Dive Brief:

• Only 15% of consumers and marketers surveyed across the U.S., U.K., Germany, France, Austria and Switzerland are happy with their online shopping experiences, according to a report from Contentsquare. 

• Among the top three annoyances that customers cited as driving down their happiness were pop-ups and ads (49%), the site crashing during checkout (48%) or when a discount code fails at checkout (45%). Consumers also were dissatisfied when the website or app went offline (23%) and when they couldn't find their desired items (42%), according to the report.

• The survey also found that 37% of respondents are avoiding brick-and-mortar stores during the holiday season. Less than a third (30%) of respondents said they feel "content" with their digital shopping experience, per the report.

Dive Insight:

The importance of a seamless online shopping experience is only increasing as more consumers move online, and frustration with retailers' websites and apps could create headaches.

Retailers must create positive online experiences to rank well on Google next year, a point mentioned by Jonathan Cherki, CEO at Contentsquare. "The need to build positive experience is ... being accelerated in 2021, with Google launching a new ranking algorithm designed to judge web pages based on user experiences. It will score a webpage on several areas of a site's page, including load time, interactivity, and the stability of content as it loads."

With the pandemic pushing consumers away from physical storefronts, brands must improve relationships with their customers through an online experience that rivals in-store shopping, according to the report.

The COVID-19 pandemic has also shifted holiday sales online. Research from Adobe shows that consumers have spent more during this year's Cyber Monday than last year, and mobile sales comprised 37% of the overall sales that day. 

The pandemic has also brought the headaches of e-commerce to the surface, chiefly the complexity and high costs of shipping goods to consumers. In addition, an influx of online sales will likely bring a wave of returns following the holiday season this year, and retailers are bracing themselves for that.