The Retailer Summer Edition 2021

THE RE TA I L ER

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5 CONSUMER TRENDS SHAPING THE WAY WE’LL SHOP THIS CHRISTMAS

Becky Power Director, Consumer Retail Google U.K.

R etailers who act early this festive season will be best placed to capture new and shifting shopper demands After a uniquely challenging festive period in 2020, retailers can look forward to better times in 2021. The U.K. population is estimated to have amassed excess savings equivalent to £215 billion over the past year, giving good reason to plan and hope for a Christmas spending boom. But cause for optimism isn’t cause for complacency. The pandemic has both accelerated and created vast changes in thewaywe shop. Consumers have shifted to digital, and they have higher expectations that don’t stop at the product or service: they are also looking to engage in conscious consumption that reflects their values. The latest data from Google indicates that many of these changes are here for the long term. So howwill these shifting behaviours continue to affect retail at the busiest time of the year? We’ve identified five key trends from Google research, consumer surveys, and search data for the peak season — and actions retailers should take to meet consumers’ changing demands. Consumers are increasingly looking for a retailer with ethics and purpose that align with their own.

1. Christmas shopping has been extended Retailers have always planned for the festive period far in advance, but shoppers are fast catching up with them. In Google’s latest survey of Christmas shoppers, more Britons said they liked to get most of their Christmas shopping done early in the season than previously1 — a sen - timent we see reflected in Google Trends, with interest in “Christmas gifts” now starting to climb as early as August.

This translates into an extended peak period covering Black Friday, Christmas, and the sales —with the savviest retailers monitoring changing trends online and ensuring they’re ready to capture early bird demand as it arises. Actions: Keep pace with what the nation is searching for. With Google Trends, retailers can monitor search interest on relevant terms and categories — gleaning real-time insights to identify changes in demand and potential new profit opportunities earlier in the year. 73% of growth in retail-related searches on Google in the U.K. last year was from newor rarely searched for terms2 — a figure that demonstrates the scale of new digital shopping behaviours. It’s also indicative of the changing role of search in an increasingly complex purchase journey, as more people go online not just to click ‘‘buy’’ but to seek inspiration. Measuring online to offline sales is also increasingly important. Recent research by Analytic Partners has shown at least 50% of revenues gener- ated by search and social media are captured in-store. Actions: Establish a single KPI across all your channels. The most advanced retailers take a holistic view of marketing effectiveness — both online and offline — to navigate purchase journey complexity and overcome the issue of siloed teams working to different goals. 2. Newonline behaviours are driving retail growth