eCommerce Fashion Development Industry: Trends, Statistics, and Best Practices

fashion ecommerce cover 1

The global online apparel market is expected to continue growing over the next few years due to increasing internet penetration, rising demand for convenient shopping options, and the presence of numerous online apparel retailers. The market is also driven by the growing popularity of mobile commerce and the increasing use of social media for product discovery and purchase. If you ever thought about a fashion online marketplace or other fashion eCommerce project, it’s just the right time, as there is still room for innovation. Here we’ll examine the potential growth points, best practices, must-have features, and examples to follow.

Global Online Apparel Market Outlook

According to a report by ResearchAndMarkets.com, the global online apparel market is expected to grow by 13.21% during the period 2021-2026. The growth can be attributed to rising penetration of smartphones and the internet, and the convenience of online shopping.

The biggest online fashion retailers include companies like Amazon, ASOS, Zara, H&M, and Forever 21. These retailers offer a wide variety of clothing and accessories for both men and women, and often have competitive prices and fast shipping options. Some popular B2B apparel markets include Alibaba, Global Sources, and Made-in-China.

It is worth noting that the outbreak of COVID-19 has significantly impacted the global online apparel market, with many consumers shifting their preference towards comfortable and casual clothing, as well as the growing importance of sustainable and eco-friendly fashion.

eCommerce Fashion Statistics

How big is the fashion industry? Let’s study the statistics:

  1. The global online fashion market size is expected to reach $2 trillion by 2027 (Source: Statista).
  2. The UK has the highest percentage of online fashion sales in Europe, with an expected eCommerce fashion sales value of £19.2 billion in 2021 (Source: Retail Gazette).
  3. In the USA, 96% of Americans have made an online purchase in their lifetime, while 80% have made an online purchase in the past month (Source: BigCommerce).
  4. The most popular items purchased online in the fashion category include clothing, shoes, and accessories (Source: Shopify).
  5. With the rise of mobile shopping, 62% of smartphone users have made a purchase on their mobile device in the past six months (Source: OuterBox).

So, the market is growing year by year, and more and more eCommerce fashion brands join the niche introducing new directions for the online fashion eCommerce development.

Fashion hits the market when new fashion trends are introduced by designers, celebrities or influencers. These trends then become popular and are adopted by consumers through various mediums such as fashion magazines, social media, and retail stores. To keep up with the times, you need to use these resources and offer innovations. Top apparel eCommerce trends in the online boutique industry include increasing use of AI and AR technologies to enhance the online shopping experience, growing popularity of sustainable and ethical fashion, and expansion of online marketplaces and social commerce.

Other general fashion product trends involve:

  1. Image optimization: More and more people are shopping for fashion apparel with the use of different devices. Websites need to optimize their images for fast image uploading.
 Our client Factory Fashion optimized their images for fast loading
Our client Factory Fashion optimized their images for fast loading
  1. Personalization: Customers expect a more personalized shopping experience, including product recommendations and targeted marketing.
 Northskull considers gender while offering subscribing for their news
Northskull considers gender while offering subscribing for their news
  1. Sustainability: Many shoppers are interested in buying from sustainable clothing brands that prioritize environmentally friendly production methods.
 Our client Urbankissed is focused on sustainability 
Our client Urbankissed is focused on sustainability 
  1. Social media influence: Influencers on platforms like Instagram can have a big impact on fashion trends and sales.
Our client Northskull uses UGC for promoting own brand
Our client Northskull uses UGC for promoting own brand
  1. Virtual try-ons: Augmented reality and virtual try-on technology can help customers make more informed purchase decisions.
Our client - SeeWhatHappens use virtual try-ons to visualize customer experience
Our client – SeeWhatHappens use virtual try-ons to visualize customer experience

6. Pre-loved clothing: Secondhand boom is the growing trend of purchasing second hand items. It is a way of reducing waste and saving money. More and more people are increasingly becoming aware of the impact of consumerism on the environment and are opting for more sustainable choices. Recently, Malaysia got a secondhand boom. The secondhand market has been boosted by the rise of eCommerce platforms, making it easier for people to buy and sell pre-loved items online.

