Digital commerce demystified

Source: Accenture. Four business models shaping digital commerce - sharing, personalisation, replenishment and services.

Retailers and consumer goods companies could unlock US$2.95 trillion in value for the industry and consumers over the next decade by accelerating digital transformation, according to a new report* by Accenture Strategy. Investments in new, digitally-driven business models will give consumers greater choice around how they purchase goods and services, and enable companies to deliver profitable, differentiated experiences.

Accenture Strategy’s Painting the Digital Future of Retail and Consumer Goods Companies report, based on analysis for the World Economic Forum, quantified the impact of digital transformation on consumer industries over the next decade. The study identified current consumer appetite for new purchasing experiences, the business models that have the highest potential to unlock new value, and how organisations and policymakers can prepare themselves.


“The next decade will be a golden age for consumers, with technological innovation creating a variety of shopping experiences that will give consumers the simplicity, convenience, or excitement they crave,” said Alison Kennedy, MD, Accenture Strategy. “Out of the US$2.95 trillion in value the report identified, consumers have the most to gain – just over US$2 trillion – through cost and time savings. The success of retailers and consumer goods companies to unlock value will be dependent on their ability to gain a deep understanding of consumers, embrace disruptive technologies and adopt innovative business models.”

Singapore consumers look to be more advanced along reaping digital benefits compared to the rest of the world. Today, 41% of Singapore consumers, compared to the global average of 36%, would allow companies to collect their personal data via intelligent devices in return for a better experience or financial reward. Brand loyalty is at stake. Another 47%, again above the global average of 37%, would subscribe to a service that constantly looks for the best pricing deals on their behalf, and actively recommends which company to switch to, and when.

Forty percent of Singapore consumers, versus the global average of 28%, would use sensor-based digital services that pre-emptively address their needs without human intervention. Another 36%, 10% more than the global average, would subscribe to brands that analyse their shopping history to select products especially for them, and then orders them automatically.

“The retail and consumer goods industries will change more in the next 10 years than they have over the past 40,” said Kennedy. “As expectations around cost, choice, convenience and experience continue to increase, consumers will challenge the industry to evolve and innovate which will drive huge growth in digital commerce.”

To reach the next frontier of digital commerce, retailers and consumer goods companies need to explore the following transformative business models which are already being welcomed by Singapore consumers:

1.     Sharing economy (the next-generation rental market) – Convenience and experience over ownership, at a fraction of the price. Sixty-six percent of Singapore consumers (globally, 52%) said they would use a rental subscription for clothing, renting an item for an occasion and returning it after, instead of purchasing it outright.

2.     Personalisation economy (‘surprise me’ subscriptions) – Expertly curated products tailored to the individual and automatically delivered. Sixty-four percent of consumers (globally, 48%) said they would use this subscription for clothing, where an expert personally selects items they might like based on previous purchases.

3.     Replenishment economy (auto-replenishment) – Smart sensors detect when a product is running low and automatically re-orders then delivers it. Seventy-eight percent of consumers (globally, 63%) would use auto-replenishment for household goods like detergent. Further, 73% would consider it for fresh food items, which is more than the global average of 58%.

4.     Services economy (‘do it for me’) – Services are outsourced so someone else who does the heavy lifting. Sixty-eight percent of consumers (globally, 50%) would use this service for their laundry – pickups, wash-and-fold services, and delivered back to their door.

There is however potential disruption for people and society which companies, policymakers, and regulators need to actively address to:

·         Minimise the impact on local communities – With an increasing number of retail stores downsizing or closing due to the rise of digital commerce, local communities need to respond by businesses and government establishing economic development strategies and partnering with communities to repurpose physical space as hubs for experiences, leisure and lifestyle activities.

·         Reskill the workforce – Emerging technologies will drive a range of efficiencies which will significantly change the nature of the industry’s workforce. Business leaders and policymakers must focus on accelerating reskilling people, creating partnerships with educational institutions, and influencing public policy to meet the needs of the future workforce.

·         Ensure sustainability – Meeting consumer demand for rapid delivery needs to be achieved in parallel to minimising environmental impact. Shifting to electric vehicles and exploring load-sharing can help while also enhancing delivery efficiency. Furthermore, innovation in packaging design and supporting recycling infrastructure is also critical, helping to build a more circular economy.

“To thrive in the next decade, organisations must aggressively pursue innovation and be willing to disrupt themselves. The winners will be those organisations that prioritise adopting a partnership mindset to offer customers new value, innovatively meet consumer demand for new services, and implement advanced data sciences to derive deeper customer insight to enable better decision-making,” said Kennedy.

Interested?

