Such solid gains help explain why, despite the global financial crisis, most online retailers in France remain cheerful about their prospects in the coming year.

The digital industry Website Le Journal du Net (JDN) recently polled 151 French e-commerce firms to see how they were facing up to the challenges of today’s nervous marketplace.

Almost three-quarters (73%) said their companies had been profitable in 2008, and most saw continued growth in the first weeks of 2009. They mentioned sharp discounting that pointed toward a lower average order value, but expected higher total volumes to compensate.

More than two-thirds (69%) of the retailers said they were confident that the year ahead would also be a profitable one.

Caution reigned in many boardrooms, though.

More than one-half (55%) of the merchants polled said they had reduced their growth projections for 2009. On the other hand, 33% had not trimmed expectations, and 12% even increased growth projections for the year, believing that the tricky market conditions could be turned to their advantage.

E-tailers were divided on the issue of cutting margins. Just under one-half (47%) said they would chop, but 42% said they did not see any need to cut back and 11% said they would actually increase margins.

Overall, just 14% said they expected to see negative growth over the next 12 months. About one in five (21%) expected their firms to grow less than 5%.

Yet almost 40% of the online stores anticipated revenue growth of more than 20%, and nearly one in five were looking forward to gains of over 50%.

The bullish outlook is due to the fact that many indicators show French e-commerce is in robust health.

FEVAD noted that the number of consumers buying online rose by 2.5 million in 2008, to just over 22 million. In addition, 53% of the firms polled by JDN reported levels of repeat business (customers returning to purchase again within 12 months) up since 2007. A similar proportion (52%) had found conversions rising. The average order value also rose in 2008 for 46% of these online merchants, while 30% said it had stayed the same.

For a majority of retailers, two other indexes remained relatively stable in 2008: the level of abandoned carts and the percentage of product returns.

France’s e-tailers also recognized the need for key investments, even in a year when money is tight. Overall, 62% of JDN’s respondents said they would spend more on marketing and communication in 2009 than they had in 2008. Other priority areas were search engine optimization (where 59% said they would spend more) and customer relationship management and loyalty programs (where 57% planned to boost investment).

Admittedly, marketing and communication was cited as the second-most-likely area to suffer spending cuts in 2009, after supply chain investments. Overall, one-quarter of respondents said they would spend less to market in the next 12 months.

Many merchants also accepted that their online stores should be more attractive and useful to shoppers. More than four in 10 (43%) said they hoped to improve the product images on their site, and 40% admitted they could do better at cross-selling.

A striking majority of these retailers (80%) were convinced that online commerce in France would fare better during the financial crisis than offline retail. Just 13% said e-commerce players were no better insulated against the economic storm than other merchants. Three in five (61%) also thought multichannel retailers were more vulnerable than pure-play Web stores.

Another large majority of JDN’s sample (76%) considered themselves well-prepared for the economic downturn, and 81% thought they would do better even than their fellow e-tailers in the French market.

Time will tell whether this is optimistic bravado, or just another sign of a sector in excellent form.