On Garage Sale It, you can open a sale of preloved items to reduce your environmental impact
On Garage Sale It, you can open a sale of preloved items to reduce your environmental impact

What Do Customers Value In Fashion Clothing eCommerce

Being on the same page with industry leaders is important, but meeting customer needs is equally meaningful. Digital entrepreneurs should understand their target audience. Fashion eCommerce customers value convenience, personalized experiences, transparency, social responsibility, product quality, and value for money among other things. Apart from brand image features, your target audience will estimate if your site speed and performance are great (especially, during the high season). The right hosting solution will cover the ‘technical’ side of the business. When deciding on opening a fashion marketplace, consider how to satisfy these needs in the first turn.

Tips For Improving Sales

Here are our tips for improving fashion online sales:

Optimize your fashion eCommerce website for user experience

User experience (UX) in clothes eCommerce refers to how users interact with the website, navigate through pages, and ultimately make a purchase. It includes elements such as visual design, ease of use, responsiveness, and overall satisfaction.

Some key factors to consider when creating a fashion eCommerce site with a focus on user experience include:

  • High-quality product photography: The site should feature high-quality images that showcase the products in detail from multiple angles with zoom in capability, and 360 degree rotation.
  • Personalization: The site should offer personalized recommendations based on the user’s interests and purchase history. This may include the ‘You may also like’ section or suggesting product bundles with matching items. Zara, ASOS, and Farfetch use ML and AI algorithms for their personalized offers. Their recommendation systems are powerful enough to suggest personalized products based on the user’s behavior on the site, purchase history, browsing history, recent searches and viewing history. Some popular AI and ML libraries for building recommendation systems include TensorFlow, PyTorch, Scikit-learn, and Apache Mahout. Another option is to use Blog for recommending. 

Cooperate with large media for promoting

Large media outlets have a huge reach and audience base, which helps in promoting a product or service to a wider audience. Cooperating with large media outlets can give you access to their existing audience and help in building brand awareness, increasing visibility, and driving traffic to your website or product.

Collect feedback

Collecting feedback is essential for businesses and organizations to improve their products, services, and processes. Feedback allows them to understand their customers’ needs, preferences, and pain points, and make necessary changes to address them. It also helps businesses to identify areas of improvement and prioritize their efforts accordingly.

Feedback can be collected through various channels, such as surveys, reviews, social media, customer support interactions, and more. It is important to analyze and act upon the feedback received, as it can lead to increased customer satisfaction, loyalty, and retention.

Additionally, feedback can also help businesses to innovate and stay ahead of the competition. By listening to their customers’ feedback, businesses can identify emerging trends, new opportunities, and needs, and create products and services that meet those demands.

Optimize images

Web pages with optimized images load quicker and are accessible to users with slow internet speeds or limited connectivity. Optimized images reduce storage and bandwidth costs, which is essential for an eCommerce website as it is a visual-heavy platform.

Draft appealing and complete product descriptions

Accurate and detailed product descriptions show customers that the website cares about the products they sell and are knowledgeable about fashion. This builds trust and credibility with potential customers.

Product description on Volcom
Product description on Volcom

A well-written product description (see the example of Volcom fashion brand above) should include details such as the product’s features, benefits, materials, dimensions, and care instructions. It should also be easy to read and understand, engaging, and persuasive. Product descriptions can also help with search engine optimization (SEO) by including relevant keywords that users might search for when looking for that product.

Use responsive design

The site should be optimized for multiple devices, including desktops, laptops, tablets, and smartphones.

The site should be optimized for multiple devices, including desktops, laptops, tablets, and smartphones.

Cater for UX/UI

With simple and clear navigation, users can easily find what they are looking for, whether it’s a specific product or category.

With simple and clear navigation, users can easily find what they are looking for, whether it’s a specific product or category.

eCommerce Fashion Website Development – Our Cases

As we have examined the fashion eCommerce site theory, let’s see our customized sites to understand their success.

