Latest developments from the consumer goods market

E-commerce continues to be a main driver in the consumer markets these days. In particular, this has been fuelled by mobile, which has enabled online shopping to reach ever new heights. Forbes have found that the largest 18 e-commerce marketplaces account for more than $1 trillion in global sales annually. As part of this trend there is a constant evolvement of new opportunities engaging consumers into new experiences, overlaying digital elements onto the real world. From a consumer perspective in times of digitalization, consumers expect nothing less from brands but to encounter a cross-channel offering of products and services.

Communicating with consumers across multiple touchpoints is the key challenge and to further offer product experiences across the different channels. As such there is an ongoing trend towards organizations adopting latest technologies and acquiring skills to capitalise on this trend. In order to remain competitive in the long run, organizations need to reinvent their customer experience. To start of with this begins with means such as bringing in data and analytics-based insights on what truly matters to consumers how to excel in delivering value.

At the same time, the market reflects an increasing customer centricity. Here there are increasing  efforts undertaken to deepen one-on-one connections with the consumer market. One such effort towards this approach is the use of technologies fostering greater product engagement via means such as Augmented Reality & Virtual Reality. Spanning across all sectors from clothing to make-up, furniture to home products, there are seemingly no limits to the use of technology – be it trying on clothes, putting on makeup or decorating homes virtually before completing a purchase.

These developments are putting further pressure on retail whilst tech-savvy firms such as Amazon and other e-retail platforms note remarkable growth rates. These latest developments have led to a new need for new talents such as marketplace managers, being in charge for nothing less but manging and guaranteeing strong performance on 3rd party marketplaces.

From a workforce perspective the German market is very candidate driven these days. Over the past years a continuous level of satisfied candidates has been the challenge for companies to get talent on board. Career opportunities, new challenges, larger responsibility scopes or attractive locations (such as Munich, Berlin, Hamburg, Dusseldorf) are no longer pull factors for candidates. Hence, companies need to target direct competitors within their radius to find talent. Beyond all else, it is vital that companies strive to make themselves more appealing to potential candidates and act as a partner at eye-level during the interview process.