Sinch predicts personalised, secure shopping trends for 2024

Sinch has announced its predictions for the 2024 Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping period, indicating trends will focus on personalisation, conversational commerce, and secure communication technologies.

The insights were derived from Sinch's 2024 Consumer BF/CM Survey, which took into account responses from consumers across several countries. The survey suggests that retailers will leverage communication technologies to enhance consumer experience, boost sales, and maintain secure transactions during the shopping season.

Recalling last year, mobile messaging was key in retail communication strategies with formats such as SMS, RCS, and WhatsApp leading the way. Sinch reported processing over 4 billion messages globally during Cyber Week 2023, a significant increase from 2022. This reflects the growing consumer dependency on direct communication channels.

Sinch's predictions for 2024 highlight the importance of omnichannel promotions, with 77.9% of consumers preferring promotions through multiple channels. Email remains popular, with 61.3% of consumers expecting holiday offers via this medium, while 44.9% wish for messaging channels like SMS. Notably, 51.2% of consumers are inclined to engage with interactive campaigns through messaging apps.

The report also forecasts increased use of AI and RCS for personalisation. Nearly 80% of surveyed consumers desire personalised recommendations, and growing RCS adoption, especially with support from newer iOS versions, is set to facilitate enhanced customer engagement. RCS offers rich media functionalities, enabling brands to provide a streamlined, immersive customer experience during transactions.

Interactive messaging is expected to gain traction, with 51.2% of respondents reporting they would engage with holiday campaigns directly through messaging applications such as RCS. The combination of AI targeting with RCS's multimedia capabilities could lead to enhanced promotional interaction and conversion rates.

Regarding transactional messaging, Sinch's survey indicates that nearly half of the consumers expect immediate order confirmations post-purchase, underlining the necessity for quick and reliable communication during peak sales. Furthermore, 94.4% of consumers see such transactional messages as critical, with channels like email and SMS being preferred by many.

Conversational commerce is also expected to enhance customer engagement this holiday season. The survey found that 56.6% of consumers are inclined to use chatbots to track orders, 45.8% wish to gather more product information before purchase, and 43.2% value customer service accessibility outside typical business hours.

Virginie Debris, Senior Vice President of Messaging Product at Sinch, emphasised the need for retailers to stay attuned to the evolving expectations of digitally savvy shoppers.

"Our predictions for 2024 emphasise the growing importance of omnichannel, personalised, and secure communications in driving customer engagement and sales. Sinch is dedicated to providing the cutting-edge tools businesses need to excel in this competitive landscape," Debris stated.