The Real Luxury

Our client – The Real Luxury uses appealing photography with zoom-in features and a clear menu.

The Real Luxury homepage
Homepage of the realluxury.com site

To allow a more comfortable shopping experience, they offer visitors to enlarge pictures and view their favorite item in more detail.

Zoom in on the realluxury.com site
Zoom in on the realluxury.com site

The Real Luxury uses the blog function to recommend clothes. Blog is a simple and elegant solution for cross-selling with minimum investment.

The Real Luxury uses the blog function to recommend clothes. Blog is a simple and elegant solution for cross-selling with minimum investment.

Urbankissed

Urbankissed is a fashion marketplace that offers sustainable and ethical fashion for conscious consumers. Their collection includes clothing, jewelry, bags, shoes, beauty, and wellness products from brands committed to sustainability, ethical manufacturing, and social responsibility. Some of their conscious brands they carry are Mate the Label, SOKO, Nisolo, and Voz.

Homepage of Urbankissed
Homepage of Urbankissed

Urbankissed created a separate page to recommend Looks

Urbankissed created a separate page to recommend Looks
Articles on Urbankissed

Urbankissed cooperated with Financial Times among others and had their mentioning 

Social proof as implemented on Urbankissed
Social proof as implemented on Urbankissed

URBANTALKS is a blog page with the articles that promote the Urbankissed brands and products and link to the appropriate brand/product pages 

Fashion advice on Urbankissed
Fashion advice on Urbankissed

Just in one year the marketplace doubled the number of vendors from 50 to 100. 

We guess the success is hidden behind the following practices:

  1. Sustainable and ethical products: Urbankissed offers a wide range of sustainable, eco-friendly, and ethical products.
  2. Independent designers and brands: the company supports independent designers and small brands that prioritize sustainability in their production processes.
  3. Transparency: Urbankissed provides transparency about the sourcing, production, and materials used in the products.
  4. Community-driven: Urbankissed is a community-driven platform that connects fashion consumers who prioritize sustainability with designers and brands that share those values.
  5. Fashion Advice: To help their customers make more informed choices, Urbankissed provides fashion advice on how to style and pair sustainable clothing.

Simtech Development experts customized the Urbankissed platform to create a seamless shopping experience for customers and provide a user-friendly interface for vendors.

Northskull

Northskull homepage

Simtech Development customized Northskull’s eCommerce platform to improve the customer experience and increase sales.

We have introduced the new features:

  1. Developed a custom theme for Northskull’s website to match their brand image and improve usability.
  2. Implemented a new payment gateway to accept a wider range of payment options.
  3. Added new features such as product customization to enhance the customer experience.
  4. Optimized the website’s loading speed and search engine optimization (SEO) to increase visibility on search engines.
  5. Integrated analytics tools to measure site performance and provide insights on visitor behavior.

Summarizing

While developing a fashion website, follow the key points:

  1. Choose the right platform: Consider using popular eCommerce platforms: cloud solution (for plugin-based easy start) or license-based CMS (to have more room for customizations).
  2. Use High-Quality Images: Fashion eCommerce sites require high-quality images to showcase products. Consider professional photography and editing to ensure high-quality images.
  3. Ensure the platform allows for a responsive design: make your site mobile-friendly and optimized for different devices as many customers access eCommerce sites through mobile devices.
  4. Cater for the user experience: Make sure that the site is easy to navigate, the checkout process is simple, and there are clear calls to action and product descriptions.
  5. Ensure that the eCommerce site is secure and integrates with a reliable payment gateway to make sure that customers can complete transactions safely.
  6. Integrate social media accounts like Instagram and Facebook into the eCommerce site to increase engagement, customer retention, and conversion rates.
  7. Optimize the eCommerce site for search engines and implement strategies like email marketing and affiliate marketing to drive sales.

Simtech Development can help with your CMS customization, adding enhanced filters and search capabilities, creating UX/UI design for better website perception, connecting local payment and shipping systems for better meeting customer preferences, improving SEO and more.

FAQ about Fashion Ecommerce Development

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