E-commerce Update: Another Increase in Online Traffic

Here, the IndieCommerce team shares an important look at current trends in the world of e-commerce.

After seeing average daily sales slowly decrease over the past month, this week’s sales revenue increased by 5.34 percent. We also saw a 1.86 percent increase this week in the e-commerce conversion rate (the number of online customers who complete an online purchase) and a 2.75 percent increase in the quantity of items sold last week.

Traffic over the past week increased by 4.97 percent (blue line) versus the previous week (orange line), with a 10 percent increase on Tuesday, August 4. As with the increase in revenue and sales, the increase in traffic is going against the slow decreases in online traffic we’ve been seeing over the past month.

The gains in the conversion rate, sales revenue, and traffic to IndieCommerce and IndieLite websites this past week could indicate that bookstore customers are shifting back to online purchases due to the national increase in the number of COVID cases. If this is the beginning of a shift, stores should once again emphasize the options they offer for online order fulfillment, such as curbside pickup, home delivery, and shipping, as well as any measures they are taking to keep customers safe from infection.