Romanian e-commerce market is becoming saturated
2018. 04. 19.
Romanian e-commerce market is becoming saturated gradually indicates a research by eNET Group. Nearly half of all webshops surveyed were launched in the last five years. Average number of employees operating the webshop was 3.6 person. 42% of online shops also had a physical store. In 2017, eNET Group conducted an online survey of e-commerce in Romania for the fourth time.Cash on delivery was offered by almost every webshop
Cash on delivery was available at almost all of the webshops surveyed, followed by bank transfer and cash payment in-store / at site / in an office. However, the availability of the last two and card on delivery option decreased slightly between 2016 and 2017. Romanian online shops offered an average 3.6 types of payment methods for their shoppers. Online stores that also sell goods offline provided more payment options than online only webshops.
Courier services still dominated the delivery
Delivery with courier services was still the most popular delivery method, 97% of the webshops surveyed offered courier delivery. Delivery by an employee and personal collection in-store gained a few percent points between 2016 and 2017. Online shops were under contract with an average of 2.1 courier companies. The most popular ones among the webshops surveyed were Fan Courier and Urgent Cargus. 96% of the webshops provided time guarantee for delivery which was typically within maximum 2 business days. One quarter of online stores received orders from abroad.SEO became the most popular type of online marketing tools
Appearing in search engine results, on social media channels and on price comparison sites were the most typical type of online marketing solutions among the surveyed Romanian webshops. However, the last two lost some popularity recently. The most popular comparison sites according to webshops were Shopmania.ro and Compari.ro.
More orders will come from mobile platforms
Two-third of webshops reported having a website optimized for mobile devices (phones, smartphones or tablets). 30% of online stores surveyed had their own mobile application and an additional 23% were planning on developing one. Webshops surveyed were expecting a large increase in the share of sales via mobile devices. Purchases via smartphones and tablets might represent up to 40% of total sales by 2018.
General optimism for the future is the main characteristic attitude
Respondents expect increase of the Romanian e-commerce market in general. Webshops count on a significant growth in the number of online purchase transactions for the years 2018 to 2021. Webshops surveyed expected more online ordered products to be delivered by courier companies, and to be paid electronically. The surveyed Romanian webshops expect the number of competitors to increase significantly in the next few years.About the research:
The survey was conducted by eNET Group in Spring 2017 by interviewing Romanian webshops (retail webshops accepting orders via a Romanian-language home page). Businesses only selling services online were excluded from the research.
Definition of a ‘webshop’: store selling goods via the Internet using online ‘carts’.
