The Real Challenge in eCommerce Isn’t Your Agency

One of the biggest concerns in the digital ecosystem this year has been eCommerce performance. However, this behavior is not necessarily driven by poor agency management, pricing strategies, website technology, ad investment, or similar factors. In this article, I’ll explain the variables behind what’s happening and hopefully help brands make better strategic decisions moving forward.

This article is mainly aimed at brands, companies, and eCommerce executives who have been asking themselves why sales or growth are slower compared to previous years, why ACOS has increased and ROAS has decreased, or why achieving goals now requires larger investments than before.

The information below is structured from general to specific, starting with platforms and then moving into consumer behavior. I’m trying to highlight the variables carrying the most weight while explaining each one in greater depth.

Marketplace-First

Let’s start with the first variable — or better said, variables.

Over the last three years, Mexico has become a country where marketplaces have turned into the preferred shopping platforms, specifically Mercado Libre and Amazon. Together, these giants account for 7 out of every 10 eCommerce sales in the country (AMVO, 2026).

Both companies have done an exceptional job building consumer loyalty through discounts, bonuses, financing options, seamless payment experiences, less-than-24-hour deliveries, customer service, returns, and more. On top of that, their marketing execution has been outstanding. Their logos are everywhere: international events, local sports, buildings, and their unmistakable delivery vans all across the country.

Speaking specifically about Mercado Libre, what they’ve built in Mexico is practically a case study. They average more than 55 million daily visits, have over 25 million active buyers, and operate a highly adopted financial ecosystem through Mercado Pago, with more than 18 million active users. As if that weren’t enough, Mercado Libre remains the preferred channel for most Mexicans during Hot Sale events (Zamora, 2026).

At this point, there’s little room for debate. Competing against marketplaces today is incredibly difficult. In pricing, promotions, payment methods, and logistics, beating them is almost impossible (Oré, 2025). That said, not every battle is lost.

Consumer Behavior — The New Buyer

This is one of the most interesting parts of the conversation.

While many companies were looking for solutions through new campaigns, higher investments, agency changes, or platform migrations, a large part of the explanation was not in the campaigns or the technology itself, but rather in the consumer shift.

Marketplace Search: unfortunately, just as Mexican consumers prefer marketplaces like Amazon and Mercado Libre for purchasing, they now also prefer them for searching.

This trend had been developing for years, but recently it intensified to the point where Google and other search engines started losing relevance against marketplaces (Pun, 2026).

This is not the fault of brands, agencies, managers, or internal teams. Competing for top search visibility and against the level of consumer loyalty marketplaces have built inside their ecosystems is extremely difficult — and in many cases, very expensive.

Assisted Shopping: at the last two eCommerce events I attended — interestingly hosted by two of the strongest eCommerce platforms in Mexico, Shopify and Tiendanube — we were shown impressive numbers around how Mexican consumers are making more thoughtful and better-analyzed purchasing decisions through artificial intelligence platforms.

According to Tiendanube, AI-assisted purchases alone have grown by more than 350% this year.

What matters now is not only where consumers end up buying, but how they discover products and make purchasing decisions.

This is where SEO becomes critically important. Brands need to optimize their catalogs, product structures, websites, and overall content as much as possible.

Direct Purchase Behavior: three or four years ago, several studies were already pointing toward an interesting trend (Fraguela, 2023): Mexican consumers were increasingly searching for and buying directly from their favorite brands (AMVO, 2026).

Today, that behavior has become so strong that direct purchases through brand websites have surpassed purchases originating from social media platforms (Pun, 2026).

Although social networks were once a powerful sales and traffic driver, Mexican consumers increasingly prefer to directly search for or type in the brand’s website through their preferred search engine (Pun, 2026).

And this is important: social media has gradually fallen to a fourth or even fifth-place influence factor in eCommerce purchasing decisions — including both organic content and paid advertising.

Conclusions

In conclusion, eCommerce is not dead, nor does this necessarily mean that agencies, brands, or teams are doing things wrong.

The reality is that the market evolved faster than many expected, and today we compete against platforms with complete ecosystems, massive budgets, and deeply loyal consumers.

Marketplaces are no longer just sales channels. They are now search engines, comparison tools, financial platforms, logistics systems, and even trust anchors for consumers.

At the same time, the Mexican buyer has become smarter, more analytical, and less impulsive when making purchasing decisions.

The key here is not to panic, switch agencies every six months, or assume that increasing ad spend will solve everything. The real key is understanding the new consumer behavior and adapting digital strategies around it.

Brands that learn how to coexist with marketplaces, leverage artificial intelligence, build communities, and create real differentiation will be the ones that continue growing in the years ahead.

Because yes, competing directly against Amazon or Mercado Libre is almost impossible. But connecting better with your customers, delivering value, and building a strong brand — that is still completely winnable territory.

The game changed, and so did the consumer. The faster we understand that, the better decisions we’ll make moving forward.