Will a new market actually buy what you sell, or are you about to spend a year and a sizable budget finding out the expensive way? That is the question eCommerce market research answers before you commit a cent to inventory, localization, or paid acquisition in a country you do not yet understand.
The stakes are higher than they used to be. Worldwide eCommerce revenue is projected to reach about $3.88 trillion in 2026 (Statista), and online sales are forecast to grow from 19.4% of global retail in 2023 to 22.6% by 2027 (Statista). More markets are worth entering than ever, which also means more ways to misread one and pour budget into the wrong assumptions.
When a European sporting goods retailer asked us to help them enter a new market in their region, we ran the research that answers that question before the commitment is made. This guide walks through exactly what we asked, why each question mattered, where we found the answers, and what went into the final report, so you can run the same process for your own expansion.
Overview
- eCommerce market research answers one decision: is this market worth entering, and on what terms. It covers demand, market size, buying power, competition, and how people actually shop there.
- A complete study has five areas: country overview, eCommerce trends, competitor analysis, social media analysis, and a consumer survey, validated against real users.
- Size the opportunity before the detail. A quick TAM, SAM, SOM estimate tells you whether the market is big enough to justify the work that follows.
π Quick takeaway
Market research is not a report you commission to feel prepared. It is the cheapest way to kill a bad market-entry idea before it costs you a year, and to enter a good one with the competitors’ playbook already in hand.
What is eCommerce market research?
eCommerce market research is the process of gathering information about a target market, its demand, size, buying power, competition, and shopping behavior, to decide whether and how to sell there. It tells a company whether a product or service is viable in a new market, and it keeps what you sell relevant and competitively priced once you launch.
What does market research tell you?
A solid study answers the questions that decide an expansion:
- Demand: Is there real desire for your product or service here?
- Market size: How many people would realistically buy?
- Economic indicators: What is the income range and employment rate of your prospective customers?
- Location: Where do your target customers live, and can you reach and deliver to them?
- Market saturation: How many similar options do consumers already have?
- Pricing: What do people currently pay for the alternatives?
How to size the market first: TAM, SAM, SOM
Before the detailed research, put a rough number on the opportunity. Three figures do it, and you can estimate them in an afternoon from public data:
- TAM (Total Addressable Market): everyone who could buy your category in the country. Start from population and category spend per capita (Statista, the national statistics office, eMarketer).
- SAM (Serviceable Addressable Market): the slice you can actually serve, given language, shipping, payment methods, and regulation.
- SOM (Serviceable Obtainable Market): the share you can realistically win in the first few years, given the competition you map below.
If the SOM is too small to cover the cost of entry, you have your answer before the deep research starts. If it clears the bar, the five areas below tell you how to win it.
A rough worked example. Say you sell premium running shoes and the target country has 10 million adults, of whom perhaps 3 million are active runners who buy online: that is your TAM by headcount. If a third of them are reachable given your language, shipping, and price point, you have a SAM of roughly 1 million. Win 2% of that over three years against the competitors you map below, and your SOM is around 20,000 customers. Multiply by a realistic average order value and repeat-purchase rate, and you have a revenue ceiling to weigh against the cost of entry, all before you spend a month on the detailed study. The numbers are estimates, but they are the difference between a decision and a hunch.
This split between secondary research (existing data: Statista, government statistics, competitor sites) and primary research (data you gather yourself: surveys, five-second tests, interviews) runs through the whole study. Secondary research is faster and cheaper and tells you the shape of the market. Primary research is slower but tells you whether the shape is right for your specific product. The five areas below use both.
π Quick takeaway
Do the sizing math before the detailed study, not after. A market that cannot return the cost of entry is not worth a four-week research project, and a fast TAM, SAM, SOM tells you that in an afternoon.
The five areas of eCommerce market research
Our research for the sporting goods retailer focused on five areas: country overview, eCommerce trends, competitor analysis, social media analysis, and a consumer survey.
