It’s easy to imagine a great customer experience with a physical store. Whenever you go to your favourite shop, you are welcomed by friendly staff who guide you in your shopping and answer all your questions. The purchase process is smooth and you love the packaging too. In the end you leave with a sense of satisfaction and delight. But what about an online store? Surely you cannot include that personal touch can you? There are many ways to improve your online store’s customer experience that also positively impact customer loyalty and boost sales. A great customer experience is what guarantees repeat sales and referrals. We’ll take you through some of our top tips in this post.
What is customer experience?
Customer experience is the way that a company interacts with its customers at every step of its relationship with the customer. It’s the impression you make on your customer as a brand. It’s how you make them feel. You may have a fantastic product but if the customer doesn’t feel good about it, they won’t be interested. The goal is to make them feel fantastic when they buy and use your product! A great customer experience is created when you speak to your customer’s emotions and help them solve a problem or fulfill a need.
Customer experience is not the same as customer service. Although these are often used interchangeably, customer experience is more than customer service. Customer service is a part of customer experience. Customer service is the help and support you offer to customers while customer experience consists of the overall image your brand presents to its customer from start to finish.
The importance of customer experience
It is said that customers form the backbone of a business. And in the case of eCommerce where you cannot physically interact with a customer it is even more important to have a great customer experience.
A good customer experience ensures your customers are happy. {design team: please show happy customers here}Happy customers are repeat customers. They talk about your brand and build credibility for your brand. On receiving a positive experience 77% of consumers are likely to recommend a brand to friends.
According to research by Super Office 86% of consumers are willing to pay more for a better customer experience. It is also expected that customer experience will be more important than price and product when it comes to brand differentiation.
According to McKinsey & Co., “Today’s consumers do not buy just products or services – more and more, their purchase decisions revolve around buying into an idea and an experience.”
This is why companies that invest time and effort on creating a great customer experience outperform their competitors. 70% of purchase decisions are driven by how the customer feels instead of factors like product quality and price. A poor customer experience will lead to poor reviews and loss of customers.
With increasing competition in eCommerce a focus on good customer experience helps brands stand out. Your company’s customer experience reflects your brand identity and values which is important for a long term growth.
Improving customer experience for your eCommerce store
The retail experience of your print on demand business consists of how your customers perceive your brand from their discovery of your custom printed products to purchase and beyond. Let’s look at some of the ways you can try to create an excellent customer experience for your print on demand eCommerce store.
- Focus on Customer Service
An exceptional customer experience includes a great customer service. Your customer service can be the difference between an unhappy customer and a loyal customer. Customers have a lot of options with the growth of eCommerce businesses. The way you treat your customers will impact your current and future sales.
Introducing live chat through chat bots is a simple yet effective way to help your customers instantly. The main benefit is that you can help the customer before or during shopping. This can help reduce complaints and issues after the purchase. [DESIGN: Find a chatbot image]
When your business expands to multiple channels, you can use a ticketing system to collect all your customer service requests and keep them in a single location.
The main idea is to make it as easy as possible for your customers to seek help and support. It may not be possible to respond right away but make it a rule to respond within a set amount of time.
- Order Product Sample
The greatest benefit of the print-on-demand model is that you do not have to keep inventory and worry about fulfillment. On the flip side when a third party is fulfilling orders you don’t get to hold the product and see what it looks like when your customer receives it.
In order to be fully confident in promoting and selling a product you must be 100% satisfied with quality and happy with the overall product. You may have carried out extensive research on your print on demand provider but you cannot be completely sure what your customers are buying unless you can hold your products in your hands.
We recommend you order a sample of each of your products before you start selling. You may have spent hours creating the perfect designs and mockups but actual printed products can look different from that on the screen. Ordering samples can help you decide if you need any changes in color, contrast, or design adjustments.
- Answers common questions
When buying products online customers can have any number of questions on their minds. Taking the time to add the most frequently asked ones on your store will pay off in terms of customer satisfaction and conversions. Customers don’t like waiting to find answers. They might not want to make a call to find answers to common questions. If they can easily find top queries right on the main website they’ll be less likely to leave.
- Improve your emails
Are you sending generic auto-generated emails for your print-on-demand store? Don’t make the mistake of ignoring your email copy. Your transactional emails get the most eyes because your customers expect to see them in their inbox.
Creating a great customer experience is all about making your brand more personable, and by letting your brand personality shine through in all your interactions with customers. Email provides a great opportunity to reflect your brand culture and personality which is known to build brand loyalty.
Do you sell pet themed custom products? Make sure your copy lovingly references pets. Include an adorable picture of kittens or puppies. Make your customer smile.
Do you sell sustainable fashion? Make sure you talk about your love for the planet. Whatever your brand personality is let it come alive through creative copywriting. It can mean the difference between customers just skimming your email and returning to purchase again. The same thing applies to your copy on your website, product pages, and checkout page.
- Add a personalized thank you
The online shopping experience can be cold and impersonal. Make it warm and personable for your eCommerce customers. You can build better relationships with customers by expressing gratitude and thanking them for choosing your company.
You can stand out by sending a personalized thank you note. Receiving a handwritten note or card can really make a person feel special. Quite often customers take a picture of your notes and share it on social media. This is essentially free marketing. You can also share their content on your accounts (with their permission) and this creates more trust with your brand.
