It is not the end of window shopping and lines to the fitting room yet, but we are well on the way towards it. In 2018, fashion ecommerce accounted for roughly\u00a020.4%\u00a0<\/a>of the total fashion retail sales in the United States. Every year, the category grows\u00a0by 14.2%<\/a>\u00a0and is forecast to generate\u00a0$112.6B<\/a>\u00a0of revenue in the US\u00a0in 2019. At this rate, apparel, footwear, and accessories online stores seem to have no margin for error in their marketing strategies.<\/p>\n To help marketers and business owners save time on research activities\u00a0and concentrate on their strategic goals, we have collected a lot of critical data that can assist them\u00a0with future marketing decisions. Our high-level research of the current digital landscape and traffic dynamics of the fashion ecommerce industry includes digital marketing trends, consumer behavior, and patterns in the use of technologies. All statistics were analyzed to provide you not just with raw data but interpreted insights.<\/p>\n In our\u00a0recently published ebook<\/a>, we studied fashion ecommerce websites both worldwide and specifically in the US. In this article, we will focus exclusively on the US\u00a0market, providing you with the latest stats and more detailed analysis of what is happening to online fashion retailers countrywide. If you choose to use our findings in your work or quote some of the statistics for the US, please refer to the current article as it has the updated figures.<\/p>\n The Semrush Data Science team developed its own website categorization service, which allowed\u00a0the analysis of any domain on the Internet. With this website categorization, we made a list of websites that fall into the category of fashion ecommerce, including both fashion aggregators (those that accumulate offers of various retailers, for example, asos.com) and brand websites (those that sell their own particular brand of clothes, for instance, hm.com).<\/p>\n We did not make any distinction between sportswear and formal dresses online stores; we were neither interested in classifying ecommerces\u00a0by their price range. We\u00a0limited our list to the US as the set location and filtered out the top\u00a0130 fashion ecommerce websites that were most successful in generating traffic<\/strong>. All of the trends and specific rankings were put together from these 130 sites.<\/p>\n We researched these websites with the use of\u00a0Semrush Traffic Analytics<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 a tool specially made for analyzing any company\u2019s traffic individually and\u00a0comparing\u00a0it with competitors\u2019 traffic. Its\u00a0features<\/a>\u00a0revealed the following:<\/p>\n We also referred to\u00a0Semrush Organic Research<\/a>\u00a0to add the share of branded and non-branded traffic to our dataset to provide you with more profound insight.<\/p>\n Except for the website owner, no one has access to the domain\u2019s internal stats. Therefore, all of the metrics in the research were estimated with the Semrush algorithms. All of the figures presented in infographics are rounded.<\/p>\n Reveal any company’s website traffic<\/p>\n with Semrush Traffic Analytics<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n The reason may sound obvious \u2014 in an online-based business, any conversion starts with a visit to the website. There are, however, some aspects of a domain\u2019s online performance which are often overlooked.<\/p>\n Provided you don\u2019t rely solely on the number of visits, traffic-related metrics help you reveal a company\u2019s position in the market, their marketing strategy, and their possible partnerships. Armed with this information, you can then make conclusions on what direction to choose for your campaign.<\/p>\n With access to overall\u00a0Traffic Volume<\/a>, as well as the percentage of visits to the payment service as a\u00a0Destination Site<\/a>\u00a0from the researched webpage or to the same-purpose\u00a0Subdomains<\/a>, you can get a rough idea of an ecommerce\u2019s conversion.<\/p>\n Therefore, if you aim to get insights from competitive intelligence and to optimize\u00a0your marketing strategy, traffic analysis is essential.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n We first derived the average amount of traffic generated by 130 US fashion ecommerce websites monthly in June 2018\u2013May 2019 to see the seasonal peaks typical for the whole industry in the region. The most visible increase of traffic was in\u00a0November<\/strong>\u00a0and is also the most evident one \u2014 Black Friday did its job for fashion e-tailers, as well as some early Christmas shopping. The change of seasons helped online stores\u00a0in September, as well as drew some extra visitors in March.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Branded vs. Non-Branded<\/strong><\/p>\n Apart from the overall Traffic Volume of the researched websites, we also studied their branded\/non-branded traffic breakdown, shares of Traffic Sources, and key user engagement metrics.<\/p>\n Our research revealed that users are not focused on specific\u00a0brands in\u00a0June<\/strong>\u00a0\u2014 whether it is because of the starting summer sales or the urgency to find something to pack for vacation, non-branded queries prevail in the organic search.\u00a0April<\/strong>\u00a0appears to be the high season for the most determined customers looking for specific brands online. In general, however, April is not the most \u201csearched\u201d month, as this share of traffic source indicates.<\/p>\n Traffic Sources<\/strong><\/p>\n The share of a particular traffic source in a specified period of time can reveal\u00a0fashion e-digital marketing strategies.