Online Business Statistics: Facts & Tips Every Entrepreneur Should Know 

The field of online business statistics can give you valuable insights into how the business environment reacts to the current circumstance, the market sentiment, and the validity of your expectations. Join us in this important report to uncover many exciting facts.

Statics is the art of collecting, analysing, sorting, translating, generating readable data, and presenting the outcome. But when we break through online business statistics, many important facts are waiting for us, because in the past few years, online businesses have boomed around the world. Many companies have turned to digital; even others set their companies to be only online. The outcome has skyrocketed. Everyone ordered at least one thing online every day.

Many factors have contributed to this revolution, leading to multiple changes ranging from consumer behaviours to new production trends and technologies to cope with these rapid developments. And, of course, the pandemic has accelerated this process. 

Whether you run a reputable retail building embracing thousands of employees or create hand-made crafts in your bedroom, you already see the value behind establishing an online appearance. 

Let’s see the most important online business statistics to understand why you should consider building a catchy digital identity for your business. 

Online Business Statistics: Your Ultimate Guide

Understanding online business statistics can bring many benefits to your business, guiding you to take the right approach to grow your market share. 

However, having an online business doesn’t mean setting yourself up for success! The digital world is now more crowded than before, especially after the whole world was managed online only during Covid-19.  

Whether you want to know how your company is performing, estimate your sales, find solutions to increase your customer retention, know the reasons for running a successful startup, calculate the average working hours, and so on, you must check out online business statistics frequently.  

Thankfully, all information for all online businesses has been collected here from reliable statistical analysis. 

Here we go!

General Online Business Statistics

• There are roughly 333.34 million companies worldwide, up from 314.21 million in 2021. (Statista)
• There are about 8 billion internist users in the world (Internet World Stats)  
• Asia has the highest online population, representing 54.9% (Internet World Stats)
• Around 4.9 billion people in the world use social media. (Statista)
• Google receives around 99,000 research requests every second, or about 8.5 million questions are being asked through Google a day. Internet Live Stats, 2022)
• 44% of internet users use laptops and desktops, while %52 use mobile phones and the rest use tables. (Digibean)
• Whether navigating, chatting, jamming, gaming, snapping, or checking the forecast, mobile internet users love these six apps: maps, instant chat, music, games, photos, and weather. (WP Forms)

• 84% of Google users open the search engine, hit their queries, and press search around three times a day or more! (Moz)
• Google is the most-visited website in the world— around 90 billion visits a month. (Similarweb)
• When it comes to searching the web, Google Chrome reigns supreme with a whopping 64% of the market share. Safari is a distant second with 20%, while Bing Edge and Firefox trail behind with 4% and 3.9%, respectively. The rest is divided between Samsung’s browser and Opera. (StatCounter)
• As we see, Google dominates the search engine world with a 91.9% market share worth. (GS Statcounter)
• Eight billion people use Google Lens per month to identify different objectives. Oberlo)
• The pandemic gave e-commerce businesses a considerable boost as people had to make all their purchases online. Thus, in 2020, the e-commerce company has grown by 44%. (Financial Post)
• The US dominates the e-commerce market, with a growth estimated at 50%, from 907 billion in 2022 to around 1.5 trillion in 2025— followed by Europe (47%) and China (15%). (Oberlo)
• The e-commerce sector has expanded dramatically in a short period of time. Many online business statistics refer to a 50% expansion between 2019 and 2021. (Forbes)
• 63% of Google users in the US get access to the search engine through their mobile devices. (Merkle Inc)
• Social media users are the rising stars of the online world, growing faster than any other digital audience. (vpnMentor) 

