LinkedIn Report: eCommerce Stats from Q4 2021

The results are in, and we’re counting down the top eCommerce and shipping stats from polling our audience of eCommerce pros.

Here’s the results...

Big & bulky shipping

62% of shippers report that the most challenging part about shipping large items is the cost of shipping. 15% reported packaging large products as the biggest challenge, and 15% reported additional handling fees.

Holiday shipping

46% of people are doing 75%-100% holiday shopping online this year.

Prior to the holidays, 69% of users anticipated that the biggest challenge they would face would be having enough inventory, followed by 31% of users predicting slow delivery times.

Inventory proved to prevail as a top challenge during Cyber Monday/Black Friday with 54% of users reporting that Product Stock was their biggest challenge during that weekend, followed by Fierce Online Competition, which was reported by 31% of users.

Percentage of holiday shopping LinkedIn users report doing online

Product and shipping pricing

78% of users agree that “Free Shipping” is Very Important to their purchase decision whereas only 6% of users report that it has no effect on their decision to purchase.

68% of audience members polled believe that shipping should make up less than 15% of total eCommerce product cost. Note: the average percentage of product cost shipping makes up is 18-30%!

70% of users believe that online sellers should include shipping costs directly into the product price.

How important "free shipping" is to online shoppers when deciding to make a purchase

Sustainable eCommerce

The most commonly reported method of corporate sustainability preferred by consumers is Sustainable Products/Technology.

65% of people report that sustainability is Very Important when deciding to make a purchase, whereas only 10% say it has no effect on their purchasing choices.

What method of corporate sustainability do you prefer to see from brands?

Areas of profit loss

Data from our audience of eCommerce and logistics pros shows that shippers are fairly split in terms of their biggest areas of loss. Damages (36%), not getting good shipping rates (27%), and shipping fees (27%) all are reported to be equally large concerns. Cost of product packaging is reported to be the least problematic area of loss at only 9% of shippers reporting it as their largest loss area.