May eCommerce News Roundup

May, the month of royal weddings, sunshine, thunderstorms, a lot of emails and the following not-to-be-missed eCommerce news.

Let’s Get Physical

Shopify announced plans to open a physical store later in the year. A hub for Shopify e-retailers to get support for their growing online businesses, this move follows the release of strong Q1 results, including a 68% increase in revenue. This wasn’t the only partnership this month either: CoinPayments also tweet-nnounced their Shopify relationship enabling store owners to accept a variety of cryptocurrencies. And still that wasn’t it.

Hubba Hubba

Marketing software developer, Hubspot, also announced its integration with Shopify, providing a one-stop in-bound marketing service for online sellers. Users will be able to sync their Shopify data into Hubspot and automatically generate workflows, analyse purchasing patterns and build lists. Best thing: it’s free.

I Do

Royal wedding fever hit the country big time, with early predictions of a £195.5 million retail boost and not just on cucumber sandwiches, commemorative plates and bottles of Pimms. Non-food spending was expected to rise by £48.9 million, as everyone splashed out to achieve the Meghan look.

What’s the Magic Word?

We all get fed up with trying to come up with passwords that are unique, cryptic and not obvious, while also being memorable but are we ready to do away with them entirely? eBay thinks so. Last year it launched Google Sign-In for Android, as well as touch and face-ID on compatible devices. This year it has have created a new state-of-the-art on-boarding system, which will take it one step closer to obliterating passwords forever, by allowing users to use their social media accounts to sign in.

They Call Me Mellow Yellow

Forget the Millenial Pink that all those avocado-eating, working-from-home, renters were buying. It’s now all about Gen Z Yellow. According to Etsy, this summer-inspired hue is hot, with a 20% surge in searches. Luckily, Etsy has over 595,000 items available in this life-brightening tone, allowing you to decorate your home, body and life in this feel-good shade.

San Fran and Chi-Town

In January we announced Amazon’s first checkout-less store in Seattle and it looks like Chicago and San Fransisco are next on the list. This month, Amazon was noticed to be on the lookout for store managers in these exact cities, leading the detectives amongst us to come up with four.

Magento and Adobe

Adobe has announced its plans to buy eCommerce shopping cart giant, Magento. It will be parting with a little $1.68 billion in its biggest deal in nearly a decade – also the amount of time that Magento has been alive. We’re looking forward to seeing how Adobe’s analytical, advertising and marketing expertise will expand Magento and challenge Shopify.

Interesting, Very Interesting

eBay has launched eBay Interests – the new mobile shopping homepage that is individually personalised to your life loves (not just your most shopped). eBay’s “ecosystem of things” will see product recommendations based on lifestyles, not categories. Just bought some yoga pants? Get ready for a homepage full of woven blankets, meditation and aromatherapy, amongst your usual yoga mats, leggings and bricks-of-shame.

Track That

Amazon has taken its delivery tracking to the next level, with the ability to map-track your parcel when it is within ten stops of your home. Currently restricted to Amazon US deliveries through its own logistics service, we see this one taking off – in fact, we best be quick, it’s only eight stops away.

Denied

In December, we announced that Amazon had gone down under to Australia. Following a new law that requires online retailers to charge sales tax on products brought into the country, Amazon is denying Aussies’ access to its overseas websites – the first time it has ever done this. This will be a blow for Australian shoppers who have noticed a smaller selection and higher priced Amazon.au but could potentially be great news for eBay who is not following suit.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

Things were all a’change over at eBay this month. They announced this year’s eBay millionaires, opened the 2018 eBay for Business Awards, launched their new Shop by Product search page and completed phase one of their Shopfront migration.

GDPR…We’ll Leave it at That

Here’s to a Jammy June.