Enormous Brand Chains Move to Online Business
We know you’ve had enough hearing and talking about this pandemic and the lockdown that affected the whole world and changed life on the face of earth. We are not here to talk about that. We are here to encourage you to start your own business or convert your business to the online world like the big brands who are going online every day.
Brands Who Chose to Survive Online
Merits of Having an Online Store
How to Launch an Online Store for Any Kind of Business
Brands Who Chose to Survive Online
To survive the lockdown and the recent decrease in sales worldwide, big international and national brands converted their business to the online world. Whether essential or luxury, brands selling all types of goods chose to reach their audience and offer their catalog of products through an online store.
Some brands already had ecommerce stores and some created ones to cope with the changes in the market and user behavior.
Nationally, Raneen, a retailer with many chains all over Egypt for household appliances and home decor, has launched its first online store to cope with the events and calls for social distancing. Their online store is still under development, but, thanks to ExpandCart, they managed to create and launch an ecommerce store in less than 2 weeks.
On an international side, the famous fashion titan retailer has announced the closure of more than 1200 branch all over the world and convert towards online selling.
The lockdown measures have not affected people’s spending, they just changed the way they spend. Famous fashion brands have made sure to follow that change in users’ behavior and invest in online shopping through their ecommerce stores.
By doing so, key fashion players have seen a tremendous increase in sales and consumers’ base during the last months, including H&M, Puma, Hugo Boss, and Zalando.
For example, the Swedish and the world’s second-biggest fashion retailer H&M has recovered from a 57% decrease in local sales by a growth in online sales by almost a third.
Puma, the world-known sportswear firm, Chief Executive said that the company has decided to invest more in online logistics after they saw their e-commerce sales grow by around 40% in the first quarter and by 77% in April.
The same happened to Hugo Boss, the German luxury fashion house, where their online sales jumped 39% in the first quarter of the year and accelerated again strongly in April, accounting for 11% of their total sales.
In Europe, Zalando’s market shares have jumped 11% and are expected to grow even more by the end of the year. This is a clear evidence that there is an accelerated consumer shift from offline to online. Zalando is like a marketplace, selling fashion and beauty products. They announced that more than 50 new brands have signed up for their marketplace in the last quarters only! This has made Zalando decide to extend an offer to shops to digitize their assortment to Spain, Sweden, and Poland in the third quarter.
As for luxury goods, while offline store selling luxury goods are suffering from a 60% decrease in sales, online luxury stores have remained resilient and are expected to reach 30% of sales by 2025.
And probably because people are staying more at home, complying with the stay-at-home laws, and are paying more attention to their homes, online retailers in the home goods and furniture industry are seeing an increase in sales and revenue growth during the pandemic, with a sales volume of up to 220% on average for those retailers.
In line with that, online brands selling athletic goods and loungewear are also seeing notable sales increases in recent weeks. Take for example NOBULL, an athletic apparel brand, which has seen a 50% increase in year over year online sales over the past 30 days, and Thousand, a safety gear brand, which saw an 80% increase in year over year sales during the last week in March of 2020, expecting to climb more than 200% in comparison with the same time frame in 2019. Richer Poorer brand, a loungewear online store, has declared that they have sold three times the amount of sweats online in the first three weeks of April than they had in all of 2019.
Makeup and beauty stores are also surviving through their online sales, with changes in traditional sales techniques: tester stations, one-on-one beauty advice, and complimentary makeovers. Sephora for example declared that, after closing their physical shops in the US and Canada, they are waiving standard shipping fees and extending the return policy to 60 days, in an attempt to be more online-friendly.
The jewelry industry has had its share of ups and downs. For example, the world’s largest retailer of diamond jewelry, Signet, declared that its stores’ sales dropped by 40% and that 150 closed stores in North America will stay closed and another 150 locations will shut down later in the year. But their online sales are not bad that they say that the virus has sped up the company’s transformation into more of an online retailer.
Merits of Having an Online Store
Even though stores are opening in most countries around the world, people are looking to minimize the risks by not going out much and not shopping for non-essentials.
Thousands of brand chains are shutting down after tens and hundreds of years of history all over the world.
Famous retailers in all industries are holding back from investing in opening new stores as planned previously.
So, is that it? Is it the end for such brand names and thousands of workers all over the world?
Absolutely not!
Brands are converting to online stores because of the advantages they offer and the merits they provide for any type of business.
1. Reach New Audience Everywhere
Brands can market for their products everywhere to reach existing and new audience, on social media platforms, on YouTube, on search engines, and through online advertising. A business in the UAE can reach new audience in Brazil and sell to them online with door-to-door shipping and secured online payments. It can never get easier.
2. Cut Expenses
Creating and operating an online store costs far less than opening and runner a physical one. Not only that, but the sales are doubled and tripled through smart marketing techniques and decent customer care.
3. Enhance Brand Awareness
If it weren’t for their Facebook or Instagram pages or ecommerce stores , you wouldn’t have probably known a thing about brands in other countries. Having a strong online presence enhances awareness about your brand and eventually increases sales.
All of the previous merits and advantages of having an online store are not mere words, they are proven by numbers and statistics as shown above from big brands achieving sales growth and better brand awareness once they converted to online selling.
How to Launch an Online Store for Any Kind of Business
Launching an online store is now easier than ever. With platforms for creating and operating an ecommerce store all from one dashboard, you do not need any programming or coding experience.
You should read first about the service provider you choose to create your ecommerce store, know all of the features they provide, compare prices, read reviews from previous clients, and try the platform first.
ExpandCart prides itself to be the largest ecommerce platform for creating online stores in the Middle East. You can read yourself about our features, pricing, and services. Not only that, but you can also get a free trial for 14 days before subscribing to any of our packages. We can also gladly assist you and answer any questions you might have.
To Sum Up,,,
The recent crisis has forced major changes that are going to last even after the virus is gone. Although business has not been so good for some, for many others it has hit the roof. Businesses and brands that have chosen to operate through an online store and retailers who have decided to convert to online selling have seen double- and triple-digit increases in online sales.
Online selling is not a trend; it is a fact in the new after-Corona world. People’s behavior has changed and online shopping is safer and saves a lot of time.
So whether you’re selling an essential product, a non-essential product, or a service, meet your customers online today!
Build your online store with ExpandCart to enjoy marketing consultation, 24/7 customer support, and a full marketplace of apps & services tailored to every eCommerce business.
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