Find out more about the Accenture Painting the Digital Future of Retail and Consumer Goods Companies report 

Hashtags: #Retailers, #CPG

*Accenture Strategy created a value-at-stake methodology to quantify the impact of digital transformation on the retail and consumer goods industries, and consumers, in digitally developed economies over the next decade. Consumer insights were taken from Accenture Strategy’s latest Global Consumer Pulse Research which surveyed 25,426 consumers across 33 countries during July and August 2016, including 360 Singapore consumers.

posted from Bloggeroid

Two-day Millennial 20/20 APAC Summit to look at the future of commerce

Source: Millennial 20/20.

Singapore will play host to the Millennial 20/20 APAC Summit, a two-day event running from 7 to 8 September 2016. Over the two-day period, the Millennial 20/20 APAC Summit will host over 130 speakers, a series of interactive and experiential showcases, 50 panel discussions, 24 keynote presentations and interviews around understanding the millennial consumer.

“Times are rapidly changing and the millennial generation already has an active role in reshaping our commerce marketplace. The Millennial 20/20 Summit will ignite the conversations that are paramount to help brands and businesses adapt and stay relevant in one of society’s most influential movements,” said Rupa Ganatra, Founding Partner, Millennial 20/20.

With its global connectivity and resources for business innovation, Singapore will be the first city in Asia and second in the world to host the summit. This year’s edition will gather more than 1,500 brands, companies, founders and startups to look into the future of commerce from across the four key industry sectors of travel and hospitality, food and beverage, fitness and sport and fashion and beauty.

“Singapore with its robust infrastructure, communities and innovation capabilities makes it a natural choice for us to launch the Millennial 20/20 Summit. Its progressive environment for innovation has led it to be a leading player in disruptive technology as most businesses embrace ways to co-innovate with the technology industry to reach the next stage of growth,” added Simon Berger, Founding Partner, Millennial 20/20.

Discussions for the summit will centre around the evolving business landscape in a millennial generation where innovation, disruption and technology are key components of its future. The summit focuses on pillars such as retail, marketing, mobile, payments, video, social, e-commerce, customer relationship management (CRM), advertising and big data. The topics are aligned with Singapore’s vision of embracing technological innovations and enterprise to transform its economy of the future.

Each of the industry tracks feature a distinguished speaker panel of local and international industry heavyweights such as Mark Liversidge, Chief Marketer of Hilton Hotels; Tom Glick, Chief Commercial Officer of City Football; Elaine Rodrigo, Global Director of Mondelez; Victor Ciu, CEO of One Championship; Aseem Puri, Chief Marketing Officer of Unilever; Clarence Chew, Chief Marketing Officer of Decathlon; Magnus Grimeland, Managing Director and Co-Founder of Zalora Global Fashion Group; Alexis Horowitz-Burdick, Managing Director of Sephora Digital; Cheryl Goh, Vice President of Marketing, GRAB; Deepesh Trivedi, Head of Retail & Ecommerce, Facebook; Fergus O'Hare, Head of Creative Shop APAC, Instagram and James Rothwell, Director Of Marketing - Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Netflix.

Session topic highlights include:

Selling Real Value: Building brands in an ad-free world 
 “What do they really want?” Talking to the next-gen consumer, fan and ambassador online and offline
Rewire & Rethink: The hotel proposition for the 21st century traveller 
Winning in a Billion Dollar Industry without landing a punch; 
New Spirit of Innovation transforming the Space Tourism industry; 
21st Century football fans – Mobile. Digital. Global: Driving innovation on and off the pitch; and Delivery 2.0: Changing Food Consumption Habits and the Business Models that are disrupting it.

Another highlight of the summit will be an experiential showcase of a ‘store of the future’ presented by headline partner Accenture. Featuring The World of ME, the inspirational playground for consumers will give visitors the opportunity to immerse themselves in innovative products, services and experiences; co-create and test ideas, and participate in live events.

Unilever, one of the world’s leading suppliers of fast-moving consumer goods, is collaborating with Millennial 20/20 to surface the most innovative startups in this space. Up to 25 startup companies which have developed truly innovative technology in future of retail, future of media, brand and content innovation, social impact and data, insights and personalisation, will be handpicked to be part of the Unilever Foundry’s Startup Street. The selected startups will be given the opportunity to ‘speed-date’ with Unilever’s marketing leaders.