\u00a0May<\/strong>\u00a0happened to be the month when advertisers either invested the biggest sums in paid media and subsequently received the highest level of reach or optimized their campaigns in a way that resulted in the highest CTR.<\/p>\n At first glance, you won\u2019t be able to tell what caused the rise or decline in the level of traffic.\u00a0In a case like this, we would advise you to continue competitor analysis with\u00a0Advertising Research<\/a>. If you need to learn which social media and referring websites drove the majority of traffic to your competitors\u2019 domains, refer to the corresponding tabs in the\u00a0Traffic Sources<\/a>\u00a0report.<\/p>\n User engagement metrics (bounce rate, number of pages per visit, and average time on site) reveal the quality of the attracted traffic. In\u00a0November,<\/strong>\u00a0customers spent a record of 10 minutes and 12 seconds on each site, visiting on average more than 7 pages per session. Furthermore, the bounce rate did not exceed the average.<\/p>\n February<\/strong>\u00a0may look off-season by the amount of traffic, but its quality is extremely high with the lowest bounce rate and the largest number of pages per visit in the analyzed period.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n As we mentioned above, these are fashion ecommerce websites that received the largest amount of traffic in the US. The figures presented in the infographics are rounded and are sums of estimated monthly traffic received by each domain from June 2018\u2013May 2019.<\/p>\n Continue reading to learn\u00a0if being mobile-friendly is still crucial<\/a>,\u00a0what traffic sources<\/a>\u00a0fashion ecommerce websites relied on and\u00a0how they handled user engagement<\/a>\u00a0on their pages \u2014 or go straight to the\u00a0Macy’s and Victoria\u2019s Secret\u2019s marketing strategies<\/a>\u00a0review.<\/p>\n Fashion ecommerce websites are no exception to Google\u2019s \u201cMobile First\u201d principle. On average, 68.54% of the analyzed websites\u2019 yearly traffic came from mobile devices. The figure goes up to 93% for companies like Rainbow Shops whose apparel is targeted at teens and a young women\u2019s audience.<\/p>\n US fashion e-tailers should not consider mobile as secondary in their marketing strategies. However, ignoring desktop users means cutting off a vast audience whose customer journey may be much longer than a one-click purchase at the very first website visit from a stationary device.<\/p>\n In certain cases, where we observed desktop preference over mobile (i.e., look at the volume of desktop traffic that grailed.com received) the reason may lie in a brand\u2019s positioning and targeting to a particular audience. Instances like this should also be a clear sign for you as a marketer to dig deeper into the company\u2019s online strategy \u2014 it must have been the choice of media platforms that led to such an atypical breakdown.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Roughly speaking, shoppers account for 57% of traffic generated by fashion retailers in the US. The individual share of any other country\u2019s is relatively small compared to that and yet it can\u2019t be ignored. For marketing teams, it means adapting their websites and optimizing strategies to feed the needs of their biggest markets outside of the US. Or, if their customers mainly base within the country, it means directing the localization budget to more urgent costs.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n In a competitive environment, as the one fashion ecommerce websites deal with, knowledge of traffic sources is critical\u00a0to optimizing ones marketing efforts. Below you will see interpreted data on each marketing channel. If you are curious about how leaders in each traffic source made a breakthrough,\u00a0continue your research<\/a>\u00a0with the Semrush Traffic Analytics tool. Hacking their marketing tactics\u00a0will provide you with some optimization\u00a0ideas\u00a0for your campaigns.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n In the US, online fashion stores generated almost a half (48.45%) of their traffic with\u00a0direct<\/strong>\u00a0visits, meaning that users knew precisely what domain to type in the search bar. If\u00a0you would like to know if\u00a0these were first-time or returning visitors, compare the\u00a0numbers of\u00a0Visits\u00a0and\u00a0Unique\u00a0Visits<\/a>\u00a0for\u00a0a particular website. You will obtain actual information for each\u00a0specific case. In general, a high level of unique direct traffic can stand for strong brand awareness, while recurring direct visits speaks to either customer loyalty or the\u00a0length of the customer journey.<\/p>\n Rechercher<\/strong>\u00a0traffic ranks second in the list of traffic sources; this metric includes branded and non-branded queries. The predominance of branded organic traffic is another indicator of brand awareness, while success with non-branded visits can be read as a sign of a competent SEO strategy. Given the current digital landscape in the US, fashion brands and aggregators count on maximum search results with a blend of branded tactics \u2014 referring to the company\u2019s essential items as well as non-branded options.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Referral<\/strong>\u00a0traffic analysis reveals which external websites (referring domains) provide backlinks to the studied domains. We went further in our research to provide you with comprehensible categories of sites that drove the biggest amount of traffic to fashion e-tailers.