Growth in online spending in 2008 represented a considerable outperformance of the increase in total retail and in 2009 it is forecast to grow by 13.3%, despite the overall retail market shrinking by £1.7bn. But with growth slowing, retailers must work harder to stand out.
The AB shopping demographic offers retailers the most potential over the next two years .This group is now responsible for over half of all online spending.
Indeed, with their more robust finances, they achieved by far the biggest growth in 2008 and were the only group to increase spend per head – which now stands at over £1,000 per person.
There is major scope for women to spend more online – don’t we know it gents!
However, it is Men, surprising enough, that are the biggest online spenders, but the gender split of Internet shopper numbers continues to move towards parity.
Retailers must now persuade women to spend more per head online rather than the more traditional shopping activity that they currently undertake; perusing in person.
Maybe comparing online shopping habits of both genders shows men are happier to find what they want online and buy it rather than physically going to a shop. For example, in music and video, men now only narrowly outnumber women, but are still responsible for 70.6% of spend.
Bath Marketing Consultancy suggests that retailers learn how to manage their approach to utilising their websites in terms of the design, usability, delivery operations, online marketing etc in order to maximise Internet sales growth.
