New whitepaper highlights the importance of human connection and seamless experiences in digital marketing strategies

Khoros, an award-winning leader in digital-first customer engagement software and services, today released its latest whitepaper, Navigating the Rise of Digital Commerce. The whitepaper explores the consumer trends that have reshaped the commerce landscape and reveals the opportunities and blind spots marketing executives should be preparing for as we look forward to 2022.

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“Commerce strategies over the last two years have largely been placed in reactive mode as marketers have had to adapt to the quickly shifting digital landscape”

Since the onset of the pandemic, brands have prioritized digital channels for everything from customer support to commerce. In fact, the rise of digital commerce has accelerated in almost every consumer facing industry: kiosks are the new waiters; mobile apps the new foyer. Businesses saw digital channels generate profit like never before. The question for chief marketing officers (CMOs) today is which of these changes are here to stay.

Leveraging insights from more than 1,300 consumers and marketing leaders around the world, this whitepaper provides marketing executives with foresight into consumer preferences, both in 2022 and beyond, to inform key decision making and future-proof marketing investments.

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Key findings from the report include:

• The purchase journey will become increasingly hybrid. 67% of consumers believe the best shopping experiences in the future will incorporate both humans and digital channels.
• Marketers need to preserve human connection over digitized interactions. 57% of consumers want the option to talk to someone before buying a product or service, but that doesn’t mean they are going to ignore the convenience of e-commerce(Khoros).
• Social commerce is here to stay, but conversational commerce is the next frontier. While conversational commerce is a powerful strategy in achieving this balance of digitization and human touch, only 12% of marketers consider this to be a very high priority in their commerce strategy today.
• Digital-forward consumers are painting the picture for the future of commerce. This segment expects a simpler, more convenient, and hyper-personalized purchase journey—and they are willing to share more of their personal data to get it.

“Commerce strategies over the last two years have largely been placed in reactive mode as marketers have had to adapt to the quickly shifting digital landscape,” said Katherine Calvert, CMO at Khoros. “Moving forward, CMOs should be looking to the new doors that have been opened by the rise in digital commerce to proactively address the new needs of consumers. The future of commerce will be more connected, more convenient, and more personalized than ever before. Brands that invest in the toolkit to serve these needs now will be able to remain relevant and capitalize on this wave of digital growth.”

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