Gen Z shoppers embrace Temu, Shein, and TikTok Shop: 1 in 4 makes a purchase at a Chinese online marketplace at least once a week, as their array of cheap, trendy goods proves impossible for the price-sensitive cohort to resist.

This is the first installment of our quarterly “Ad Spending Benchmarks” series, which helps ad buyers and sellers calibrate their spending and revenue mix against the market.

Retail sales via online marketplaces are growing faster than overall ecommerce. As competition in the sector rises, brands and retailers must navigate the challenges of an increasingly complex landscape.

Etsy fights against Amazonification with new seller policies: The marketplace is overhauling its product designations to ensure all items have a human touch.

Marketplaces will continue to expand their share of US retail ecommerce as new players with roots in China vie for prominence.

As the share of US ecommerce sales on marketplaces continues to expand, our latest survey examines consumer buying habits and expectations across leading platforms.

US consumers shop frequently with Temu and Shein, despite trust issues: Both Chinese retailers are winning more repeat customers than established players like eBay and Etsy.

Consumer spending rose in the first four months of 2024: Shoppers are becoming more deal-conscious as cost-of-living pressures weigh heavily.

The ecommerce search experience is ripe for reinvention: Pinterest, Walmart, Etsy, and others are relying on AI to deliver more relevant results and drive sales.

Here are some insights to maximize success on the platform, including how Amazon supports brand and performance goals, how sellers are leveraging AI, and the sweet spot for product volume and price.

Retail media will make huge gains this year in Canada. Our first-ever forecast for retail media ad spending in Canada and our joint survey of ad buyers (conducted with IAB Canada) highlight the latest developments.

Etsy’s sales have remained “essentially flat” for two years: The niche online marketplace’s inability to broaden its reach led it to lay off about 225 employees.

’Tis the season for a deluge of holiday ads, as everyone tries to score a piece of the $1.317 trillion holiday sales pie (per our June 2023 forecast). To break through the noise, brands need to zero in on what resonates with consumers—and maybe even have a little fun.

As brands seek to diversify the number of places they sell their goods, retailers should consider building out a marketplace model that can help brands reach more customers while also cutting down on retailer costs and creating new revenue streams. You don’t need to be Amazon to launch a third-party marketplace—Macy’s, Michaels, and H&M have all gotten marketplaces off the ground in the last year or so.

The initial wave of excitement over generative AI is fading, leaving many retailers asking, “Now what?” Some might want to look toward Shopify, which is incorporating generative AI capabilities across its platform to help sellers build and scale their businesses more quickly. Or maybe take a cue from eBay, which is using the tech to make more accurate and helpful product recommendations. Meanwhile, Etsy is working to democratize access to machine learning models to help speed up deployment across its organization.

Amazon sits at the top of US ecommerce, accounting for 37.6% of sales this year, according to our forecast. In addition to generating billions of dollars in sales, Amazon’s ecommerce business propels its other ventures, including retail media and B2B ecommerce. By harnessing the power of generative AI, Amazon could leave its retail competition even further in the dust, and possibly catch up to the Google and Meta duopoly.

The pandemic ecommerce boom that drove online sales is over. But marketplaces will continue to expand their share of US retail ecommerce, contributing almost 40% of the $588 billion in US online sales growth that we forecast over the next five years.

Amazon and big-box stores are likely to win from Bed Bath & Beyond’s collapse, while fast-fashion retailers could score displaced David’s Bridal customers. But keep a lookout for underdogs like Etsy, which may bring in shoppers looking for personalized party supplies in Party City’s absence.

Healthy growth will obscure the upheaval that retail media’s evolution is causing. Retailers racing to think more like publishers—and brands trying to rethink the value of retail media—are feeling some strain.

Smaller retailers are gaining share and reshaping the ecommerce landscape, but will they be able compete with giants like Amazon?