Three quarters of consumers in our country said that the preference for online purchases has increased with Pandemia.According to Google study, this trend will be maintained in the following period: 9 out of 10 Romanians say they will continue to buy online.
How much did they buy online, following the pandemic?41% of Romanians said that the latest purchase was an online one, while in 2019, before the pandemic, only 31% of them had a similar answer.
Google analysis was performed on people who bought a product from electronic categories (phones, computers, audio, gaming), house and garden (appliances, interior/exterior) or clothing/footwear.Electronic and home and garden products are those with the most recent online purchases - around half, while fashion products are purchased with predominantly offline, although here online purchases have increased to almost a third in 2021,compared to 17% in 2019.
Seniors, the biggest advance in online
Leaning to online trade increased on all age categories.The older ones see the biggest increase in appetite for online commerce, along with pandemic, given that young people were more bent to new methods of purchase naturally.According to the study, almost 40% of people over 55 said they made the latest online purchase, increasing to 24% in 2019.Young people between 25 and 34 are the ones who buy the most online - 44%, but the pandemia did not bring significant changes in their purchase behavior.
Most Romanians are indifferent to the type of purchase - offline or online.Google data show that almost three quarters of buyers in Romania do not have a preference for online or offline, they choose their purchase channel according to occasion and opportunity, compared to 61% before pandemic.This increase in multi-canal acquisitions came against the background of many offline shopping online.Data show that the share of those who have an exclusive preference for offline purchases has dropped drastically, from 27% in 2019 to 10% in 2021.
Reviews become more and more important
As online trade has developed, buyers' requirements have become more sophisticated.The Smart Shopper study shows that the main failure of customers when making online purchases tends to be related to products or services: 20% of home/ garden product and clothing buyers are unhappy that they do not find independent reviews.For electronic buyers, the main dissatisfaction is the lack of ease in the acquisition process: 20% say they wanted to buy without having to register or log in.
Mobile, between documentaries and purchase
Mobile is of increasing importance in the process of documentation and acquisition.Three quarters of Romanians use the mobile to be informed before a purchase, most in the case of electronic products (90%) and less at fashion (56%), being a more personal purchase and where the products must prove.
Things are reversed when it comes to mobile purchases: 44% of Romanians purchase electronic products on mobile;Being about higher value products, the purchase process is made from home, from the desktop/laptop.
On the fashion area, almost 60% of the purchases come from the mobile;Here are several opportunity acquisitions: advertising, offers recommendation, etc..In 2021, the trend is to move the mobile shopping from website to the application.Google Smart Shopper data shows that half of those who bought mobile used the application of a brand or retailer, while 44% bought from the supplier's website, compared to 51% 2 years ago.
The Smart Shopper study was conducted for Google by the Cint market study company, in June 2021.The study has a national representative for people over 18 years old in Romania, who use a device connected to the Internet and have made a purchase in the 3 major categories of products analyzed: electronics, clothing and shoes/house/garden.