• In 2022, the most-searched queries on Google were “Wordle” in the US, followed by “India vs England” and “Ukraine.” However, the most-searched keyword about features was Johnny Depp. (Oberlo)
• In the UK, Wordle topped the most queries on Google as well, followed by “World Cup” and “Queen Elizabeth.” (Oberlo)
• Less than 1% (.6%) of people check the second page of Google search to find the answer to their queries. (Oberlo)
• More than 810 million websites are built on WordPress, meaning 43% of businesses worldwide use WordPress to manage their websites. (Statista)
• WordPress may be the king of content management systems, but it’s not the only game in town. Blogger, Wix, Magento, Shopify, Joomla, and Drupal are popular choices for creating and managing websites. (Hubspot)
• Around 2 billion people made at least one online purchase last year, representing 27% of the world’s population. (Fundera)
• The most significant countries for the e-commerce environment are China, the US, and the UK. (UNCTAD)
• In the UK, 55% of adult consumers shop their clothes online. (Statista)

• Around 4 trillion in e-commerce purchases were confirmed from a mobile; this number grew significantly during the last year. (Oberlo)  
• Small businesses are the fastest environment to adopt innovative platforms (Clutch)

• 20.8% of retail purchases take place online (Forbes)
• By 2040, online shopping will be the norm for almost everyone. 95% of purchases will happen offline in the future. (Nasdaq)
• Customers spend 30% to 50% on groceries stuff. (Gallup)
• The recent online business statistics show that the current e-commerce sales values totalled $294 billion. (RetailNext)

• 48% of customers who place their orders online are female. 49% of these orders are clothing and shoes, followed by beauty and entertainment stuff (Oberlo)
• 60% of adults like the experience of online shopping because they don’t have to wait in long queues in malls and stores. Other 71% said they could find better prices online than in physical stores. (eConsultancy)
• Immigrants have a knack for creating billion-dollar startups in the US. They founded more than 50% of the unicorns in the country.
• 81% of people searched for a business online before confirming their orders to make sure that they were making the right decision. (GE Capital Retail Bank)
• 75% of customers who order online expect to receive a response to their enquiries within 5 minutes. (Forbes)
• 24% of all purchases are expected to be done online by 2026. (Forbes)
• 40% of all business owners consider lead generation an important KPI of marketing growth. (HubSpot)
• Around 70% of SMEs said they intend to invest more in digital marketing (Visual Objects)
• Over 2 billion websites exist online now (Internet Live Stats).
• Cash is on its way out, and digital payment is taking over by 2030. That’s what 7 out of 10 people believe will happen soon. (HubSpot)
• 90% of online businesses failed after 4 months from launching their project. (Agility)
• The world e-commerce market is set to hit $6.3 trillion at the end of 2023, achieving a 10.3% increase. (Insider Intelligence)
• E-commerce sales are expected to grow 9.4% by 2024, bringing the global e-commerce market worth nearly $6 trillion worldwide. (Oberlo)
• However, some studies found that this number is expected to decrease slightly during 2025 and 2026, reaching 9.8% and 8.1%. On the other hand, by 2026, nearly a quarter of the world’s spending will be online, earning a whopping $8.1 trillion. (Oberlo)
• The US e-commerce market is expected to hit $1.1 trillion in 2023. (Forbes)
• Across the globe, women are rocking the business world with their success stories. In the US alone, over 12 million women are their bosses, and nearly half come from diverse backgrounds and cultures. (American Express)
• Over 70% of companies plan to invest more in a digital transformation strategy. (ZDNet)
• 21% of companies around the globe have already finalised the important stage of digital transformation. (Forbes)
• Four out of five marketers said automation and AI marketing tools could help them improve conversion and lead generation rates. (Invespcro)
• Marketing automation is one of the most important trends in 2023. According to online statistics, it could boost your business in two ways: by increasing your sales by 14.5% and by cutting your marketing costs by 12.2%. (Invespcro)
• 80% of marketers said they would continue to use marketing automation software thanks to the positive outcomes they deliver. In comparison, 91% agreed that integrating automation solutions in today’s marketing strategy is “very important” to the overall success of digital marketing initiatives. (Invesp)  
• More than three-quarters of marketers report a boost in conversions. (Invesp)
• Online business statistics show a lead can turn out to be a conversion nine times more if the brand connects with the potential within 5 minutes. This follow-up process could be a direct email to encourage the prospects to take the next decision, an SMS to inform the customers of what they might miss, or a message through social media. (Dripify)
• Amazon acquired the most significant market value in online business (or all business), 1.597 trillion dollars, followed by Apple has a $65.34 billion market cap. (Statista)
• Being the biggest player in the e-commerce industry doesn’t mean it’s the only one. Amazon dominates the game, but there are still some other large-cap e-commerce businesses out there, and it’s expected to grow to over 710 billion in 2025. (Forbes)
• Businesses offering online business increased their sales by almost 50% between 2013 and 2018, while sales in stores increased by 10%. (Gitnux)
• Within only 3 months, 90% of e-commerce startups fail to survive due to poor website performance and ineffective marketing strategies. (Internet Retailing) 
• 82% of consumers shop online every day compared to traditional ways (the offline shoppers represent now only 24%) (Office for National Statistics)
• 16% of retail purchases will be placed online in 2023. That applies to clothes, furniture, and everything in between. Unlike traditional shopping, it matches the rapid pace of our daily life and provides shoppers with comfort. (Forbes)   

