The best of February is here, and it feels like deja new; two topics that keep coming up, but with new flavors and variations on their themes.
We’re distilling and deconstructing benchmarks from across ecommerce, focused on the on-site experience and subscriptions, with a view into Dynamic Yield’s "eCommerce Benchmarks and KPIs" and Recharge’s "The State of Subscription Commerce for 2022." Read on.
IYKYK
Dynamic Yield shines a bright light on the shopper journey (stay tuned - more on the shopper journey later this week). We can’t help but notice the ongoing plight of mobile. While dominating at the top of the funnel, phones phall phlat as shoppers progress through the funnel. Even though mobile delivers the lion’s share of traffic, checking in at 68% per Dynamic Yield’s analysis, mobile underperforms desktop on almost every key ecommerce benchmark.
Add to Cart: 11% lower on mobile
Cart Abandonment: 20% higher on mobile
Conversion Rate: 29% lower on mobile
We’ve been excusing mobile performance for quite a while:
from "it’s simply the new window shopping" and "shopper’s intent is low"
to "mobile shoppers are distracted" and even "shoppers simply aren’t comfortable buying on phones."
Ack.
Even offering the indulgence that mobile expectations can be lowered early in the on-site experience, it’s difficult to accept poor mobile performance at the end of the journey. As the Checkout Benchmark shows, the mobile gap expands, even after checkout starts:
More on-site experience benchmarks await at Dynamic Yield’s eCommerce Benchmarks and KPIs.
Members Only
The subscription model is on a similar path as the now-it's-cool QR code. They’ve both been around a while, but each is finally coming into their own aided by better technology in consumers' hands and retailer tech stacks.
Consumer adoption of subscriptions exploded during 2020 due in large part to you know what. According to Recharge, strong growth continued through 2021 across all of the verticals they track: overall customers grew by 31%, with the largest increases coming in categories practically built for subscriptions: Pets and Animals, Food and Beverage, and Home Goods.
The real value of subscriptions and what all retailers hope to achieve is sustained recurring revenue through loyal customers. From the insights from 2021, retailers have started to crack this nut with impressive MRR and subscriber growth.
Even though MRR and subscriber growth are up, subscriber churn remains a battle. According to Recharge, up to 42% of subscribers stayed with merchants after 12-months - much higher than general ecommerce, which on average has a 1% monthly customer retention rate.
Subscriptions aren’t just for magazines anymore. Yikes – a magazine reference? What’s next, ‘zines? Subscriptions are useful across a diverse set of industries – for physical and digital products. 2020 likely accelerated this shift, but purchasing patterns have been hardened. Sure, fast-moving, low-consideration goods fit snuggly with subscriptions. With new features in subscription platforms such as skip & swap and one-time-purchases, the subscription model is proving sustainable and flexible for a much wider assortment of product categories.
On the Mark has more in the tank for wrapping up the prior month's best benchmarks. Stay tuned for a deep dive into a first-of-its-kind look at the Shopper Journey.
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