Get the most out of Czech e‑commerce. It offers a progressive environment and many opportunities

The owner of Zásilkovna, the Packeta Group, recorded a year-on-year growth of 100% in 2020. It strengthens this trend by expanding the network of parcel points, increasing the number of retail partners, and introducing automatic dispensing boxes. In September 2020, it launched Z‑BOXes in the Czech Republic — non-contact self-sufficient parcel points powered by a solar panel, which the user controls using a mobile app.

In 2020, Czech Post was the second most common mode of transport. Although the popularity of other companies is growing, Czech customers are still quite used to postal services. Also, it has an extensive network of branches, allows payment by cash on delivery, offers convenient options such as Package in hand and Package in mail. The Czech Post also started cooperation with the Chinese online marketplace AliExpress in the second half of 2020. This year, it is to become one of the countries where shipping will take within ten days of ordering on AliExpress.

Until recently, the Czech Republic excelled in European online markets in its dependence on cash payments. Cards, however, gain more and more universality due to the popularity of mobile commerce. Users can also easily link them to mobile wallets. Bank transfers take another major part of the market. It is significant due to the relatively low penetration of bank accounts (81%).

In 2020, only 23% of Czech online shoppers bought goods abroad. It leaves plenty of room for growth in this area. The most popular countries for Czech consumers are with a linguistic similarity: Poland and Slovakia. It means that Czechs are more confident in localization into Czech, or other Central European, Slavic languages. It is therefore pivotal for traders expanding from abroad that their online stores are localized into Czech.

Heureka is the most used search engine for goods in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. In addition to quality price comparison, it provides several advanced features, such as a Verified by Customers certificate, purchase guarantee, number of surveys, and more.

• Detailed information for advertising on Heureka: How Heureka.cz Works

Zboží.cz is the second most used shopping engine in the Czech Republic. It was founded in 2007 by the search engine Seznam.cz. At present, it facilitates online shopping through an extensive section of discounts, instructions, video reviews, user reviews, or the offer of a broad accessory portfolio in the product profile. In 2020, the Seznam search got extensions of product information from Zboží.cz. Using that, shoppers have the best possible information on the online store offer in the shortest possible time.

• Detailed information for advertising on Zboží.cz: How Zboží.cz Works

GLAMI combines elements of a product search engine and a social network. It focuses on fashion and accessories and allows users to view goods, create collections, share them and comment. In addition to the Czech Republic, it operates in 17 other European countries and Brazil.

• Detailed information for advertising on GLAMI: How GLAMI Works

FAVI is a specialized search engine that covers the furniture and decoration segment. In 2020, it cooperated with more than 600 stores, and its offer is visited daily by up to 100,000 users. In addition to the Czech Republic and Slovakia, FAVI operates in Poland, Romania, Hungary, and Croatia. It also offers a mobile app for Android and iOS.

• Detailed information for advertising on FAVI: How FAVI Works

Jiří is a product owner at Bidding Fox technologies. He is a part of the team that develops the Bidding Fox app. It offers automatic bidding services for the Mergado platform. Its functions enable more efficient bidding for Heureka.cz, Heureka.sk and Zboží.cz.

How is Czech e‑commerce developing from the bidding specialist point of view?

“It has been gradually evolving towards automation for some time, and this direction is beginning to be seized by more advertising managers. Of course, some have been dealing with it for a long time, but with each relevant mention, example, or case study, awareness gradually increases, and people begin to try to make their work easier.

On the other hand, there will still be enough people for whom optimization ends by inserting a feed into the shopping engine administration. Redesigns and various AB tests of product details on search engines show the key importance of bidded positions. Price comparisons are moved to the second or third screen (more scrolling is required) or further using the “More offers” type button. Therefore, it may happen that the number of online stores that start working with bidding will increase to make their offers visible.

With increasing competition, it will be harder to monitor budgets and profitability manually. Here comes a variety of automation forms, either entirely using bidding tools or various scripts, which someone will create for their store. At our support, we already answer questions about what data can be obtained from (Bidding Fox) Elements and how to use it for further automation outside Mergado on the online store side.”

Outperform the competition by automating bidding strategies. Turn on Bidding Fox in a free trial.

Marek works as a consultant at Feed Image Editor technologies s.r.o. Its application automates the setting of product images. It helps users identify errors in image advertising, improve it in bulk, and effectively increase click-through rates to online stores.

Should online store owners take advantage of online marketing tools?

“If they want their business to grow, they certainly do. In the last year, a huge number of stores have been established. The current situation has forced even those who have hesitated so far to move to the online environment. The competition is fierce, and differentiating is more important than ever before.

It can be seen in the recent progress in the quality of image advertising and product images in general. Stores try to have them of high quality. They advertise discount labels to pictures and increasingly work on graphic identity. They understood that it was a departing train and it was worth jumping on it at the beginning. Online tools, such as the Feed Image Editor, allow them to edit images automatically and in bulk, saving a great deal of time and energy.”

Do you want to improve the state of your image advertising without having to fix everything manually? Turn on Feed Image Editor in a free trial.

Martin is a specialist who runs the development company Ordelogy which creates software for marketing specialists from Europe using Mergado. For example, it offers a Monitoring Horn site control tool and an automatic Cron Runner app.

What should foreign advertisers focus on when expanding into Czech e‑commerce?

“There are several points that foreign entities entering the Czech market should not underestimate.

They must be sure that their activities in the Czech Republic, the store settings, and the legal texts are suitable for sales in the Czech Republic.

The Czech user is biassed to stores that are not in Czech, even if it is only Slovak.

Czechs have high expectations of customer service. They are especially interested in fast shipping, quality packaging, and regular communication.

In addition to global advertising giants, there are major local advertising players in the Czech Republic that need to be incorporated into their promotion: Heureka, Zboží, GLAMI, FAVI, Biano. Within Heureka, it is very appropriate to use Heureka reviews (Verified by Customers), according to which a significant part of users decide where to buy.

Tip: For SEO and PPC, it is often not enough to just take the online store categories from abroad and translate them into Czech. It is necessary to modify their structure/​tree and tweak the product names according to search queries in the local market.”