Conversions & Profits

• 61% of marketers worldwide said that driving traffic to their websites can be considered a nightmare. Generating leads is still a big challenge for any company. (Hubspot)
• 61% of small businesses allocate their marketing budget to social media. (Encounter Marketing and Public Relations)
• 43% of business owners said their first and most important priority is to set all marketing activities to generate more leads. (Hubspot)
• The average rate of leads generated per month is around 1,877. (Hubspot)
• Over half of the marketers dedicate 53% of their promotion budget to lead-generation activities across different channels. (Bright Talk)
• Based on many online business statistics, increasing leads is what marketers label as High Priority during their annual growth plan. It even exceeds the desire to gain customer stratification (22%) and increase brand awareness (19%). Only leads! (Hubspot)
• Roughly 4% of marketers measure ROI every six months. (LinkedIn)

• Companies spend an average of $198.44 to generate one lead across all industries. (Hubspot)
• Outbound marketing becomes less effective than any other digital activity to lead generation. Only 18% of marketers still use it. (Hubspot)
• One of the most obvious signs that outbound marketing was so yesterday is how people interact with cold calls— 97% ignore them. Not just that, they consider it unsolicited and intrusive. (Business Wire via Zipwhip)
• 84% of marketers send submissions to collect data from leads. (Thrive My Way)
• A slow-loading website can cost you 7% of your leads. (Hubspot)
• Keeping the current customers is much cheaper than finding new ones. You would have to spend five or six times more to get new customers. (Invespcro)
• Nearly a quarter of all website traffic comes from people who find what they’re looking for through organic search. (Merkle)
• 53% of consumers shop online after seeing a “free shipping” offer. (Digital Commerce 360)
• IT and technology solution providers generate more leads than any other sector, with 3,660 on average a month. Not just that, they acquire the highest marketing qualified leads rate, 83%. On the other hand, non-profit organisations experience the lowest leads, with less than 600 per month. (Hubspot)

Top Marketing Activities By Business Owners 

Based on many online business statistics, the top marketing channels for all businesses are social media, content marketing, websites, SEO, content marketing and social media adverting. (HubSpot) Let’s see what we know about it. 

Content Marketing

• 82% of brands invest in content marketing campaigns to promote their businesses. (HubSpot)
• Want to leverage your business? Write down your content marketing plan. It’s a savvy strategy. According to online business statistics, the leading companies are 40% more likely to have one. (Content Marketing Institute)
• In 2022, there were over 570 million blogs online. However, only some blogs are updated or active with regular publishing content. (Ahrefs) 
• Blogs drive 55% of website visitors. (Hubspot)

Pro note: Blogs have many benefits regarding lead generation, such as increasing your website authority and boosting your page visits (so, if you offer other services, the chances get higher to raise awareness about your offerings). Additionally, marketers emphasise that blogs help them to increase inbound links by 97% and get more pages indexed on search engines. 

