Customers today have a lot of options when it comes to shopping. Firstly, there are neighborhood brick-and-mortar stores and numerous online stores. You will come across people wary of online sites due to a lack of physical feel and shipping delays. But if you can think out of the box, then customers will flock to you.
Make the experience a pleasant one by incorporating some new-age tactics and tools. Moreover, a personalized approach gets them hooked. Read about all the ways to lure and keep them here.
Great User Experience
You must ensure to organize the website in the best manner possible. It involves clickable links that are easy to identify. With good information architecture, your users will be able to find what they are looking for in a short time. Ease of browsing and navigation can keep your sites in full form.
Moreover, visual elements are essential to any online venture. It is something that affects user experience in multiple ways. Hence, the graphics, user interface, and images of the products should all be high quality and visually appealing. The design elements make the site aesthetically pleasing and interactive as well. This also involves removing clutter. Clutter stresses a customer to the point of driving him away. Thus, the core is to keep ample white space on the site and make it easy to use and navigate.
Safety and Security
When you are surfing online, you will come across various bugs and viruses. The best online eCommerce sites are those that take prompt action on such issues. Customers pay through online portals, and if the environment is not safe, it can lead to many hassles. Therefore, systems and, more importantly, customer data may be compromised. The best eCommerce sites ensure to keep the digital environment safe through ServiceNow security features. Such features can reduce threats and vulnerabilities with great prowess. Customers are smart today and can differentiate between a secure site from a compromised site in a few clicks.
Any technically-savvy customer can check elements like the site’s SSL certificate, URL, and security seals. A secure SSL certificate will show ‘HTTPS’ in the beginning. Checking for missing letters and typos on the web address can easily point out if the site is authentic or not. Checking the security seal by clicking on it is another way. The link should redirect to the company that issued the seal. These are a few possibilities amongst many others that the latest software technology offers.
Live Chat Support
Today’s intelligent systems can capture data in an instant. What customers search for is easily identified through their web activities. So, the moment you see a prospect searching for something, offer assistance in the form of chatbots. Moreover, ensure to keep the bots available 24×7. Now, you can answer all general queries instantly.
If there is a complaint or an escalation, it should redirect to another helpline email or phone number. Customers will be happy this way and pleased to see that they are important to you. Chatbots can be a savior while recruiting customer service agents for mundane queries may add to overall costs.
A Detailed CRM
CRM systems can make life easy. You can now centralize all the customer interactions in one go. Thus, addressing issues becomes easy. Get all the information about any particular customer in one or two clicks. Earlier, different people oblivious to a query would make customers repeat the same story again and again. However, this irate the customers all the more. If you are a client-centric business, integrating a CRM in your web technology is a must. Now, exchanging ideas and information in a cross-functional manner is a breeze.
Social Media Tools
Engaging customers by reviews, testimonials, and interactions is the new way to go for online shopping sites. Every customer tries to search and collect information about a product before purchasing it. When you show reviews and testimonials from authentic people on your social media pages, it builds trust among the prospects.
Allow your customers to post their videos and feedback online on products and services they availed. It is all about being transparent. This will help you to engage your old customers while creating value. And, it also paves the path to get new ones. Social media has also made it easy to engage customers directly. So, get instant feedback to improve upon the product or services. Earlier, companies used to get the feedback late, by which time they would have lost the customer.
Now, you know how to take online customer service to the next level. If you start working on the above from the beginning, it will create a pleasant experience. Systematic protocols are always a great way to leverage the benefits of these tools and tactics. However, customer interactions call for much more. Each customer is different, as are their needs. So personalize each interaction to gain favor.