Millennial 20/20 will also feature 20 showcase exhibitors including Dynamic Yield, which optimises yield across channels and enables real-time personalisation; StoryStream, a live content management provider; and fraud management provider Cash Shield. Digital experience providers will include  Baozun, a digital and e-commerce service partner in China, Spotify for Brands, as well as BrandTone, which helps to grow brands. Happy Marketer, a digital experience specialist, and Sizmek, and advertising technology company that was just acquired by Vector Capital, will also be at the event. Other highlighted exhibitors include Carpal, a same-day delivery courier; Agility Research, a full service research and consulting company with a core focus on the affluent and luxury consumer; and What3Words, representing a new way to communicate location,

Interested?

The event will be held at the ArtScience Museum in Singapore from 9am on September 7 to 5pm on September 8. An early bird access pass costs S$400. Registration is open to the public.

Brands optimising apps for mobile see more sales

Source: Criteo website, Q3 2015 State Of Mobile Commerce report

Criteo, the performance marketing technology company, has released its Q3 2015 State of Mobile Commerce report. This quarterly analysis of industry-wide trends arms marketers with essential mobile commerce intelligence for engaging consumers and boosting sales. Criteo’s comprehensive analysis of 1.4 billion online transactions reveals that 50% of purchases worldwide, now involve multiple devices throughout the consumer buying journey.

Southeast Asia also ranked high on the list, with a 45% conversion rate to sales from their mobile devices, up from 27% in the previous quarter. More than half (54%) of the traffic was also generated from mobile devices. Indonesia topped the list in Southeast Asia, with a 56% conversion to sales.

Criteo’s research shows that early investment in apps is also generating significant payback for e-commerce companies that prioritised this platform. In the retail category, brands that make their app experience a priority generate nearly 60% of mobile revenue from the app, up from 50% in Q2, and heavily outperforming desktops. For travel brands that make their apps a priority, about 50% of mobile revenue comes from the app.

“We continue to see the rise of mobile commerce in a cross-device world. Advertising strategies now need to include mobile at the centre if companies want to engage today’s savvy consumer. Marketers need to pay close attention to the consumer’s purchasing journey if they want to attract buyers and maximise sales,” said Jonathan Wolf, Chief Product Officer, Criteo.

“Southeast Asia continues to be one of our fastest growing regions for e- and m-commerce,” said Yuko Saito, Managing Director, Criteo Southeast Asia. “Southeast Asia now ranks much higher above the global average of 35%, and sits in the same company as advanced mobile countries like Japan and the UK.”

“It is clear that customers are now extremely savvy and are open to browsing and buying on their mobile devices, and this is not just limited to mature markets. Mobile optimisation is now a must-have, not nice-to-have for brands, and we see apps as the next growth driver and a key area of focus for marketers,” said Saito.

Consumers are browsing and buying on all devices—laptops, tablets and smartphones. For brands to succeed, they need to invest in mobile and allocate digital spend strategically:

· For purchases completed on laptops and desktops, 39% of buyers use at least one additional device during the shopping process.

· On mobile, 43% of smartphone buyers and 47% of tablet buyers use an additional device.

· Cross-device purchasers are 20% more likely to use their mobile device to complete a transaction.

Ensuring that the app experience is seamless, intuitive and engaging is central to boosting engagement and conversions:

· For retailers who have prioritised their app experience, 58% of all mobile revenue is generated through the app; travel is at 49%.

· Apps convert at a rate of 3.7 times higher than mobile browsers and two times more than desktop in terms of adding to basket and buying.

Consumers are choosing smartphones as the preferred shopping device more frequently. While all devices and channels should be optimised, smartphones are a key vehicle for brands:

· Smartphones generate 56% of mobile transactions and drive 64% of mobile purchases for top quartile retailers.

· Smartphone conversion rate is two times better for top quartile retailers than average retailers.

Mobile commerce activity is growing worldwide with Japan and South Korea seeing some of the highest volumes of e-commerce transactions. Global brands need to be tuned into how different consumer segments behave in order to deliver the best cross-device and mobile experiences:

· Mobile commerce now represents 35% of e-commerce transactions globally. Mobile transactions in Southeast Asia now account for 45% of all e-commerce transactions (up from 27% in the previous quarter), with Indonesia at 56%, and Taiwan at 38%. 

· Cross-device purchasing is represented by 50% of e-commerce transactions worldwide.

Interested?

Download the Criteo Q3 2015 State Of Mobile Commerce report

Read the TechTrade Asia blog post on the Criteo Q2 2015 State of Mobile Commerce report

Mobile-optimised sites get more sales: Criteo

Source: Criteo website, Q2 2015 State of Mobile Commerce Report.

Criteo, the performance marketing technology provider, has released its Q2 2015 State of Mobile Commerce Report. The report highlights that mobile devices are now responsible for 34% of global e-commerce transactions, while m-commerce accounted for 27% of all e-commerce transactions in Southeast Asia, putting the region at a similar level to Spain and Italy, and right behind the US.

