, telephone, or messaging applications.
Chatbots for e-commerce is designed to:

* Guide a customer during the purchase.
* Offer product recommendations as per the buyers’ interest.
* Provide 24/7 customer support.

The major problem with the chatbot is, it only provides information to the customer with the pre-programmed data. It fails when a user’s requests or queries are out-of-the-box.

4. Social media in e-commerce– Social media has changed the way we live our daily lives, including the way we buy things. Social commerce is buying the product directly from social media. That is, you can eliminate the links that direct to your website and make your customers complete the purchase on social media itself.

Benefits:- Increase customer trust and grow your user base.   Smooth checkout process when compared to traditional e-commerce.  *Users can easily recommend products to others.

5.  The Next-gen Ecommerce Platform:- Apart from these, there are other e-commerce trends like Progressive Web Apps (PWA), omnichannel personalization, etc, that are already well-adopted by the online retail industry. But the trends and technologies discussed here change the way how people communicate, interact, search and buy for products, and make payments.

They provide various opportunities for e-commerce store owners to interact with their customers in innovative ways to make them enjoy shopping online. In 2020, e-commerce will be more automated with the help of next-gen e-commerce platform to enable a wonderful retail experience for both sellers and buyers.