Grocery shopping has drastically changed over the past few years. What used to involve time and effort to visit the local brick-and-mortar store has transformed into something much more convenient.
All this easy grocery shopping involves is the tap of a button, and everything is delivered to your doorstep. This shift has also transformed consumer-retailer interactions.
For grocery store owners concerned with providing a positive customer experience, it’s extremely important to embrace online grocery shopping. Let’s look at how online grocery can be a game-changer for your grocery or supermarket business.
What is online grocery?
The basic concept of e-grocery involves shopping for grocery items online and receiving the delivery on the same day, usually under an hour. This digital approach allows consumers to purchase groceries without visiting physical stores, offering greater flexibility and convenience.
EMarketer research found that global e-grocery sales will reach $1.6 trillion by 2026, making it a major component in the online sector.
It’s also essential to distinguish between grocery e-commerce and digital or online grocery shopping. It might seem like two names for the same thing, but that’s not the case.
Grocery ecommerce involves online sales and order fulfillment logistics. Online grocery is a broader concept, which includes catering to customer experience and implementing digital transformation for your grocery business.
In short, grocery ecommerce only focuses on making sales and delivering goods to shoppers. Online grocery aims to add value for the store owner and the shopper. It has several advantages over the traditional model of grocery shopping, which involves a much greater effort from customers.
How online grocery differs from traditional grocery
Online grocery has risen in popularity over the last few years, with over 138 million shoppers in the US. The benefits of online grocery shopping include an attractive alternative to the traditional model.
Before ecommerce, consumers had to drive to the store, search through shelves, wait in queues, and carry everything back home. Online grocery neatly sidesteps these issues, giving shoppers a more streamlined and convenient option.
The three main differences that set online grocery shopping apart from traditional shopping are highlighted below.
- Location: Customers can shop online from anywhere, including the comfort of their homes.
- Shopping time: Traditional grocery shopping is much more time-consuming since it involves a physical trip to and from the store. Online grocery shopping only takes a few minutes before checkout.
- Operating hours: Brick-and-mortar stores are closed outside business hours, but online grocery stores are open 24/7 to receive orders.
As we can see, there are many benefits of online grocery shopping. However, it isn’t without shortcomings. It’s crucial to weigh the pros and cons of online grocery shopping on their own merits.
Pros and cons of online grocery shopping
Leveraging online grocery shopping can certainly boost your business. However, it’s also essential to measure the impact of online services on customer experience. Let’s dig into the pros and cons of online grocery shopping, with a particular focus on how it affects shoppers.
Advantages
If you know how to run an online grocery store efficiently, your customers will likely have a positive experience. Online grocery shopping can be smooth and effortless when backed by the right ecommerce platform and strategy.
Here are all the benefits of online grocery shopping for the customer experience:
- Saves time: Grocery shoppers value the time saved by skipping the traffic, crowds, and queues that are part of every trip to a brick-and-mortar store. In fact, saving time is the most popular reason why shoppers opt for online grocery stores in the US.
- Eliminates impulse purchases: Shopping online makes it easier to resist the temptation of an impulse purchase. Physical stores are designed to entice shoppers to add more items to their carts, whether they need them or not.
This is done via a unique selection of goods at the checkout display. Avoiding unnecessary expenses is the second-most popular driver for consumers adopting online grocery services.
- Round-the-clock support: After a physical store pulls down its shutters, business is done for the day. Customers with concerns or complaints can only contact the store when it reopens.
However, with online grocery stores, a customer service channel can stay open 24/7, improving engagement rates.
- Personalized shopping experience: Online grocery stores keep details about shoppers’ preferences and their previously purchased items.
These data points craft a unique personalized experience for shoppers, recommending products they already use or are likely to try.
This helps customers discover what they are looking for, increasing the store's average order value.
Disadvantages
Negative aspects of the shopping experience are some of the biggest roadblocks to consumers' adoption of online grocery services. Finding ways to limit these can help your store increase customer acquisition and retention rates.
Here are some challenges to cultivating a positive online grocery shopping experience.
- Added expenses: The cost of packaging and shipping grocery orders is usually passed on to the customer. This often makes online grocery shopping more expensive than visiting stores in person.
However, the savings on incidental costs like fuel and attractive discounts and promotions can offset this and persuade customers to purchase.
- No way to inspect goods: When grocery shopping for fresh produce, many customers pick up and examine a fruit, vegetable, or cut of meat
Unfortunately, there’s simply no way to do that in an online store. You can still help them get a good idea of what they are purchasing by creating detailed product listings.
With high-quality images and relevant information, customers will almost feel like they are examining the products firsthand.
- Limited selection: Customers in online grocery stores often face challenges with limited stock as compared to physical stores.
Online grocery stores could also struggle with real-time inventory updates, space constraints in warehouses, and managing perishable goods, which can lead to fewer options and potential frustration for customers.
Physical stores, on the other hand, provide the advantage of immediate product alternatives and direct assistance from staff, addressing gaps in stock more effectively.
Knowing your customers’ preferences while stocking your online store helps avoid this situation. Efficient inventory management helps ensure that in-demand items are rarely out of stock.
Final thoughts
Online grocery shopping has inherent strengths and weaknesses. With the right strategy, you can leverage its advantages and find ways to work around the downsides.
Your online grocery strategy begins with picking the right grocery ecommerce platform. Wave Grocery’s dedicated solution for grocery business owners helps streamline and optimize operations.
This ensures your customers will enjoy the benefits of online grocery shopping without any of the aforementioned drawbacks.
