Was Q3 really that disappointing for the largest online marketplaces?

Speaking of brick-and-mortar retail, insiders say Amazon is planning a new coup in its stores with the sale of prescription drugs. According to surveys, however, the e-commerce giant will have a hard time competing with its offline rivals in Germany during the upcoming Holiday season. The British, on the other hand, plan to move some of their Christmas shopping completely online this year.

Updates: Amazon & Online Marketplaces

Amazon grows 15% in Q3 2021

Amazon has released its most recent quarterly results. Despite all current challenges in e-commerce, the company continues to grow consistently: revenues grew by 15% in Q3 2021 compared to the already exceptionally strong quarterly results last year, reaching a total of $110.8 billion. Advertising revenue was also 49% higher than in Q3 2020. However, analysts had expected more overall revenue growth, which is why Amazon’s stock price fell after the results were announced. Remazing Managing Director, Hannes Detjen, shares his personal assessment of the numbers in his comment below.

Will Amazon soon sell prescription drugs offline?

According to rumors, Amazon plans to soon sell prescription drugs and lottery tickets in its cashierless “Amazon Go” stores in the US. The idea is to lure more customers to its brick-and-mortar stores. However, as an extension of Amazon Pharmacy, there are a number of legal requirements for drug sales in particular, and compliance with these requirements makes the project more complex.

Allegro to build Eastern European marketplace

Poland’s leading e-commerce platform Allegro wants to take over its Czech competitor Mall Group for $1 billion. The move is intended to grow the company more internationally, while competition from Amazon is increasing in its home market. Allegro is planning to develop Mall Group, which operates in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia and Slovakia, into a marketplace. It also aims to leverage the group’s local expertise, e.g. in logistics.

Ebay itroduces sponsored advertising

We recently reported that many US retailers are copying Amazon’s search advertising – now online marketplace Ebay is also testing “advanced ads”. The ads can only be used by current sellers with a service status of “above average” or a top rating. With this ads option, Ebay promises its customers the access to the top position of the search results. With regard to the billing, users can set a daily budget, from which the ads are then paid for via CPC.

Other quarterly results: Ebay and Etsy

Ebay’s Q3 2021 revenue rose 11% year-over-year (YOY) to $2.5 billion despite resurgent competition from offline retailers. The online marketplace presumably benefited from the growing trend toward second-hand goods. DIY marketplace Etsy is also increasingly competing with Ebay and increased its sales by 18% YOY in Q3, with the strongest growth in the home & living and jewelry categories.

Walmart uses driverless delivery trucks

Autonomous driving gets increasingly tested: On Monday, Walmart announced that it is using driverless trucks to deliver packages in its home state of Arkansas. The retailer has been working on the program since late 2020 and hopes the use of driverless trucks will help solve supply chain issues caused by labor shortages. Amazon is also currently working on a driverless package delivery solution.

Updates: E-Commerce

Maersk takes on Amazon FBA

Danish shipping giant Maersk recently purchased logistics company Visible, which operates nine e-commerce fulfillment centers in the United States. With the purchase, Maersk aims to build a supply chain that combines its own fleet of container ships with the U.S. company’s warehousing expertise to provide a port-to-door service. This setup is expected to enable the delivery of goods to 95% of U.S. households within two days. With this offering, Maersk is competing with Amazon’s FBA program.

Christmas shopping tends to be online in the UK, but offline in Germany this year

31% of all Britains plan to do their 2021 Christmas shopping exclusively online, according to a survey by Yodel. It’s a different story in Germany though: 78% of Germans plan to buy gifts in-store, according to a consumer study by Yahoo and YouGov. After a year and a half of the still ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, 35% of respondents yearn for a physical shopping experience.

What caught our attention

In Amazon’s Advertising Console, there is a “Diagnostic Hub” for troubleshooting. Users can find recommendations for optimizations that are given at campaign level. However, according to initial tests by us, the hub is only of limited use to Amazon experts. Presumably, it is more aimed at advertising beginners with its suggested solutions.

Comment: Amazon’s Q3 2021 results

Amazon released its latest quarterly numbers just about two weeks ago: Q3 revenue reached a total of $110.8 billion, up 15% YOY. Analysts had expected revenue growth of 16% YOY, aiming to reach a total of $111.8 billion. Because of this, Amazon’s stock price initially dropped 4% after the announcement of the figures.

Amazon’s Q3 advertising revenue totaled $8.1 billion. The growth rate has slowed down a bit, but it’s still an impressive 49% YOY increase.

Despite seeing a slightly slower growth overall, it is still quite impressive that Amazon continues to grow at this rate at all. This is especially the case when considering factors like the pandemic-related, extremely strong 2020 results and the current global supply chain issues.

In addition, Amazon Services sales surpassed retail sales for the first time: Net product sales were $54.9 billion, and Amazon Services revenue (e.g., Advertising, Amazon Web Services, 3P Services and Prime) totaled $55.9 billion.

Remdash: Suppressed ASINs

With our own Amazon tool Remdash you can identify what we call „Suppressed ASINs“, which is basically your products that match the following criteria:

• you still have stock available for a product showing in Brand Analytics
• in the Buybox, it shows the product as „Temporarily out of stock“ or „Currently unavailable“

Interested in Remdash?
Schedule your personal product demo here!

Top 5 Amazon Keywords

On all Amazon marketplaces we analyzed, customers are already busy preparing for Christmas: Advent calendars and Christmas decorations are high in search queries. Moreover, Italian Amazon users are already looking for Black Friday deals. In Spain, on the other hand, many residents are afraid of rumored power outages.