The report also reveals that globally, more than 40% of e-commerce transactions now involve multiple devices. Smartphones, desktops and tablets are used in a variety of combinations to research and make purchasing decisions.

“Consumer adoption of mobile continues to be the biggest trend in both e-commerce and advertising today, and the pace of growth is astounding,” said Jonathan Wolf, Chief Product Officer, Criteo. “Marketers’ ability to leverage new technologies to accurately identify and reach consumers wherever they are is going to become critical, as this trend perpetuates and carries us toward a world where the majority of transactions will take place across multiple devices.”

“Southeast Asia is currently the fastest-growing region globally, with mobile being a key driver, especially in developing markets like Indonesia and India,” said Yuko Saito, Managing Director, Criteo Southeast Asia. “These developing markets are ‘mobile-first’ – most consumers will own smartphones before they own desktops, with potential for further growth as smartphone penetration continues to increase.

“For mature markets like Singapore and Taiwan, there’s a higher incidence of cross-device usage. But overall, for both developing and mature markets, mobile optimisation is crucial for e-commerce businesses looking to engage the region’s growing smartphone population.”

The findings in this report are based on Criteo’s analysis of 1.4 billion individual e-commerce transactions totalling over US$160 billion of annual sales globally. 

Additional takeaways include:

· Southeast Asia is set to follow the trends in the US – mobile-optimised sites experience more than double the conversion rate of non-optimised sites, where only 1.6% of consumers convert; mobile apps experience higher conversion rates than mobile browsers or desktops, accounting for half of mobile transactions for e-commerce players who invested in an app experience.

· Whereas mobile transactions in Southeast Asia now account for 27% of all e-commerce transactions, Indonesia stands at 34%, Taiwan at 31% and Singapore at 29%. More than half of all online sales in Japan and South Korea come from people who buy via mobile devices. Globally, mobile transactions are expected to reach 40% by the end of 2015. 

· Leading the charge are the fashion, luxury and travel verticals, with one in three transactions now on mobile devices.

“The customer purchase journey has become increasingly complex as consumers stop using a single device to make their purchases,” said Wolf. “Delivering engaging app experiences and connecting seamlessly with consumers across multiple devices are key to capturing e-commerce sales in this new world.”

Interested?

Download Criteo’s Q2 2015 State Of Mobile Commerce Report. 

Malaysia's MICCI and MACC agree to cooperate on combating corruption

The Malaysian International Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MICCI) and the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) have agreed to partner to combat corruption and enhance good governance and integrity in the private sector.

MICCI is Malaysia’s longest established trade association. The Chamber’s President, Simon Whitelaw, said corruption can only be addressed through concerted efforts involving various parties and stakeholders.

"We agree with the statement by Deputy Chief Commissioner (Prevention), Datuk Mustafar Ali that we need concerted efforts. To this end, MICCI is pleased and is willing to cooperate with the MACC to achieve this objective," he said.

"MICCI is witness to the comprehensive transformation programme currently being undertaken and the various initiatives that have been introduced including creating partnerships with various stakeholders, including the private sector," Stewart Forbes, MICCI's Executive Director said.

MICCI has recommended three proposals to be included in the 11th Malaysia Plan, which is currently being formulated by the government. Strengthening the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2009 and the MACC, as well as providing comprehensive education programmes were among the recommendations.

MICCI also announced in June 2014 the establishment of a Business Ethics Award, to recognise companies who demonstrate exceptional progress in promoting good governance, ethical business and anti corruption compliance throughout their business.

Meanwhile, Datuk Mustafar said that the MACC welcomes the commitment rendered by the MICCI, which is one of the five founder members of the National Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia (NCCIM).

The other four members of National Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia are the Malay Chamber of Commerce Malaysia, the Associated Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia, the Malaysian Associated Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia and the Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM).

"The fight against corruption requires a holistic approach including the support from all parties, especially the private sector. Thus, the commitment by MICCI is indeed a good example. We will make the best of this opportunity to achieve a common goal," he said.

According to Datuk Mustafar, the MACC will take efforts to introduce more than 30 initiatives developed through the MACC transformation programme to members of the MICCI.

These includes creating partnerships and promoting the involvement of stakeholders in the program organised by the MACC.

"Similarly, the MACC is open to suggestions and input from the private sector," he said.

Mustafar said the Corporate Integrity Pledge (CIP), the Certified Integrity Officer program and the module on private sector investigation are among the initiatives that can be leveraged by the private sector. He said that the MACC would also take similar steps to foster ties at the state level.