6-Country Study Finds Digital Dominates How Consumers Shop and Pay at Retailers

For many consumers around the globe, 2022 marked a triumphant return to the physical world. After two years of pandemic-influenced restrictions, shoppers are heading back to stores — but at the same time, they are using more digital shopping features than ever.

The “2023 Global Digital Shopping Index,” a PYMNTS and Cybersource collaboration, draws from six census-balanced panels of consumers from across six key countries — Brazil, India, Mexico, the United States, the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates — making for a total of 13,349 consumers. We asked these individuals which digital features they used while shopping for their most recent purchases, how they paid and acquired those orders and how satisfied they were with the merchants’ digital offerings to pinpoint which factors play the most significant role in driving satisfaction.

Key findings from our research include the following:

• Eighty-seven percent of consumers used digital features to shop and pay for their most recent purchases, even if they shopped in-store. The key to a consumer’s heart, and wallet, is realizing that digital is no longer described as just a channel but how consumers engage with the merchants they want to shop at and pay for the products they want to buy.

• Payment choice remains the most important shopping feature for all consumers in all markets, with digital wallets gaining ground. Payment choice ranked first of 34 features in terms of importance in every country for the third year in a row.

• Smartphones, apps and digital features give consumers greater confidence and certainty about their purchases, especially when they shop in a physical store. Our data suggest that the features that offer product certainty and ease of access are highly correlated to reducing friction and improving overall customer satisfaction.

These are just a few findings we uncovered during our extensive research. The “2023 Global Digital Shopping Index” details how merchants across the globe must tailor their digital feature offerings to suit local consumers’ demands and expectations.

To learn which digital features are most important for driving consumer engagement and sales across the globe, download the report.