What is the worth of a talking prospect for an e-store?

A few days ago, I was shopping at a reputed e-store on a Saturday evening.

I searched and browsed through the products for almost thirty minutes and found what I wanted — color, design, material, quality and price.

I selected three items and added two of them in the cart. Before I add the third one, I observed its price increased by almost 15% in the blink of an eye. No wonder since online (and even offline) stores keep on changing prices based on some predefined parameters.

Let’s assume the price increase was triggered by a time-based algorithm withdrawing a specific discount offered on the item.

Now at the new price, the third item ceased to be the value for money proposition for me. And I decided to keep the purchase on hold for a while.

I wrote a mail to the customer care if they can offer me the third item at the price I selected it at. Surprisingly the reply was, “Sorry sir, we can’t.”

Fair. Their business, their decision.

Now the real story begins.

Since many of the e-stores resort to what we call re-marketing, the store started showing banner ads on almost every website I visited for a few days after the incident. Asking me to return to my abandoned cart and complete the purchase. I didn’t.

Moreover, the ads were irritating me since every time I saw them; they reminded me of the thirty minutes I wasted on the store. Somehow I started a feeling of dislike for the store which was way beyond control for my rational thought process.

Now there are three questions.

1. Where are the matrices e-stores use to decide the value of a genuine customer who cares to invest thirty minutes of his time on the store to search for what he wants and is ready to buy?
2. What is the significance of a few bucks, which the store would not have earned anyways had I made the purchase only five minutes earlier, in the context of the size of the business they are aspiring to build?
3. What flaw in the communication strategy has made them think that banner ads are more effective in winning hearts compared to a real customer talking to them via email giving an opportunity to win him for a lifetime?

E-commerce in India is emerging and everyone is learning, agreed. But there are some constants which are fundamental to all businesses, globally.

Listening to, respecting and valuing a prospect talking to you is definitely one of them.

What would have been your decision if you were the e-store?