How to Improve the Customer Experience of Your E-Commerce Business
Now more than ever, the quality of your customer experience is just as important as the quality of your product or service. But before we dive into why and how it can be such a game-changer for your e-commerce business, we first have to clarify what we mean by “customer experience”. In broad terms, it refers to a multitude of details that come together to inform your customer’s perception of your business. These details can range from everything from the tone of your language to the quality of your packaging, and the ease of your user interface to the conduct of your staff.
It stands to reason then, that the more your customer feels as though they are seen as a person, and less as a number, then the likelier it is they will want to keep doing business with you. So how can you convey empathy to your customers?
The Importance of Customer Experience
The way you treat your customers is not always a conscious or deliberate thing. Though it can include something as straightforward as the friendliness of your staff, it can also refer to how easy your website is to navigate, or how fast your shipping is. All of these variables will determine two things critical to the growth of your e-commerce business: whether your customers come back and whether they recommend you to others.
A high-quality customer experience will ensure the following benefits:
- Customer Retention
- Brand Loyalty
- Referrals
- Revenue Growth
- Increased Brand Awareness
- Greater Brand Equity
Now let’s take a look at some of the ways you can improve your customer experience!
Personalise Your Customer’s Journey
Personalising a customer’s buying experience is a great way to convey that all-important sense of empathy. This can come in the form of personalised emails, ads, and product recommendations (based on the user’s location, shopping history, or any other such variables). This will help your customer feel seen and improve the quality of their buying experience.
Cultivate a Strong Social Media Presence
Social media is a great way for brands to show a more relatable, light-hearted, and human side to them. A skilled social media manager with a sense of humour can have an immense impact on how everyday people perceive your brand. Platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Tik Tok, and Instagram are especially popular with businesses as a way to connect directly with individual consumers. Twitter, for example, is an ideal place for businesses to respond to queries and often the first port of call for consumers looking to make one. Responding to complaints with sympathy on a public platform goes a long way to building consumer trust.
Customer Surveys Are Your Friend
Reaching out to consumers with surveys can offer an invaluable insight into how good your customer experience really is. Query them on their buying habits (e.g., do they prefer web or mobile?), how they prefer to be contacted (e.g., emails, text messages, or push notifications), and what they may find inconvenient or frustrating about your business. To incentivise consumers to take part in surveys, offer them a discount. Make it worth their while, because the feedback will certainly be worth yours.
Offer Fast Shipping
A lot of customer experience is tied to convenience. Fast, reliable, and consistent shipping times will be a deal-breaker for many customers who remember when a product they’ve ordered arrives promptly. This ties back to that sense of customer empathy – making them feel important and valued.
See more: How to Create an Effective E-Commerce Delivery Strategy
Simple Checkout Procedures
This should be the part of your website that is as easy and hassle-free for your customers as possible. You don’t want to give them any reason to abandon their cart and shop elsewhere. This can happen if the information they need is not clearly provided, or if you’re making them jump through too many hoops to get to the finishing line. If you have a high abandoned cart rate, then evaluate the checkout process from beginning to end. Are all of the payment methods visible and clearly stated from the beginning? Is the shopping cart clearly visible on every page? Is it easy for consumers to add and remove items from their cart? Do your checkout forms have autofill enabled? Do you have a clear returns policy? The entire process should be as seamless as possible.
Go Beyond Your Website
Ensuring that customers can purchase your product or service on a mobile device is an absolute must in today’s e-commerce landscape. This allows busy consumers to purchase on the go. But to optimise your customer experience for mobile devices, be sure to have fast page loading, autofill enabled for all browsers (reducing the amount of typing they have to do), and consistent performance across various devices.
E-Commerce Fulfilment with Allegro Logistics
Here at Allegro Logistics, we’re experienced logistics and integrated e-commerce fulfilment providers. Our customer service is something we take great pride in, having been founded as a father-and-son business whose family values inform everything that we do.
In the world of logistics, the satisfaction of businesses and consumers is of paramount importance. That’s why we strive to ensure a hassle-free and efficient distribution of your goods based on a seamless, integrated warehouse management system. We’re constantly investing in the latest technologies to provide our customers with a reliable service with which to grow their business.
For more information on our services and how we can help improve the customer experience of your e-commerce fulfilment, don’t hesitate to get in touch with our friendly staff today.
See more: The Role of Warehouses in Supply Chain Management
See more: Should Your Business Outsource its Order Fulfilment?