Country overview
This area gives a high-level read on the target market. We gather:
- GDP per capita and inflation rate
- Average monthly income
- Population size and demographics
- Main populated regions
Buying power is the point here. GDP per capita and income level show how much consumers can spend, which sets the ceiling on pricing and positioning. Demographic data shows who the client is actually reaching, so they can build offers and messaging that fit the people in the market rather than the people back home.
eCommerce trends
This is where we look at the factors that matter specifically to an online business:
- Market size: growth rate versus prior periods, and predicted growth
- Online consumer insights: drivers and barriers to shopping online, shopping frequency, average order value, mobile commerce use and growth, local online shopping events, delivery preferences, and popular payment methods
- Digital consumption: online penetration, social media use, popular browsers and devices
- Popular sports in the market (our client sells sporting goods)
- Most trusted brands in the category
What you learn here decides where you position the brand on entry and which strengths to lead with in the marketing strategy. One detail worth flagging early: payment is rarely universal. The methods that convert in one country (an invoice-after-delivery option, a local wallet, bank transfer) can be the ones your checkout does not even offer yet.
scandiweb’s Head of Growth, Reinis Groskops, covers which parts of the customer experience need localizing when you expand to a new market in the talk above, from the Meet Magento Baltics conference.
Competitor analysis
Competitor analysis is about knowing the field well enough to do better than the companies already in it. We benchmark competitors on:
- Product categories (for our client, apparel and equipment by sport, compared as separate groups)
- Price differences
- Shipping terms and costs, especially whether free shipping is offered
- Return policy
- Payment methods
- Online vs offline presence (online-only or with brick-and-mortar, which often explains delivery costs)
- Unique selling proposition on the website
- Promotions currently running
- Loyalty program
- Desktop vs mobile experience
- Regional differences across a competitor’s international stores (country-specific layouts, offers, or ranges)
The output is a clear picture of the table stakes (what every serious competitor offers, so you cannot launch without it) and the gaps (what nobody does well, which is where you win).
π Quick takeaway
Competitor analysis is not a feature checklist for its own sake. Split what you find into table stakes you must match to be credible, and gaps you can own. The gaps are the entry strategy.
Social media analysis
Social channels show what content and campaigns people in the market actually respond to. We start with a general read on social media use in the territory, then study each competitor on:
- Channels: follower counts, engagement rate, posting frequency, average likes and comments per post
- Content strategy per channel: post types, style variations, content formats
- Added functionality: shoppable posts and stories, a Facebook store, and similar
- Marketing activity: use of micro-influencers, macro-influencers, local celebrities or brand ambassadors, user-generated content, and contests
Reading competitors’ social presence surfaces the tactics worth borrowing on entry, micro-influencers, user-generated content with branded hashtags, and contests among them, weighted by which competitors are local players with physical stores versus online-only brands.
Consumer survey
The first four areas tell you what the data says. A consumer survey tells you whether real people in the market agree. We survey potential customers to compare our findings against actual behavior: spending habits, shopping frequency, online preferences, delivery concerns, and what tips a buying decision one way or the other.
For this client, the survey showed that a wide product assortment and better prices mattered most when choosing where to shop. After that came delivery: free delivery, fast delivery, and a generous return policy. That tracks with wider data, 65% of respondents to a 2020 International Post Corporation survey named “free delivery” as the single most important factor in their decision to buy online.
π Quick takeaway
Desk research tells you what the market looks like. A survey tells you whether you read it right. Skipping it means betting your entry budget on assumptions you never checked against a real customer.
Five-second testing
A five-second test captures a potential customer’s first impression of a site, the read you get before anyone reasons about it. It points to the UI and design changes that make a storefront more appealing on entry. We ask:
- What do you think this website sells?
- What do you remember from it?
- What is your first impression?
- How would you describe the design?
- Where would you go next?
The final report
To recap, we ran this research for a European sporting goods company and handed them everything they needed to decide how to approach the new market and which strategies to use. The final report pulled the five areas into the factors that actually move buying decisions in that market, and the strategies competitors had already proven.
