Shopify Partner News: Retailer Technology
While Shopify is most popular for driving the online stores of more than 1 million organisations, the multinational e-commerce company is releasing a shopping application of its own called ‘Shop’, free to both shoppers and brands globally.
The application presents the challenge of re-educating consumer behaviour when it comes to online shopping as it shifts the user not just from desktop to mobile commerce, but also from mobile web to mobile apps.
‘Shop’ is in fact an update and rebrand of existing app ‘Arrive’ which tracks packages from Shopify merchants and other retailers. Additionally, the new application allows consumers to browse a feed of recommended products, learn more about each brand and make purchases using the one-click Shop pay checkout process.
For the last couple of years, Shopify has been on a mission to unlock the power of omnichannel experience for its businesses, a historic methodology in CEEK’s marketing services, which is typically defined as a multi-channel sales approach that provides the customer with an integrated customer experience, whether that’s shopping from mobile or desktop or at a brick-and-mortar location.
In an aim to give retailers, especially local and small businesses, every possible advantage ‘Shop’ offers a point-of-sale that helps them shift their sales from in-store to online, easily offer store pick-up and local delivery, and be ready for growth when in-store customers start to return.
Shopify noted that in 2018 and 2019 merchants who connected their online and in-store sales with Shopify POS saw revenue increase by 30 percent year over year.
Viceversa, the feature allows shoppers to browse local merchants, see which ones currently support delivery and in-store purchase, then make purchases to support them. Unlike other shopping portals, Shop will not include any unwanted ads but instead will provide customised product recommendations based on the brands you’ve either already purchased from or followed in the app.
The main struggle with mobile shopping applications is that most customers only download and shop from a handful of native apps, so it can be hard for an independent brand to launch an app of their own. ‘Shop’ is giving these businesses a platform to call their own.
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