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MITC panel: Pandemic-driven e-commerce pivots are likely here to stay

For many businesses, the pivot to e-commerce during the pandemic has been a big lift. The question for the future is whether they’ll continue to maintain their new e-commerce presence.

“It’s a little hard to say without the crystal ball,” said Keith O’Brien, a principal of business consulting firm HarborHouse Partners in Blue Hill and CEO of Page.One, a Dania Beach, Fla., marketing firm specializing in Amazon listings.

But, he continued, much of the shift to e-commerce is here to stay.

“I think we’ve seen some culture shifts,” he said.

O’Brien was speaking at an Oct. 22 webinar hosted by the Maine International Trade Center in Portland, or MITC, and the Maine Ecommerce Collective on e-commerce strategies.

According to MITC, global e-commerce sales are expected to top $4.2 trillion in 2020 and reach more than $6.5 trillion by 2023. More than 2.1 billion shoppers are expected to buy goods and services online by 2021. Increasingly, online shoppers live outside the U.S. The webinar was designed to share long-term e-commerce strategies to reach the growing online international audience.

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