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n These stats give you a clear idea of what insights you can discover with the knowledge of referring sites. Typically, backlinks are a sign of some\u00a0sort of co-marketing or business connection between domains. In the above list, 9.8%\u00a0of referral traffic must have come specifically from affiliate programs.<\/p>\n Another important point we want to mention, it is not only directly related publications that create a quality backlink profile. For fashion ecommerce, television shows and programs turned out to be a resourceful category. The reasons could lie in collaborations between fashion brands and television franchises, the relation of both to the sphere of leisure, or ongoing and still growing interest for a\u00a0television series. Referring sites give you a hint of where to search for more details \u2014 further action and interpretation are your analysts\u2019 business.<\/p>\n Paid<\/strong>\u00a0sources create hardly 5% of the overall traffic; this means two things for you as an aspiring fashion ecommerce owner or marketer. First,\u00a0you should not rely solely on advertising and expect it to solve all of your problems with a thousand clicks. Second,\u00a0it can be the case that lack of paid traffic to your competitors\u2019 is a gap that you could cover. Research the issue more thoroughly, test advertising placements for a short period of time, and decide if they work for you.<\/p>\n As for the\u00a0social<\/strong>\u00a0traffic, it takes the smallest share of overall volume if we speak in absolute numbers. However, social networks serve a different purpose \u2014\u00a0attracting not just high-volume but high-quality traffic. The functionality of platforms like Facebook, Reddit, and YouTube allows marketers to target individuals based on demographics, likes, and interests, which allows marketers to reach the audiences that are most likely to engage with and buy\u00a0their items. A\u00a0solid social media presence is a must for a business that aims at optimizing their costs. Focus on a few social networks with the highest potential to generate traffic.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n As data indicates,\u00a0Facebook is the most popular social platform in the US<\/strong>\u00a0with the vast majority of traffic to fashion ecommerce websites coming from its domain, both from desktop and mobile devices. Reddit, YouTube, and Pinterest follow with popularity shares ranging from 9% to 19%. With these stats, we can say that deploying your social media marketing strategy on these few platforms could result in increased traffic and improved brand awareness.<\/p>\n Large Traffic Volume means nothing if it results in a high Bounce Rate. To adjust your marketing strategy the smart way, pay attention to user engagement metrics. For fashion ecommerce, the average time on site and number of pages per visit show the relevance of attracted traffic and the audience\u2019s interest in presented items.<\/p>\n There will be seasons and individual\u00a0campaigns\u00a0where\u00a0a businesses\u2019 top priority will be the amount of traffic \u2014 for example, when they are building brand awareness. Other times, user engagement metrics\u00a0\u2014<\/i>\u00a0meaning the relevance of received traffic\u00a0\u2014<\/i>\u00a0should be among the first\u00a0that you check.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Traffic is definitely not everything you need. If we base the ranking on ecommerce net sales, it will look different: Macy\u2019s will stay the leader (with almost 3.6 million dollars in 2018<\/a>), but Victoria\u2019s Secret will only be the 8th in the list (with about 1.2 million dollars in 2018<\/a>). Nevertheless, if the aim of our research is discovering competitors\u2019 digital marketing strategies, it is traffic that tells us the most.<\/p>\n If you work in the sphere of ecommerce in general, and online fashion retail specifically, these\u00a0benchmarks of key industry players<\/strong>\u00a0can form the basis of your company\u2019s analytics and make ground for prompt decisions. If you are thinking of\u00a0expanding to the US market<\/strong>, these findings will be your guide to action when forming a marketing strategy there.<\/p>\n If you observe this data from a higher level, you may want to\u00a0consider the main trends:<\/strong><\/p>\n Finally,\u00a0use the template below<\/strong>\u00a0to carry out your own research and reveal intriguing insights about your competitors as we did.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" State of Fashion It is not the end of window shopping and lines to the fitting room yet, but we are well on the way towards it. In 2018, fashion ecommerce accounted for roughly\u00a020.4%\u00a0of the total fashion retail sales in\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[112],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14350\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alienroad.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}What We Have Done<\/h2>\n
\n
Who We Researched<\/h2>\n
The Tools We Used<\/h2>\n
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Why Website Traffic Matters for Ecommerce<\/h2>\n
Fashion Ecommerce in the US: First Glance<\/h2>\n
That Is What You Are Here For: Top 10 Fashion E-Tailers in the US<\/h2>\n
Mobile First, Desktop Second<\/h2>\n
Geographical Markets: It Is Not All About the US<\/h2>\n
Sources of Traffic<\/h2>\n
User Engagement Speaks Volumes<\/h2>\n
Macy\u2019s: Top Multibrand Fashion Ecommerce in the US<\/h2>\n
Victoria\u2019s Secret: Top Monobrand Fashion Ecommerce in the US<\/h2>\n
How to Use These Findings<\/h2>\n
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Competitor Analysis Template<\/h2>\n