Some of the conclusions and recommendations we delivered:
- The target country is an attractive entry market, one of the larger eCommerce markets in its region, with online sales taking a rising share of retail year over year.
- Carrying over the same free-delivery offer and parcel price the client already runs in existing markets would give them an edge on entry.
- The client’s prices could sit at least 7% above competitors’, so pricing needed a review to stay competitive.
- Competitors offered up to 365 days for returns against the client’s 14-day window, and return difficulty is a top reason shoppers abandon orders. A clear area to fix before launch.
- Preferred online payment methods in the market were online banking, card, and invoice.
- Every trusted sports brand in the market ran a membership program, so a loyalty program deserved serious consideration.
- Sustainability was a prominent message on the international brands’ sites, worth matching.
- Every competing brand used user-generated content with branded hashtags, plus frequent creative posting, contests, and collaborations with local fitness influencers and athletes. A similar program would fit the client.
That is how we run eCommerce market research at scandiweb, and how we help businesses build a strategy specific to the market they are entering. The same approach underpins our growth marketing work and the eCommerce uplift tactics we apply once a store is live, and it feeds straight into the conversion rate optimization work that turns new-market traffic into orders.
π Quick takeaway
The report is only useful if it ends in decisions: a pricing position, a delivery and returns offer, the payment methods to add, and a social playbook. If your research does not change what you are about to do, you researched the wrong things.
The tools we use for eCommerce market research
You do not need a large research budget to start. A capable study can be built from these:
- Market sizing and trends: Statista, eMarketer, the national statistics office, the U.S. International Trade Administration country guides.
- Demand and search: Google Trends, Google Keyword Planner, and keyword tools (Ahrefs, Semrush) to read what the market actually searches for.
- Competitor and traffic intelligence: Similarweb for traffic and channel mix, BuiltWith for the platforms and payment tech competitors run.
- Social listening: the native analytics in each platform, plus a social listening tool for share of voice.
- Primary research: a survey tool (Typeform, SurveyMonkey, Pollfish for panel reach) and a quick five-second test platform for first-impression data.
π Quick takeaway
Pair public data with primary research. Statista and Similarweb tell you the shape of the market, and a survey plus a five-second test tell you how its customers actually behave. The combination is what separates a real study from a slide deck of guesses.
Frequently asked questions
What is eCommerce market research?
eCommerce market research is the process of gathering information about a target market, its demand, size, buying power, competition, and how people shop online, to decide whether and how to sell there. It reduces the risk of entering a market that will not return the cost of entry.
How do you do market research for an eCommerce business?
Work through five areas: a country overview (economy, demographics), eCommerce trends (market size, online behavior, payments), competitor analysis, social media analysis, and a consumer survey to validate the findings against real buyers. Size the market with TAM, SAM, SOM first to confirm it is worth the deeper work.
What tools are used for eCommerce market research?
Common tools include Statista and eMarketer for market size, Google Trends and keyword tools for demand, Similarweb and BuiltWith for competitor intelligence, native social analytics for engagement, and a survey or five-second-test platform for primary research.
How long does eCommerce market research take?
A focused study on a single market typically takes three to five weeks: roughly a week of desk research per area, run partly in parallel, plus time to field a consumer survey and write the final report. A quick TAM, SAM, SOM sizing can be done in a day to decide whether to commit to the full study.
What is the difference between market research and competitor analysis?
Competitor analysis is one part of market research. Market research covers the whole market, demand, size, buying power, and customer behavior, while competitor analysis focuses specifically on what rival companies sell, charge, and do to win customers.
Why is market research important before entering a new market?
Because the methods that work in your home market often do not transfer. Payment preferences, delivery expectations, return windows, and trusted brands differ by country. Research surfaces those differences before you commit budget, so you enter with the right pricing, logistics, and marketing rather than discovering them through lost sales.
If you want the most complete picture of a market you are about to enter, our Growth Team runs this research end to end, from sizing to the final report. Talk to our growth team and tell us which market you are eyeing.
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