Sarah
Chambers September 6, 2019 • Illustration by Bronwyn Gruet
An estimated $4.8 trillion dollars will be spent online by
2.1 billion shoppers by 2021. Every dollar and every shopper offers e-commerce
businesses an opportunity to win over customers for life. But how do you stand
out above the crowd?
To differentiate, you may think about adding
more products or reducing prices. But there’s a better way to outshine the
competition: by providing top-notch e-commerce customer service. Research shows
that customers who receive a great customer experience are 54% more likely to buy from a company, compared
to those who received a poor experience.
If you want to grow your e-commerce business,
you need to deliver consistently great customer service.
Let’s look at five strategies to deliver an
e-commerce customer experience that will supercharge your brand growth.
How to use e-commerce customer service to build customer relationships
To understand how customer service can impact
e-commerce brands, we asked five experts to share their experiences on how
great customer service drives growth for them.
1. Harness the power of customer reviews
Laura Marciano, Head of Customer Experience at
The DB Method,
says that implementing Yotpo for customer reviews had the biggest impact on their
growth. Not only are public customer reviews exceptionally powerful social
proof, they also provide the customer service team with more insight into the
customer journey. Marciano explains that The DB Method’s negative reviews are a
huge source of learning: “Implementing Yotpo has influenced many of our
shipping flows and customer experiences. For example, one of our customers was
unhappy with the notifications during the order process (i.e., they didn’t
realize their package was going to be delivered, didn’t have tracking, etc).
Because of this feedback we changed our email provider to Klaviyo, which
totally improved the overall experience for customers who are waiting on their
shipment.”
To harness the full power of customer reviews,
it’s important to make it easy for customers to leave their feedback. It’s also
essential to actually read the feedback customers provide in reviews
and respond to them if possible. Marciano shares how they’ve implemented this
in their workflows by adding a link in their welcome emails and encouraging
happy customers to submit reviews. “We’ve had a lot of success turning bad
reviews to good reviews which has been fantastic for our overall growth as a
brand.”
2. Have a multi-channel strategy
We all have preferences, whether they’re about
the food we eat, the places we shop, or the ways we communicate. Some customers
still want to call, others are interested in chat or email, and some simply
want to send you a tweet.
No
matter what the case may be, you need to be ready to serve the customer where
they are.
A Dimensional Research study found that 28% of
customers say being able to contact a company on their preferred channel
is part of a good customer experience.
Furthermore, the same study found that 27% of
customers said not being able to contact a company on their preferred
channel contributed to a poor customer experience. Offering multiple ways to
contact you reduces the effort customers need to put into doing business with
you. For example, for most people, picking up a mobile phone and messaging a
business over Facebook or Instagram is easier than calling a 1-800 number, and
it just feels more conversational.
Sephora uses modern customer service channels to
provide on-the-go service to their shoppers. In addition to the traditional
email notifications, customers can also sign up for shipping notifications or
start a new conversation with their customer service team through Facebook
Messenger.
You’ll also want to invest in e-commerce customer service software that helps
manage incoming requests across all of your channels. Having a multichannel
strategy doesn’t always mean investing in more tools or spending more time on
customer interactions, though. With all your conversations in one inbox, you
can serve your customers wherever they are, while staying in the same place
yourself.
3. Make customer service as easy as possible
Customers want to shop at businesses that make
things easy for them. Antonio King, Director of Experience at Shinesty,
has built this principle into every piece of the Shinesty customer service
strategy. “We’ve focused on customer effort rather than customer satisfaction,
as a low effort experience is a much bigger indication of customer loyalty,”
says King.
Through measuring customer effort alongside
customer lifetime value, King has been able to showcase the impact of great
customer service on their bottom line. “Being able to associate customer
retention directly with customer support has been an eye-opening move for
everyone in our organization to the extent of identifying ways, across the org,
to continue to minimize the customer’s effort.”
So how do you minimize customer effort?
Investing in self-service options is one of the most impactful
ways to make your customers’ lives easier. A SOTI survey revealed that:
73% of U.S. consumers were in favor of self-service
technologies to improve the retail shopping experience as opposed to
speaking to a company representative.
Using a live chat
tool like Beacon, which is designed to surface instant answers, can
help grow your business in three ways:
·
When customers have to
wait too long they may become discouraged. In fact, 53% of online shoppers will abandon their purchase if support
takes too long.
·
Making it easier for
customers to get in touch means they can ask questions instead of abandoning
their carts. Being available to help results in more sales overall.
·
Self-service options
can also help your team keep up with demands during high-volume stretches. When
you’re preparing for the busy holiday season, anything
that helps customers find their own answers will improve your sales.
4. Provide personalized, expert advice
Rachel Thaw, Customer Experience and Logistics
Manager at Andie Swim,
knows that e-commerce customer service is more than just tracking packages and
processing refunds. To provide the best experience, agents need to offer
guidance to help customers make the right purchases for them.
“Often times, our customers look to us to be
“experts” when it comes to swimwear, fit, and all things Andie. And we are! At
Andie Swim, I can tell women who love playing volleyball in swimwear what style
works best for me when I’m running on the beach. We’re all more alike than not
in most cases, and putting that front and center always leads to a memorable
(i.e., reputation-building) customer service experience.”
This kind of personalized, knowledgeable
service is what sets Andie Swim apart from other online retailers.
Today’s world is about treating each person as
an individual, and your e-commerce customer service should be no different.
According to Segment’s State of Personalization Report, 71% of respondents are frustrated by impersonal experiences.
Providing thorough answers to a customer’s specific questions is a great
starting point to remedy that. Using the context of a customer’s previous
experiences to offer personalized suggestions is even better.
However, just like all humans, customer
service agents don’t know everything. And that’s OK! Thaw says,
“In the same way that it is understandably
difficult for a customer to share her measurements, swimwear preferences, and
sometimes body insecurities, we meet our customers in that vulnerable space
when we sometimes mess up, too.” She shares how they are honest but capable at
Andie: “Showing our customers that we don’t always have all the answers but
that we’re going to work until we do is infinitely better than pretending than
being too afraid to admit your mistakes or your ignorance.”
5. Align your service with your brand values
Tracey Wallace, Founder of Doris Sleep
and all-around
e-commerce expert, knows a few things about growing a brand. For
her, the most important thing to remember is to develop brand values and stick
to them — even when it’s inconvenient. “The biggest thing I’ve done from a
customer service standpoint is getting really specific about our mission and
values. Our pillows are made from 100% recycled plastic bottle fiber all
sourced from the U.S.”
However, there was a downside: “But until
recently, our pillows needed to be shipped in plastic (ugh!) to keep them dry
and clean.”
Recently, through conversations with
customers, they’ve found a new packaging company that can provide recycled
plastic poly bags big enough for non-compressed pillows –– and they’ll be
moving all their packaging to those.
For your brand, sticking to your brand values
might mean being generous with refund policies, spending time to create
educational content, or bringing
more fun into your customer service conversations.
Branding isn’t just a marketing exercise. It
needs to translate into every interaction with your customers.
Exceptional customer service is your competitive differentiator
More and more dollars are being spent online,
and you don’t want to miss out. With the boom in e-commerce, however, comes the
boom in competition. Investing in strong customer service by implementing the
practices above will put you on track to stand out from the rest.
Sarah is a customer service consultant and the
founder of Supported Content. When she’s not arguing about
customer service, she’s usually outdoors rock climbing or snowboarding. Follow her on
Twitter to keep up with her adventures.
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