Nordic e-commerce CEOs take on e-commerce trends in 2016

According to leading Nordic e-commerce CEOs a lot has to be looked into for key e-commerce trends in 2016.Nordic Etail owns, invests in and manages e-commerce stores in a broad range of exciting verticals with considerable growth potential. Marcus Fredriksson is founder of Nordic Etail.

Christoffer Tyrefors is CEO of Cykelkraft.se, Sweden’s largest online bicycle shop, owned by Nordic Etail and here is his take on the trends:  Customer experience: The trend is shifting from offering “a list of products” to emulating high quality physical retail. The e-commerce players understand that the purchase does not end with the payment; Delivery and after sales must be of highest class. Customer driven business: The customer assumes that the presentation of the e-commerce (popular products are offered first, top lists are “cool”, “most blogged products” etc.). The cellphone: Last year, the e-commerce sites became adapted to mobile purchases. The next step is to adapt the mobile e-commerce sites to payments (Square, PayPal, Klarna etc.) with notifications etc.

Torkel Hallander, CEO and co-owner of Scandinavian online retailer Bythjul.com, which is an online shop that deals with tires and rims said: Personalization: Web sites, web shops, e-mailings and other forms of digital marketing are becoming ever more targeted. The presentation and the offering are becoming more designed for individual customer preferences, behaviors and purchasing power – all in order to maximize sales, profit margins and customer satisfaction. Omni-channel:The omni-channel trend is not new but is still strengthening. Consumers are interested in physical contact with the products on offer. Virtual and physical stores supplement each other and strengthen the brand. Retailers who can deliver a compelling shopping experience in all channels will be the winners in 2016. A saturated price race: For commodities with easy distribution, which can be easily compared with each other and without the need for physical connection, the transparency will create a “winner takes it all’ situation.

Sven Hammar is co-founder and CEO of Apica, a provider of technology for testing, monitoring, and optimizing the performance of cloud and mobile applications. Continuous technological development with multiple choices: Players in e-commerce today have far more choices of infrastructure for their digital market places, with migration to the cloud and especially hybrid platforms, which sets higher demands on testing and quality assurance of the e-commerce platforms for optimal reliability. Customers are becoming more discerning and do not accept technically substandard or slow sites. New opportunities with API: APIs create great opportunities for e-commerce businesses. Internet connects people and computers, while the API (Application Program Interface) uses hardware and software to exchange information through these contacts. API creates new opportunities for e-commerce businesses to generate new revenue streams by improving the performance of the platform and provides customers with a more complete site with multiple products and services based on individualized data. Performance as a competitive advantage: Technical performance will become a stronger competitive advantage. With the same stock on offer and price as the (often) only distinguishing factor, the performance of the e-commerce platforms will become increasingly important.