Ready for the lowdown on some of the most dynamic retail tech businesses in the UK?
For the past few months, we’ve partnered with BusinessCloud – one of the leading publishers in the tech sector – on its RetailTech 50 list. The ranking focuses on the most innovative retail technology creators for 2024.
As part of the partnership, our director of strategy and partnerships, Lucy Moore, joined the judging panel, which was made up of industry experts, to curate the eagerly awaited list. The final rankings were decided, in part, by a public vote too.
Well done to the final 50 companies making the league table, in particular, the top 5:
- ZigZag Global
- Dexory
- Ufurnish.com
- Dropit
- Sparkbox
Published alongside the annual RetailTech 50 ranking is the RetailTech Insights report, which provides more information about the retail technology scene, trends and predictions, as well as opinions of key industry players.
And if a link click is a step too far, don’t worry, our tech lead Lucy has highlighted some of the comments we contributed to the report here:
Are traditional bricks-and-mortar retail brands embracing tech effectively, in your view?
It’s hard to give a definitive answer here because for some of them, yes, but in many cases, no. While a relatively basic technology, I’ve always thought Uniqlo’s self-checkouts powered by radio frequency ID chips are pretty cool. Throw multiple items into the basket and they immediately appear on the self-checkout screen with no need for sorting: magic! They’re so easy to use and require pretty much zero input from the user, reducing waiting times for customers significantly. I read that 70% of Uniqlo’s customers choose to use these devices (up to 90% in some markets), proving their effectiveness. This just goes to show that technology doesn’t need to be complicated to make a real impact.
Describe a particular trend you have noticed in RetailTech during the last 12 months.
Affiliate technology that supports purchases made via influencer pages on social media sites such as Instagram has improved significantly over the past couple of years. In short, affiliate programmes reward influencers with a cut of the sale if something they recommended on social media is bought by a customer via their affiliate link. Not a bad money earner when you consider that 44% of people use Instagram to shop weekly (Instagram Business research, 2021). These programmes used to be pretty clunky but evolution in technology has made them more streamlined in recent years.
Describe a trend you expect to see in the coming 12 months.
I expect to see more interest in and focus on sustainability-led tech. Hopefully, we’ll see retailers leveraging technology to optimise energy consumption, reduce waste, and implement circular economy initiatives. I also believe retail sales made via social commerce and influencer marketing will continue to be popular, with more technologies being created and implemented to make the shopping experience on social media as seamless as possible.
How might accessibility in online retail be improved, in your view?
By considering accessibility from the start rather than it being an afterthought! There are over two million people in the UK living with sight loss (RNIB) and many digital products and services still aren’t accessible to these people. Simple things like adding alt text to images so that people using assistance technologies know what the image is of, adding audio or video options, and prioritising effective colour combinations can go a long way. For those needing to improve the accessibility of their ecommerce site, there’s a great starter for 10 on ecommerce accessibility from Shopify here.
Is there anything you would like to add? You can include anything related to the industry or the ecosystem of wider business support, whether positive or negative.
With so much competition in the RetailTech sector, providers need to work hard to shape their unique value proposition. With more retail competition than ever – compounded by the ease and prominence of selling via social media channels – to stand out, retailers need to carve out a strong brand voice and ensure that is present across the omnichannel experience; not an easy feat when you consider how many channels retailers are now communicating with customers through.
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