A new study by Juniper Research has found that the global spend for conversational commerce over OTT channels, including WhatsApp or WeChat, will rise from $13.3 billion in 2022 to $25.1 billion in 2023. OTT Conversational Commerce

This growth of 89% will be driven by verticals such as retail and eCommerce, which provide increased online presence and product availability as retailers refine their online customer experience.

OTT-based conversational commerce enables users to make purchases or transfer money directly in OTT messaging apps.

eCommerce & Retail to Offer Biggest Opportunities OTT Conversational Commerce

The new research found that eCommerce and retail will account for over 35% of spend via OTT conversational commerce channels in 2023; accounting for $9 billion of spend globally. However, it identified regional fragmentation in the OTT messaging space as a key hurdle to growth. To overcome this, it urges conversational commerce vendors to onboard each messaging app individually, while adhering strictly to the varying financial regulations in each country.

Other issues for conversational commerce vendors include the varying types of payment methods in use across countries. Vendors need to account for these differences and support various digital wallets. This flexibility will enable vendors to offer a complete omnichannel experience by providing payments across OTT apps, chatbots, voicebots and RCS business messaging.

Omnichannel Plus!

To increase market share, conversational commerce platforms must also invest in value-added services to provide differentiation from existing conversational services. For example, digital loyalty programmes can be used to provide personalised and incentivised messages to achieve increases in digital engagement. In addition, vendors must facilitate features such as link tracking and call-to-action support to monitor engagement.

Research author Elisha Sudlow-Poole commented: “Supporting a sufficient number of communication channels is no longer enough to ensure the success of omnichannel experiences. Vendors must look to include additional value-added services into their business model to create depth within existing communication channels.”

BNPL

Digital BNPL fulfils the same objective as its offline predecessor; greater transparency and flexibility in payments for customers without the financial restrictions imposed by credit cards or personal loans. BNPL results in merchants being far more active in the BPNL ecosystem solutions.
This is thanks to digital BNPL’s unique value proposition; potentially yielding greater benefits for both customers and merchants. It represents a shift away from the credit card model of consumer financing and offers greater flexibility to consumers, including those who do not own a credit card.
The BNPL model within eCommerce removes the necessity for credit approval (other than the ‘soft’ credit checks generally undertaken by companies offering this payment model), it is free from high interest rates, complicated terms and conditions and the relatively short interest-free period attached to paying by credit card.
This may seem like a key differentiation point over other payment mechanisms. However, we expect that payment vendors’ reluctance to relinquish control of the checkout processes will hinder its implementation over channels such as RCS conversational commerce, especially so when the nascent nature of the technology as a commerce channel is considered. OTT Conversational Commerce