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June 11, 2024
In the ever-evolving realm of e-commerce, creating an exceptional customer experience (CX) is not a luxury but a competitive advantage and good for business. According to Watermark Consulting’s 2021 Customer Experience ROI Study, CX leaders outperform baseline of S&P 500 Index companies and CX laggards by staggering margins.
Investing in CX creates opportunities for your brand to stand out among competitors, differentiates with the bigger commerce players, and allows you to build relationships with your customers in meaningful, mutually beneficial ways. Businesses must innovate to capture and retain consumer attention in order to maintain their customer base, let alone grow them.
Sound like a lot? Not sure where to start? Well then we’re glad you’re here. Below we'll explore innovative strategies to enhance customer experiences in the rapidly changing e-commerce landscape and a few actionable tactics to get you going.
To stand out in the crowded digital marketplace requires you to go beyond meeting expectations – delight your customers. Yes, this is more easily said than done but companies should strive for delight in all aspects of the customer journey.
Personalize their shopping experience, recommend relevant products based on past purchases, and consider implementing loyalty programs to reward their continued patronage.
How to Start 💡: In-depth interviews can give you a good idea of existing deficits in customer experience (CX) as well as uncover opportunities for delight.
For many customers it’s easier to purchase something from an omnipresent online retailer than directly from a brand’s website, as those mega-retailers have trusted, tried-and-true user experiences and some built-in CX inertia. Combat this by providing shoppers with unexpected delights, such as exclusive discounts, early access to sales, or gifts with purchase. This can improve the value of your offering and therefore the likelihood a consumer will purchase directly with your website.
How to Start 💡: One of CXperts newest partners, SiteVibes is doing great things in the customer loyalty space, including powering entire loyalty programs where you can set custom thresholds and ways to earn points.
This directly describes the ethos of CXperts so we’re going to say it: prioritize the needs and preferences of your customers by adopting a customer-centric approach. Understand their pain points, actively seek feedback, and tailor your offerings accordingly. Without user experience (UX) research you risk focusing your precious time, energy, effort, and funds on irrelevant features. A customer-centric strategy ensures that every aspect of your e-commerce business is designed with the customer in mind and is solving their actual pain points.
How to Start 💡: Some simple voice of customer (VoC) tactics like intercept polls, quick online surveys, or feedback widgets by Hotjar or similar vendors can be a great place to start building a customer-centric mindset.
What does employee training have to do with customer experience? EVERYTHING. A sound employee experience (EX) can directly impact your CX in ways that are profound. Think of some of the most notable experience brands in the world – Nordstrom, St. Regis, Virgin to name a few – they all empower their employees to go above and beyond to surprise and delight their customers and guests. The world of ecommerce should be no different. A powerful example comes from Chewy – a pet food and product online retailer – is known for sending bereavement flowers to customers who recently lost their furry loved ones.
Well-informed and empowered staff can contribute significantly to a positive customer experience, you just have to let them. Invest in the training and development of your employees to ensure they provide excellent customer service – yes, that applies to ecommerce as well.
How to Start 💡: this is likely going to take a cultural shift, but starting with a hand-written note to key customers could be a small touchpoint that turns into positive customer goodwill and loyalty downstream.
This is the most tactical of our recommendations but is worth including because every visit, every click on your site is a micro-moment of trust. We’ve all experienced sites where the navigation is clunky, jarring or just-plain bad. In those instances it’s often far easier to just x-out of a site than thumb wrestle with a poorly designed navigation. Improving your site's navigation is crucial for a seamless online shopping experience.
How to Start 💡: A relatively small investment in a usability study paired with some light analytics can quickly unearth errors that, when optimized, can transform your site experience. Session replay tools like Clarity – a free platform by Microsoft – can also provide insights into how users interact with site navigation.
As you navigate the dynamic landscape of e-commerce, these strategies and tactics can elevate your customer experience and set you apart from the competition. However, the e-commerce journey is unique for every business; customer needs and preferences change, and that's where CXperts can help.
CXperts specializes in tailoring customer experience strategies to the unique needs of your e-commerce business. Whether you're looking to address site navigation, kick-start a VoC program, or jump into experience optimization, our customer experience experts – or CXperts – are here to guide you. Let’s Connect.
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