IMI’s data analyzed by the HelpCenter app team reveals that a sudden, pandemic-inspired shift to digital had a significant impact on consumer behavior, boosting the downloads of shopping apps and making them rank second in popularity after music apps. Daily shopping online has become popular among all generations, but millennials lead the group at 73%. 

The survey was conducted between September 1 and late November 2020. The results are provided based on the answers from more than 40.000 people across 39 countries.

E-commerce will continue to grow, shopping on mobile devices will take the lead

The E-commerce industry was already growing at a steady pace, yet the pandemic has accelerated the shift to digital by roughly 5 years. In Q2 2020, the U.S. Census Bureau reported retail e-commerce growth of 31.8%, and 44.5% year-over-year. At the same time, the number of retail app downloads in the EU jumped by 36% compared to Q1 2020, leading to the highest increase of +109% in April 2020.

From the data, people now shop online as much as they play with their kids and even more than go outside for fun during the summer. 85% of respondents have bought something online at least once during the past 12 months, and 22% of them plan to increase their shopping behaviors in the upcoming year as well.

As the future is still unclear, further growth of e-commerce, especially via mobile devices, is projected. According to the E-Commerce Times, mobile e-commerce sales are expected to account for 54% of all retail e-commerce sales in 2021, encouraging businesses to continually provide their customers with a unique shopping experience.

To stay ahead of the competition, companies will have to pay exceptional attention to their online shopping experience and everything that follows as 71% of survey respondents admit that the purchase they’ve made was the result of experiencing a brand or service, second only to online research.

Despite the current challenges, HelpCenter’s latest survey found out that over 80% of surveyed Shopify merchants still expect their sales to grow or even boom in 2021.

The HelpCenter app’s co-founder Ernestas Petkevicius commented on the future of e-commerce:

“We have no doubt that we will see the boom of e-commerce in 2021. The competition in prices will be on juggernauts’ like Amazon side but smaller companies can still work out a better customer experience with the right kind of tools and attitude, and keep on growing their businesses.”