• Blogs are one of the most affordable and efficient sources for lead generation— businesses experienced a 126% increase in leads through creating engaging blogs. (Oracle) 
• 35.2% of brands that publish blogs frequently experienced an increase in revenue. (First Site Guide)
• According to other online business statistics, 77% of the interest population likes blogs and tends to read helpful blog posts. (Oracle)
• 28% of marketers want to invest more in content marketing strategy. (Semrush)
• When asking marketers what the main reasons for having successful content marketing are, their answers were; target audience research (47%), a good search engine optimisation strategy (SEO) (47%), publishing quality content frequently (45%), updating content and have plans to improve the quality (44%), analysing the competitors (41%), and creating more visual content and video production (40%). (Semrush) 
• The content marketing industry is set to hit $417.85 billion by 2025. (Technavio)
• 62% of marketers determine the success of their content marketing strategy based on the sales attained. (Asherf)
• 55% of marketers said creating more content and posting more frequently is one of the most components for your marketing effectiveness. In comparison, 53% said marketers should improve their content quality to ensure an effective campaign. (Semrush)
• According to the same online business statistics, 37% of marketers referred to the importance of creating content to serve people’s enquiries (research-driven strategy). The last group said they prefer focusing on improving their SEO website performance. (Semrush) 
• More than 9 million blog posts are published every day. (Internet Live Stats)
• 52% of marketers plan to publish a blog post regularly as part of their digital content strategy. (Semrush)
• However, 27% of marketers allocate less than $1,000 to content marketing campaigns, and only 6% said they would spend more than $20,000. (Semrush)
• 69% of marketers have plans to increase their content marketing budget. 28% of brands plan to make this increase medium, ranging from 11%-25%. 25% would increase their budget slightly, while 21% of companies said they would keep their budget the same. On the other hand, 16% of respondents to the study said they would invest significantly in content marketing, with more than 25%. (Semrush)
• Only 3% of brands have planned to decrease their content marketing budget. (Semrush) 
• AI-content-generated tools such as ChatGPT help brands increase content production, but most content remains low-quality and lacks a human perspective. You need to build original and human-crafted content to gain your audience’s attention and overshine your competitors. (Content at Scale)

Pro tip: To have a successful content strategy, you need to diversify your offering between videos, interviews, podcasts, infographics, case studies, and more. 

Email Marketing

• 77% of digital marketers said that email marketing contributed to increasing engagement with their brand. (Hubspot) 
• 34% of companies send at least two emails to their weekly email list. (Luisazhou)
• Well-targeted email campaigns generate over $42 for every $1 spent. (Luisazhou)
• 27% of brands use personalised messages in email marketing to create more conversions. (Thrive My Way)

Social Media

• According to many online business statistics, Linkedin is the most efficient B2B businesses social media platform. Not just that, but companies that have a social media marketing strategy on Linkedin experience a boost in their ROI. (Sprout Social)
• 17% of brands report a positive ROI from Twitter, making it the poorest social media channel for B2B businesses. (Lxahub)
• Facebook and Instagram are top channels to enhance ROI for B2C businesses. (Sprout Social)

Video Marketing

• 65% of marketers rely on video marketing to boost their services or products, while 87% said it’s a powerful marketing tool. (Content Marketing Institute)
• 73% of all brands use explainer videos to promote their products or services, making it the most popular video type. (Forbes)
• Most marketing videos with all their formats are within 2 minutes or less. (Convince and Convert)
• 87% of B2B video marketing views come from desktops. Of course, mobile ideas gain momentum, but desktop still dominates. It makes sense as most of these views happen during work time. (Gintux) 

