By Alan Coleman on 6 Apr 2020
The Weekly Online Economy Report - April 6th
We've analysed over 38 million website sessions and over €127 million euro in online revenue over the past 9 weeks (Mon-Sun), to compile a weekly report covering the previous week's movements in the online economy during the Covid19 crisis.
The first four weeks fell in February and were before the Covid19 crisis took hold. The next 5 weeks are from March into April when the crisis started to escalate. When we say 'last week' we are referring to Monday 30th - Sunday 5th April. Here are last weeks figures:
Overall
Overall traffic is up 19% against pre-corona levels and it is actually the largest traffic figure we have seen, increasing 10% on the previous week.
In addition to the traffic volume increasing the share of new traffic has increased by 4% week on week, illustrating new traffic is growing faster than returning traffic.
Overall online revenues are up 14% compared with the pre-covid crisis average. This figure is down marginally on the previous week’s high which was a 15% increase. This decrease is a result of supply side factors in online retail.
Retail
April week 1 saw a 40% increase in traffic on pre covid levels for online retailers. This is trending upwards having been up 32% the previous week.
Online revenues were up 196% to almost treble their pre-covid levels. This is trending down marginally. The previous week’s high was up 207%.
The week on week decrease in online revenue is as a result of supply side factors. A number of e-commerce merchants stopped taking online orders early last week for a variety of logistical reasons including health and safety of workers and to ship the backlog of orders accrued.
Most of those retailers who had stopped selling online have addressed the various issues and were taking online orders again by the end of the week.
The Enterprise Ireland recent COVID-19 Online Retail Scheme announcement also brings welcomed news to the industry. The support has a total fund size of €2m and supports a maximum of 80% of eligible costs with a maximum grant of €40,000 available.
Find out about Wolfgang’s Covid-10 Online Retail Scheme Packages to get your retail operations back on track, including details on how you can apply.
Travel
Last week’s traffic was down 74% on pre-covid levels. Last week’s online revenue was a miniscule 3% of the February weekly average. Trending down.
Wolfgang Digital’s CEO Alan Coleman said “Over the last decade e-commerce sales have grown share to 14% of overall retail sales. In the last month the volume of those ecommerce sales has trebled. The dramatic increase in online demand has created significant logistical challenges for retailers. When you set that increased demand against the backdrop of health and safety restrictions you can see retailers are under massive pressure to service their customers. The pressure is most pronounced on multichannel retailers who are dealing with massive upsurges in online demand from shoppers who would have previously popped into a shop”.
