15 Prime Ways to Boost your eCommerce & Remote Retail Operations

Retail sales are expected to grow this year between 6.5% and 8.2%, amounting to more than $4.33 trillion in sales, according to NRF’s (National Retail Federation) annual forecast. The question is why?

Social distancing, at-home consumption, and remote orders are no near to stop. Digital sales are surging, but the emerging buying patterns are much more than just a temporary phenomenon. New consumer behaviors, trends, and expectations are being forged, and with them, new business realities. This new social and economic habitat is paving the way for the rise of “remote commerce” (or “touch-free retail”).

According to Google Trends, the search for keywords like ‘’touchless’’ or “contactless” have skyrocketed in the past year. Whether working from home, playing, entertaining, streaming, shopping or attending remote classes, zero contact is becoming the new norm. In the absence of an immediate panacea to the ongoing health pandemic, business owners have to rely on alternative ways and touchless technologies to answer the pent-up for remote business solutions to enhance the user experience and boost their digital IQ.

While many non-essential businesses, retail chains, and well-established brands have lost huge market share or were forced to file for Chapter 11 protection from their creditors; other e-Tailers, agile retailers, and digitized companies with omnichannel capabilities did manage to turn online traffic, remote web orders into fast revenue streams.

As Sun Tzu said in The Art of War, there’s opportunity in chaos. In April, McKinsey shared its “thoughts on the shape of the next normal,” in which it identified e-commerce, along with telemedicine and automation, as the key verticals that would thrive in the aftermath of Covid-19.

It’s hard to refute. As Neiman Marcus shut down its stores, Amazon hired an additional 175,000 staffers to meet the surge in demand. In Canada, Shopify’s stock more than doubled since March to displace the Royal Bank of Canada to become the country’s most valuable company. In Italy, e-commerce transactions went up by 81%. This is a global phenomenon. Three years of digital transformation happened in the last three months. 

Many opportunities to rewrite the rules of the game

Grocers, home improvement suppliers, fast-fashion retailers, sporting goods, and mass-market consumer product vendors were more fortunate as they benefited from the rise of ‘’at home consumption’’ trends and patterns; so, did businesses who were tagged as essential. Brick and mortar stores in shopping malls including big department stores have struggled since the beginning of the health crisis. As result, many of them have seen their profits shrink, monthly sales recede; which led some to take drastic cost-cutting measures among many other palliative solutions to fend off the reversal of fortune. Despite these stark differences between the winners and the survivors, executives across the spectrum are unified in their resolutions to turn the corner, take bold steps to revamp their existing business processes. Decision-makers across the aisle had no choice but to focus on imminent issues and priorities; hence the importance to implement fast recovery actions and post-pandemic exit plans. Let’s dive into the main areas of investment and scaling: 

Digital Mutation

Planning “major” investments in omnichannel e-commerce, touchless technologies, contactless deliveries, smart CRMs, Customer-Experience, and upskilling.

The main challenge in this building block is the digital divide between early adopters and laggards.

Supply chain resiliency amid disruption

Widespread disruption in the second half of 2020 exposed major inefficiencies in the supply chain, leading some retailers to realize how ill-equipped they are to anticipate and meet consumer demand amid unprecedented times.

Health and safety measures

In addition to coping with health and safety regulations, retailers must also invest in the acquisition of protective gear, sanitary gel dispensers, shields, social distancing signage, supervisors, cashier screens, body testing & temperature equipment, etc. With “health and safety” being the top priority. Consumers became reluctant to shop in physical stores where foot traffic, crowds, and aisles might lead to more contaminations.  

Retailers should go beyond the concern for social distancing as most consumers are starting to feel accustomed to contactless deliveries, virtual shopping, remote decision-making, and wireless spending.

Cost Control & Lean Management

Heading into 2020 was already tough for many retailers due to sluggish revenues, heavy debt burdens, slow asset turnover, increasing SG&A, shrinking margins, and increased competition from online giants and game-changers. Thus, COVID-19 exposed the cracking veneer below the surface to show major flaws in post-industrial business models. For retailers battered by lockdowns and economic hardships, bridging the digital chasm, managing through data analytics, making informed decision shifting is a matter of life and death. Overlooked cost reductions, such as lean management, inventory flow, synchronizing business channels, touchpoints, pricing models, are no longer an option.

While COVID-19 disrupted physical-centered businesses, remote retail comes with many opportunities to eliminate expenses related to business travel, trade shows, extra staff at the store level, etc.

15 Prime Ways to Pivot Your Remote Retail Strategy & ecommerce Trends

ChainDrive gives Top 15 eCommerce Trends Every Online Retailer should Know In 2021.Whether you’re selling digital or physical products online, you need to always keep an eye on the ECommerce trends.  This will enable you to get more traction, drive more traffic to your website, increase sales, and better position your brand to win.

Watch Here @https://youtu.be/mTjpyieiknI

With the evolving trend in eCommerce technology and consumer shopping habits, you need to stay abreast of these emerging trends in 2021