One Country, Two Markets
It’s relatively hard a merchant operating in Belgium to conquer the hearts of all its inhabitants, as the country is deeply divided into two parts: Dutch-speaking Flanders and French-speaking Wallonia.
The need to tailor offerings according to local laws, culture, and in two languages (French and Dutch), combined with a small population, make Belgium a somewhat more difficult market for those entering the EU for the first time. Additional resources and careful planning are required to make a foray into Belgium a succesful one.
Major Shopping Categories
The key category is fashion with the majority of growth through to 2020 expected here. The solid growth prospects across the other categories are also interesting, particularly with furniture & appliances expected to challenge electronics for size over the same period. Data compiled by Statista.com highlights that the clothing category is responsible for around 50% of total online sales in Belgium. The online top 20 retailers also show an interesting mix of international brands with very few domestic retailers present. This does highlight the international nature of online in Belgium, also a reflection of the offline spending habits of Belgians where going to a neighbouring country is just as natural as purchasing domestically.
Major Retail Holidays
As a rule, shops are generally open Monday to Saturday, with many inner-city shops preferring a 10am opening. They are exceptionally open on certain Sundays allowed by law, for example the two Sundays before Christmas and New Year, although you will see several independent shops open most Sundays, as well as some supermarkets (typically in the morning only), bakeries and restaurants. In Belgium, promotional discounts are only allowed in January and July, so shops need to shift unsold stock fast – which means knockout shopping discounts during these two months. Dates are strictly government controlled.
Digital Advertising
Belgian internet users are avid consumers of digital media and this is reflected in the growth of digital advertising spend. IAB Belgium have reported that digital advertising in the market topped €400m in 2015, up 14.5% on the previous year. Favoured digital advertising channels include display, accounting for 36.2% of expenditure, search at 28.3%, video at 18.1%, social at 15.7% and email at 1.8%. Email spend is probably low, not because of a lack of popularity but because of the way that the service is provided.
Gaining importance as a mechanism for increasing relevancy and cost effectiveness of advertising, programmatic trading, where algorithms running on service provider’s servers and allocate advertising placement in real-time, is accounting for a bigger proportion of digital budget. Up 30% on 2014 expenditure, €187m is now spent via the technology (30% of total display spend). Mobile related display advertising increased by 51% in 2015, accounting for 35% of total display advertising spend, highlighting the increasing importance of mobile devices in the customer journey.
Content Marketing
The same study also highlighted the role of content in the discovery phase, with around a quarter of consumers suggesting that it made a contribution to the discovery phase of the purchase cycle. With single figures suggesting that it influenced the buying decision, merchants would be advised to tailor their content strategy depending on where about in the customer journey the information is being displayed; relevancy is key. Belgians are more likely to view comments in-store, really highlighting the role of mobile in multichannel retail. Website content is an important element of the transactional process and international merchants should assess how their existing formats will fit in with these requirements. Data also suggests that consumer reviews should be a major part of the cross-border offering, enabling local consumers to assess any international merchant, not by what they say, but what their existing customers have to add.
Search Advertising & Mobile Internet
As in most western markets, Google dominates the search landscape of both the Netherlands and Belgium, with only Bing and Yahoo! exchanging places. Vinden and StartPagina are worthy of note. Whilst not technically search engines, they are important local players in that they can drive relevant traffic through paid-for links.
Mobile technology is used widely, with mobile phone penetration in well over 90%. Smartphones are also gaining traction at 60% in Belgium. Tablet usage is increasing, meaning mobile strategy will be an important element for any merchant trading into the region. Around 12% of Belgian e-retail is carried out via a mobile device. However, desktop remains the most popular route to the internet in Belgium so this shouldn’t be ignored either. In Belgium, desktop is also the main method of going online whilst smartphone usage is further behind than in the Netherlands. Tablets are available to just over a third of Belgian internet users so represents potential for brand interactions.
Whilst Android Tablets have a lower share of the overall market, they do convert quite well, certainly compared to iPads. As with other territories, an overall strategy encompassing both desktop and mobile is worth pursuing in these markets. Additionally, when looking at mobile optimisation and marketing focus, it is important to take both Android and Apple’s mobile operating systems into account. If resource needs to be targeted, the iPad audience should probably get the early focus for development.