x
READY TO BECOME A MEMBER?
Stay up to date on the digital shelf.
x
THANK YOU!
READY TO BECOME A MEMBER?
THANK YOU!
"Consumers are really very demanding. In an environment where one business can do it, they expect all other businesses to do it." — Hugh Fletcher, Global Marketing Director and Thought Leadership Lead, Wunderman Thompson Commerce & Technology
Consumer behavior is constantly changing, which means brands need to deeply understand their customers to win on the digital shelf.
Admittedly, that’s much easier said than done. But if brands are looking for a data-driven roadmap to navigate ever-evolving customer demands successfully, then Wunderman Thompson’s seventh annual "The Future Shopper" report offers all the insights they need.
Naji El-Arifi, Wunderman Thompson’s head of innovation, and Hugh Fletcher, the company’s global marketing director and thought leadership lead, joined a recent episode of the "Unpacking the Digital Shelf" podcast, "Data on the Future Shopper," to share the report’s findings.
Here’s what Wunderman Thompson’s research says about the future of shopping and how brands can effectively engage consumers.
Now in its seventh year, Wunderman Thompson’s “The Future Shopper” report includes survey data from more than 31,000 consumers across 18 international markets, offering incomparable insight into shopper behavior.
"It's a massive report," Fletcher says. "It's truly global, and as a consequence, we get a really nice view of some of the key trends that are happening in the market."
The report examines shopping behaviors and trends, such as online spending, omnichannel, marketplaces, and the digitization of products.
El-Arifi says even years after the end of the pandemic, remote work continues to affect how consumers engage with brands.
Interesting insights came out of the report regarding work-from-home shopping habits.
The report found that:
"They've started to discover new brands because they're doing more buying at home," El-Arifi says. "They can get stuff delivered to their home. They're just spending that little bit more time online researching and trying new things."
Content is still crucial to moving customers further down the funnel, Wunderman Thompson’s research shows.
Though price is the top consideration for consumers who shop online, accurate product descriptions are a close second, and high-quality imagery is also important.
"You're not standing in front of the product to maybe feel the clothing, to see the quality of the stitching. So how much information, how much high-quality imagery can you give me to help me make a much better, more informed decision? Consumers now have access to so much information, so many different options. Once I land on your site, make sure that I have everything I need to make that decision and know that I've made the right one." — Naji El-Arifi, Head of Innovation, Wunderman Thompson Commerce & Technology
Content is even more crucial to driving what’s called "compressed commerce," the concept that consumers want to move from inspiration through search to purchase as quickly as possible.
The report also found that:
Fletcher says it’s no longer enough to have a website that functions. Instead, brands that are winning online are those that enable consumers to easily find and understand products and those that deliver more of an experience.
Marketplaces already deliver experiences well, but many direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands are also growing their capabilities in this area, Fletcher adds.
As an example, DFS, an online furniture retailer and one of Wunderman’s clients, has created an immersive showroom experience, with 3D and life-size imagery that allows customers to see what a piece of furniture would look like in their own living room.
As the DFS example shows and Wunderman’s survey indicates, brands need to arm consumers with timely, relevant, and engaging content to make the best buying decisions.
Whether it’s accurate product descriptions or enhanced content like videos or augmented reality (AR) experiences, brands can leverage content to accelerate the path to purchase and move consumers from inspiration to check out in a fraction of the time.
Though online likely will play an outsized role in the future of shopping, consumers aren’t willing to completely abandon brick-and-mortar retail. Sixty percent of consumers globally would prefer to shop from retailers and brands that have both physical and digital stores.
"Physical is not dead," Fletcher says. "It plays a very important role."
Physical stores are particularly critical to consumers during the search and inspiration phase, suggesting they want a tactile experience before they spend their hard-earned money on a product.
Illuminating implications for brands’ omnichannel strategy, previous Wunderman research found that:
El-Arifi says all this means brands will need to work harder to figure out which channels serve what purpose within their larger strategy.
"One thing we're going to start to see as well is how good different channels are at different things," he says. "So, 'What is online good for? What is offline good for? What is social good for?' All these different places are going to just need to have different focuses as to what people want them to be used for — as opposed to 'they all do everything' — which is where we're at now."
Whether it’s omnichannel, compressed commerce, or content optimization, the bottom line is that brands will need to dedicate more resources and effort to truly understand their customers.
"Understanding exactly how all the different cohorts interact with your brand is incredibly important," El-Arifi says.
As consumer behavior continues to evolve, brands that invest in understanding consumer behavior and building future-driven capabilities to meet their needs today and tomorrow will be several steps ahead.
"There are some businesses who are really thinking and really investing," Fletcher says. "Those businesses — especially when you look at the trends in 'The Future Shopper' [report] — are likely to be in a very good position in five, 10, or 15 years' time and to be right at the forefront of ecommerce."
To hear more of Fletcher’s and El-Arifi’s insights on the future of shopping, listen to the full episode.
