After reading this great article written by Matthew Toren from Entrepreneur.com, I learned that everyone when coming in the market to test out the waters is filled with ideas and other team members as well as the stakeholders too, so how do you find a balance of making your head spin with every new optimization system you see online or even the latest design trend out there well, for one thing you stay focused and customer centric because in the end those are the website views that will bring your e-commerce site revenue. Every situation is different when it comes to the various industries within e-commerce that exist. There is no magic sauce of what will work or what does not. That is why the ideal question you should have in mind is asking your user-community what they would like to see on your site or change if there needs to be any changes made. A great way to learn this kind of information is to conduct polls or post-purchase surveys or even a heat map tracking the user’s journey.
There have also been tons of elaborate studies done, but, keep in mind that within these statistics even though they name the most pertinent elements to have in an e-commerce site as a titan, it may not apply so much to an online retailer that may not be well-known in the industry. The sample sizes for someone that is starting in the industry may be slightly smaller than others that already have so much content to really narrow down these consumer behaviors or preferences.
According to science, here are five things e-commerce customers want from their shopping experiences:
1. Opportunities to qualify for free shipping
With the vast popularity of online shopping, brick-or-mortar stores still have their advantages such as not paying for shipping since you are physically there at the store. A lot of the e-commerce businesses do not have that commodity.
2. Smart, personalized recommendations
There has been an extreme rise in Artificial Intelligence lately, machine learning and big data mining, companies of every size can now leverage information to learn a lot about website visitors. This data is very helpful for many online retailers to promote the specific types of products most likely to be viewed and purchased, to identify where the optimization in conversion can happen and to be able to provide customized shopping experiences.
3. Special deals to keep them from hunting elsewhere
With retail shopping at the location, people have to have the ultimate curiosity in order to have the intention to purchase something there. Sometimes it is a hassle when people have to drive their cars, find parking, and walk around the store to find what they are looking for. With e-commerce, the experience is far more enjoyable. To find the product you want, you use your most trusty search engine Google to search for a product name, open several tabs and bounce out of the ones that do not make the cut. Price comparison sites and blog posts can be useful in finding the better deals.
4. Trustworthy, authentic customer reviews
One of the trademarks that the evolving digital age is known for is the user-friendly capabilities of being able to search for information about products and vendors. Yelp reviews are considered to be more authentic since it provides real-time experiences from all consumers providing you enough information to make a sound decision and decide to buy the product or try it out. Better Business Bureau license is also good to have, however, it is a certification of the organization as a whole and not providing insights from the precise target market.
5. Easy, shenanigan-free product returns
When a person buys or tries the product for the first time, only to go home and realize it does not fit it is easy for the retailers to receive proof of purchase from the customer with a receipt in order to return the product. When returning the product through e-commerce channels, the process can be a bit more complex, your customer may have to contact you to ask for a return package or they may be able to print out a self-service return package label.
So, what does this all mean, remember to always deliver an experience that is like no other and congruent to what the customer wants, consider offering free shipping on orders that cross a given threshold for a shopping cart total. Another helpful tip is do not forget to promote this feature on your homepage, product pages, and checkout experience screens. The idea of leveraging the visitor information obtained, use tools like SaaS tools like Smart Mail to put the right products in front of your customer’s eyes at the right moment. The way we would help consumers from hunting elsewhere is by starting by using the sidebar banner ads to promote on-sale items to relevant category pages with eye-catching badges. You can also use tools like StoreYa’s Coupon Pop to offer deals to visitors who subscribe to your email list.
On the other hand, the most trusted review verification site is a platform called Yotpo that allows the marketers to publish a collection of comments and even serve up re-targeting ads on Facebook with reviews appearing in the ad creative. Lastly, in creating more sales from visitors to your online shop, a huge must is to make sure the return policy is buyer friendly and promoted prominently. Another thing you can consider is to create banners on how easy it is to return merchandise and publish them at strategic touch points in the conversion journey such as shopping cart pages or even product pages. In the end, the customer is always right and the data is out there to make the appropriate improvements if needed.
Now, let’s see how our EzeeShip platform comes into play, not only did we help you notice what customers are looking for through these valuable tips, but we can connect you to the Titans in the E-commerce Industry such as Amazon, eBay, Big Commerce, Etsy, and Ship Station by providing you with a way of making multiple orders on labels having the data necessary from all of these all-inclusive marketplaces at your finger tips saving you the time and making your sales in the long run more efficient. If you have any questions on your shipping needs and how to get the best rates possible for your business, here at Ezeeship, we have an exceptional team that is more than happy to help.
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Shipping can be fun and rewarding!