South Africa, Jan. 14 -- An analysis of almost 3,000 South African e-commerce brands found that growth was uneven across the market. The top 5% of brands generated 44% of total order growth, showing that demand was concentrated among a relatively small group of higher-performing businesses during the year.

Omnisend's South African marketing data helps explain this shift.

Shoppers clicked on marketing messages less often, but when they did, they were far more likely to buy. With fewer chances to reach shoppers, timing became more important, and brands that could react quickly to customer behavior captured more sales.

As a result, behavior-based automated emails generated 30% of email revenue from just 3.9% of sends.

"What we saw in 202...