Affiliate Online Businesses

• Affiliate online marketing is expected to be worth $17 billion. (Mediakix)
• The primary sources of affiliate income are articles and blogs, nearly 40%. (Awin Report)
• Marketers are about to spend on affiliate marketing strategy $13 billion by the end of 2023. (Influencer Marketing Hub)
• 80% of brands have invested in a unique affiliate programme. (Luisazhou)
• Affiliate marketing is responsible for 15% of digital revenues. (Influencer Marketing Hub) 

Online Business Statistics for Business Owners 

• 79% of startup owners said they invested in a business website to see at least 25% growth in the long run, three to five years. (Godaddy)
• 29% of small businesses still need their website. (Visual Objects)
• 99.9% of UK and US employers run small businesses, and around 90% said investing in a website is the most efficient marketing strategy. (Iron Paper)
• Over 50% of small businesses don’t launch from an official headquarter— only from home. This number has been increased since the pandemic. (Brimco) 

• The enterprise scene in the US has been dramatically expanded as the registry authorities received a 95% increase in online business applications during 2020. *It makes sense— you could tell when people get stuck at home during the pandemic, they start thinking of their postponed plans of taking off their own businesses. (Brimco)
• According to online business statistics, there are over 582 entrepreneurs worldwide. (Oberlo)  
• Minorities in the US own around 45% of all small businesses— the total number is estimated at 30.2 million (Fundera)
• On average, 543,000 new businesses start each month. However, only a few numbers can make it for over three years due to the fierce competition. (Yahoo)

• 67% of e-commerce spend goes to the local industries in the US, which brings a huge difference to the national economy. (Wisconsin Watch)
• 35% of small business owners don’t think having a website is a must to guarantee a positive impact. They feel they are too small to run one. (The Manifest)
• Many small business owners think having a website is too expensive. That’s why they don’t bother with one. Many worry about adding expenses to their budget by having a website that would not be made up by consumers who would make a purchase through. (The Manifest) 
• Many small business owners think social media can replace websites well. (The Manifest)
• 36% of small businesses make their profits from online sales. (Search Engine Land)
• Nearly 92% of small business owners said their decision to start their own brand was BRILLANT as they tend to work more than 40 hours a week to keep it thriving. (Brimco)
• 47% of small business owners would like to receive more access to grants and funding than is currently afforded to them. This is in order to grow their operations to keep up with demand, and is seen as one of the many challenges companies face in the current market.(Incfile)

Expert Tips for Entrepreneurs to Manage a Successful Online Business 

After reviewing the most important online business statistics every entrepreneur should know, our marketing experts want to share with you some advice you need to bear in mind to guarantee a successful online business. 

Before you go:

It’s not just about having a thriving business. First, you need a strong tool to track your progress. It helps you see how much you’ve achieved and what your next steps are. Our business experts have a simple tip for you: decide what success means to you, make a plan to get there and don’t give up.

If your prospect of success equals profits, have a strategy to do so. If you find small gains are most important, clear your mind to translate them into reality.

However, maintaining your business profitable and competitive impacts your company’s longevity. Without revenues, cash flow, sustainable value, and gross profit, it’s hard to survive. 

Now, how to do that?

Always Start with Your Audience

Here is the golden milestone of any successful business; if you don’t care enough, no one will give you any care (not even the minimum level of being enough, because the market is already packed with brands who appreciate their customers enough!

Before you choose a name for your brand, here’s what you need to do: DO extensive market research. We can’t stop saying this, even to our clients. Market research is always our first step when partnering with any brand- no matter how small or big this company is.

This market research will help you analyse the market needs, gaps, and competitors. You will understand your target audience. You will have enough information to answer many questions, like where your audience is, what they like, their pain points, where they currently shop, and why they will even care about your business. 

So, invest money, time, and effort to break through your target segments. 

