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AA Smartfuel Gets Smart About Fuelling NZ Retailers’ Ecommerce Efforts

As New Zealand lurches from covid scare to covid scare, retailers have been compelled to embrace the ecommerce revolution. And the numbers are writ large on the wall. 

Global ecommerce grew 27.6% in 2020 according to Insider Intelligence, and 25% in New Zealand (New Zealand Post). No wonder the world’s biggest ecommerce software supplier, Shopify, market capitalisation grew by US$100b over the course of 2020, that’s about a third of New Zealand’s GDP. There are over 8,500 retailers using the Shopify platform in New Zealand alone. 

This is a double edged sword for local retailers. On the one hand they can sell more to the world, but on the other, the rest of the world is selling more to us. 

AA Smartfuel, along with its strategic digital partners Stitch and Firebrand, has moved quickly to help New Zealand retailers by enabling Shopify retailers to join the programme. 

“It is the right thing to do, supporting New Zealand’s mostly SME retailers in this hyper competitive online retail environment”, says AA Smartfuel Director Ian Sutcliffe. 

As Sutcliffe points out, moving to online retail is one thing, but getting people to come to your site and getting them to buy, is another thing altogether. According to ecommerce data specialists Littledata.io, the average conversion rate, or times people buy divided by the number sessions on an ecommerce website, is only about 1.6%.

Retailers and marketers underestimate the challenge of competing in an online environment, according to digital marketing specialists, Stitch. “Yes, the market potential is exciting, but it’s not a case of build-it and they will come. You have to use all the advantages of advertising and marketing technology, like the new AA Smartfuel Shopify app, to find the right audiences and create a compelling shopping experience”, says Stitch’s Managing Partner Simon Wedde. 

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For retailers who have been trialing the AA Smartfuel Shopify application on their sites, the early results are encouraging with up to 3 times better than the 1.6% average of getting to people to buy. 

Often what holds businesses back from adopting new technology is the perceived complexity, and the overwhelming feeling of ‘where do I begin?’. “For that reason we set out to make the AA Smartfuel Shopify app a super simple plug and play service. Three easy steps, and then the retailer can offer site wide fuel discount incentives”, says Firebrand Founder; Bex Twemlow. 

It’s not just New Zealand’s retailers who are set to gain from this initiative from AA Smartfuel,. At a time when soaring housing costs and economic uncertainty are the norm, the opportunity for New Zealanders to earn more fuel discounts as they support retailers online is likely to be one too good to miss. 

“We want to lend our brand and the weight of our established fuel discount programme to help New Zealand retailers get an edge” says Sutcliffe. “We have 2.8million registered card holders, so that’s a big pool of New Zealanders our retail partners can tap into. There are also 1,200 existing retailers issuing AA Smartfuel discounts already, and we want to give our New Zealand card holders even more opportunities to save on fuel, particularly at this time. So far it looks like it is working for the retail partners we have on board.” 

The AA Smartfuel Shopify App is available for download and installation on any New Zealand Shopify ecommerce site through the Shopify App Store.

© Scoop Media

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