Growth in UK online spending has beaten previous records, with e-commerce sales exceeding £28 billion - over £14 billion per quarter - in the first half of the year, according to the Adobe Digital Price Index.

This equates to 9.9 per cent year-on-year growth in the first quarter and 10.7 per cent in the second quarter.

Adobe’s figures are based on analysis of over one trillion visits to over 4,500 retail sites in the UK, with pricing insights based on sales of more than 55 million unique products. In addition, Adobe surveyed 1,000 consumers in the UK between the end of May and the start of June.

As other retail statistics this week have backed up, the summer heatwave and World Cup football tournament have helped drive online sales. In fact, the two highest online sales were the first days of the competition - June 14 and 15 - with £218.7 million and £237.6 million respectively.

Just over half of UK consumers (52 per cent) have ordered via store websites at some point in the past year, and they are not just using online stores for the basics either, with 40 per cent now buying most of their groceries online. UK shoppers have also embraced mobile shopping, with visits from smartphones to UK retailers overtaking desktop visits in December 2017.

Vijayanta Gupta, senior director for digital marketing EMEA at Adobe, said the UK is quickly becoming a nation of online shoppers.

“While shopping figures are lowest over the weekend, Mondays consistently have the highest sales of the week, with sales decreasing as the week goes on,” he explained, adding: “This trend goes back to the days of direct mail catalogues, where decisions were made on Saturdays and Sundays, and conversions took place back at work on a Monday.”

Adobe suggested that shoppers are spending their weekends researching options (often visiting physical stores to see goods in person) and then purchasing online at the start of the working week.

Adobe’s analysis stated that most brands have already optimised for mobile, so the challenge is now to deliver an experience that is both optimised and personalised, at scale.

“The augmented reality capabilities within smartphones will change how we shop in the physical space – either intelligently providing recommendations based on preferences while in store, or helping visualise how items online would look in-person,” concluded Gupta. “Retailers should consider how these capabilities could help them build personalised experiences.”

Share Story: