Ten e-commerce trends for 2022 – part 1

The e-commerce trends for 2022 are more diverse than ever and new ones are constantly being added. The main trends included in part 1 are growth in e-commerce, small influencers, the Federal Act on Data Protection, the D2C approach, interactive e-mails and new store concepts.

The e-commerce trends for 2022 are more diverse than ever and new ones are constantly being added. These trends have resulted in new shopping experiences and high growth in sales. Because the e-commerce sector, which enables buying and selling via digital channels, is expected to have grown by a good 50 percent to 15 billion Swiss francs in 2021 compared to 2019 (Online retailer survey 2021). In addition, this study by Zumstein from the Zurich University of Applied Sciences finds that nine out of ten online shops grew during the pandemic. Half of the study participants acquired a lot of new customers via e-commerce. Both large and small online shops have benefited from this boom in e-commerce. Other sources (Carpathia and Handelsverband.swiss) expect the e-commerce sector to have grown by almost 15 percent in 2021 compared to 2020, during which it had already experienced strong growth.

Small influencers

In addition to the trend of working with influencers which started a few years ago, there are always new, individual trends within influencer marketing. For example, HypeAuditor has discovered that it is better to use several smaller influencers to promote products rather than a single big influencer. The thinking here is that smaller influencers have higher engagement rates among their followers compared to influencers with a high number of followers. The following is a list of engagement rates compared with number of followers (source: HypeAuditor):

• Up to 5,000 – 5.86 percent
• 5,000 to 20,000 – 2.73 percent
• 20,000 to 100,000 – 1.94 percent
• 100,000 to one million – 1.72 percent
• Over one million – 1.69 percent

The Federal Act on Data Protection is not a trend, but mandatory in 2022

In the second half of 2022, the Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection (DPA) (in German) comes into force, following the EU GDPR (in German) which became legally binding in 2018. The Federal Act on Data Protection has been amended to reflect technological developments and social changes. The resulting revised data protection law is also based on the European Union’s GDPR in certain areas. Since e-commerce companies in particular collect a lot of data about their customers, preparing for the new legislation as soon as possible and implementing the appropriate measures is strongly recommended.

Direct-to-consumer (D2C) – from the manufacturer directly to the end consumer

Here too, digitization and the pandemic have lent impetus to the trend that helps end consumers to shop directly from manufacturers. The e-commerce platform Sana Commerce has published a whitepaper and Swiss Post has carried out a study in this area.

But why would this be a trend in 2022? Forced or spurred on by the pandemic and lockdown, many manufacturers have now sufficiently developed their infrastructure, such as shop systems and logistics, so that they can now offer and sell their products directly to end consumers – in line with the omnichannel approach.

Interactive e-mails – a long-awaited dream for many

Good old e-mail is reinventing itself, making it part of a promising e-commerce trend in 2022. Every marketer in e-commerce knows that e-mail and newsletters are two of their most powerful weapons when it comes to generating conversions. With interactive e-mails, recipients can perform an action directly in an e-mail without having to switch to a browser or website. This increases the engagement and conversion rates. For example, forms can be filled and sent directly, products can be configured, or purchases and payments can be made directly.

New shop concepts

The trend towards online retail has been under way for a few years and has accelerated over the past two years due to the current situation. This recent impetus means that we will continue to see an increase in new e-commerce store concepts. This omnichannel approach will be one of the major e-commerce trends in 2022. New store concepts will be created, such as click and collect, experience and advice stores, self-service stores without sales staff, showrooms and pop-up stores.

You can find out about other e-commerce trends set to emerge in 2022 in part 2 of our blog post, which will be published on 6 January.