The end of 2013 might have seen a slight dip in the ecommerce market, but many retailers believe their online sales luck will change in 2014. A recent survey conducted by Create Ecommerce, an online platform provider for more than 10,000 merchants, revealed that 82 percent of surveyed sellers predicted growth in the online retail industry for 2014 in comparison to 2013. Only 3 percent felt there might be a decline in online sales this year.

Online merchants should not just sit around and wait for sales to pour in, however. Looking into retail customer trends can help retailers target their audience through email campaigns, sales, and other promotional tools. Entrepreneur.com recommended focusing your marketing strategies on the consumer rather than the business. This means blog posts, ads, newsletters and other written materials should target shoppers. Addressing them directly can help draw them in, whereas talking about the business alone might dissuade shoppers from visiting your site, let alone making a purchase.

Having a streamlined online shopping experience can go a long way toward winning over new customers. Everything from allowing shoppers to save items in their shopping carts for later to improving point of sale interactions can give shoppers confidence in their decisions to purchase goods from a particular online retailer.