In September, e-commerce reversed the four-month trend of increasing media coverage we’ve seen this summer. The topic registered a 5% decrease in coverage volume from Aug’21 – from 161,378 stories to 153,714. Despite the drop, e-commerce continued to rank as the #6 most-cited term among the top conversations in technology in September, the same position it has held since April. Year-over-year, it was up 30% in coverage volume (from 118,105 stories) and compared to Sep’19, it grew 69% (from 90,962 stories) showing just how far it’s come as a hot topic over the last couple years.

So, which companies and topics were prominent in e-commerce news in September?

As many fashion houses try to figure out how to reach new eyeballs after the long ordeal of the pandemic, Gucci made news by launching Gucci Vault – an e-commerce site featuring refurbished vintage Gucci pieces alongside capsule collections by young designers chosen by Gucci creative director Alessandro Michele – as the luxury brand attempts to overcome major headwinds in its core business.

E-commerce platform provider OpenCart jumped into the top set of newsmakers with a number of partnership announcements. First, the company was boosted by mentions as a new brand partner for TikTok Shopping, the video platform’s big social e-commerce play. In addition, OpenCart was mentioned among the companies that are working to open up e-commerce in Africa such as Klasha, a San Francisco-based startup that sees a niche in cross-border commerce and provides multiple integrations and APIs, including plug-ins for OpenCart, to facilitate transactions.

And with the Metaverse being all the craze these days, Tencent, Alibaba and a host of other Chinese e-commerce and Big Tech companies rushed to register Metaverse-related trademarks and explore opportunities in the virtual world that many believe, including Mark Zuckerberg, is the next iteration of the internet.

Will e-commerce start to spike up again as we enter the holiday shopping season? Check back for our October snapshot to find out!