Manage Your Online Assets 

Your online assets are like your business’s digital closet. You need to keep them tidy and well-arranged, just like you would with your physical inventory. We mean here by online presence everything from your official email, social media accounts, digital business cards, your tone of voice, and website. 

All you publish online should be in line with your brand value. For example, you should use the same colour palette and fonts in your website pages, social media posts, and email marketing. In addition, you need to choose the same keywords and message; all of them should be updated with your company vision. 

While the global market will continue booming, you have a greater potential to target your customers on either national or international levels. Even if you’re in Northern Ireland, you can sell to those found across the continent or even the US. E-commerce is an effective, easy, affordable, and accessible marketing model to boost sales.  

Social Media is a RICH Source to Reach Your Audience 

Your competitors know social media is a gold mine for marketing. So if you ignore social media, you give them a free pass to take over your market share.

Invest in Your Blog

Blogs are still super helpful for any business to lead generation and gain customers’ trust, as we mentioned beforehand. However, millions of publishers are out there, and the competition gets fiercer. To make your blog stand out, many things can be considered. First, you must invest more in visual content, great video explainers, interviews, writing prowess, helpful guides and targeted subject matter.

With millions of blogs competing to have a good position in Google, it means you have to do many marketing activities to tap into this market. Still, it also means you can leverage your online exposure with an excellent blogging mindset and deliver the best quality for your niche. 

Invest in SEO

Do you use Google frequently to search for something?

Yes.

Do you press the second page to find the answer to this question?

No.

Of course!

All Google users will probably only find the right link to answer their questions on the first page. Everyone loves to stay here, and if they can’t find what they’re looking for, they will change the words used on the Google bar search instead of clicking on the second-page results. 

And that’s not all. Google’s first organic result has a considerable advantage over the rest. It’s a click magnet. It attracts 10 times more clicks than the bottom results. That means improving your position by one stop organically will increase your chances of receiving more clicks— a 2.8% increase. 

This increasingly highlights that your SEO practices are necessary to enhance your organic rankings. Your rank on Google matters. Your investment in your website for a better SEO score matters. Your analysis to figure out your website performance matters.

Ranking higher means increasing your visibility to users. 

If you operate a business website, you should strive to be on the first pages because visibility means clicks which means more people will know your brand, which means more conversions. 

Paid Search and Search Engine Marketing Become More Important 

Online businesses faced a challenge in the second quarter of 2019. Organic searches dropped on all devices, but especially on mobile phones.

Paid search is eating up the organic search. That’s why it’s dropping. People tend to click through links on the top search results even they see the sponsored label.

However, please don’t assume this undermines the power of organic search, but it means you need to have a balanced and comprehensive digital marketing strategy to gain more visibility.

Not just that, but the organic search will keep its influence because it’s highly targeted. That means if you cater your content to offer a solution for a specific user query and optimise your website flawlessly, you will appear in front of this user and gain a new customer. 

How can Profiletree Help your Online Business?

Unleash your capacities and set your business to success. Companies can only make it today with a really GOOD digital marketing strategy that would include all activities that can be launched online to reach new audiences, build a relationship with the current customers, and find an advantage edge that entices people to buy from your brand.

Whatever your industry, our marketing experts are here to polish your selling point and turn your vision into sales.

Achieve your business goals by not playing it safe. Instead, get it by enhancing your online presence, building a sustainable growth plan, and creating a unique digital identity.

With the help of a proactive and creative team who aspires to be your assistant and an extension of your business, you will get the following:

• An enchanting e-commerce website to sell your products
• A well-structured website that will speak on your behalf.
• An SEO audit for your website to get a high rank on search engines
• A video marketing strategy that will capture your customers’ attention 
• A social media marketing strategy to outreach your audience through different channels 

Let’s partner and start creating your own inspiring story because your business is worth to be seen!

Ready to skyrocket your sales? Let’s partner. Book your consultation call today. No commitment, no pushy copies.