6 Ways to Design a Seamless Commerce Experience
By Brandon Levey , CEO and Co-Founder of Stitch Labs
Note — Connected technologies give today’s consumers more purchasing power than ever before. In this first post of a two-part series on Conquering Connected Commerce, we explore how modern retailers can excel in the age of connected commerce.
Today’s customers are more connected than ever. With the number of smartphone users expected to reach 207.2 million this year in the U.S. alone, it’s safe to say that most consumers now carry the power to purchase in their pockets and purses every day. And purchase they do.
According to Internet Retailer, mobile sales now account for 30 percent of all U.S. eCommerce sales and are projected to grow at three times the overall rate of U.S. eCommerce. On a global perspective, Juniper Research predicts that by the end of 2017, more than two billion worldwide mobile phone and tablet users will make some type of mobile commerce transaction.
Still, those projections say nothing of the fact that most mobile devices are used for knowledge-gathering and discovery. Google found consumers spend more than 15 hours per week researching items on mobile devices, and 93 percent of people who use mobile to research go on to complete a purchase of a product or service.
Businesses can’t afford to ignore these trends that will only continue to grow as the number of connected devices increasingly proliferates, becoming a permanent part of buyers’ everyday lives.
Omnipresent commerce
We’re living in the “Age of the Customer,” as Forrester Research is calling it, where customers are empowered by the Internet and their mobile devices to demand an unprecedented level of customer experience. Today’s consumers expect the stores they buy from to have a responsive, easy-to-navigate site, a seamless mobile payment process, a social media presence, great customer service, fast delivery, and effortless returns. Not to mention, those same customers expect to have this same seamless experience replicated across all the top online marketplaces and sales channels they regularly frequent.
To conquer the challenges and opportunities of connected commerce, businesses must develop a dual approach of providing a seamless front-end customer experience by also implementing fully integrated supporting technologies on the back-end.
Cultivating a seamless commerce experience
Crafting a truly seamless omnichannel experience requires a mix of marketing and UX (user experience) design elements. Not only does your online brand experience need to be responsive, interactive, and easy to navigate, it also needs to be consistent, clear, and clever enough to cut through the clutter and reach customers at the right place at the right time.
Here are six steps to designing a seamless commerce experience.
1. Become a master of mobile. Gartner predicts that by 2017, U.S. customers’ mobile behavior will drive mobile commerce revenue to make up half of all U.S. digital commerce revenue. If your site isn’t optimized for mobile devices, you’re already at a disadvantage when it comes to reaching half the market. Omnichannel retailers must optimize for mobile search, enable mobile payments, experiment with mobile ads, and even create mobile applications to attract and engage customers.
2. Adopt a multichannel sales strategy. Although it may seem like customers are forcing brands to expand their presence into new sales channels, this is something businesses should be welcoming with open arms. Stitch Labs data has shown that small to medium-sized retailers increased their revenue by 38 percent by selling on a single marketplace (like Amazon, eBay, or Etsy) in addition to their branded website (hosted on eCommerce platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, or Bigcommerce). And by simply expanding to a second marketplace, online retailers can grow their revenue by an estimated 120 percent. On average, retailers who sell on at least two channels have double the revenue of retailers that sell on only one.
3. Secure online payments. All retailers know the importance of building trust with customers, and nothing is more important to buyers than the safety of their financial information. Businesses must make customers feel confident that their credit card and personal data are secure. One way to demonstrate that you’re taking the proper steps to secure customers’ data is to add SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) authentication to your eCommerce site, which helps to secure Web visitors’ data and communications by establishing an encrypted link between the Web server and browser. Security-minded shoppers will be on the lookout for the https Web signal that indicates these SSL certificates are in place and will hopefully be more likely to input their credit card information upon seeing them.
4. Provide visibility into shipping and delivery. At no time is the importance of communication more critical than between the moment a transaction takes place and when the product is actually delivered. Retailers need to effectively communicate the status of the customer’s order as it goes through the payment, fulfillment, shipping, and delivery processes. By continually providing up-to-date tracking information through emails, in-app messages, social, and/or text communications, companies can keep their customers informed and engaged.
5. Get social. As social media platforms continue to mature, they become more and more valuable to businesses. Connected customers are constantly on sites like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and YouTube discussing, researching, and sharing information (and opinions) about brands and products. And now they can even buy directly from their favorite social platforms — Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest all have buy button features. As part of the omnichannel experience, consumers expect brands to not only have a presence on these sites, but to also interact with them in a meaningful way.
6. Perfect personalization and customization. In the emerging connected economy, online shoppers will increasingly demand customization and personalization. To replace the “personal touch” of in-store experiences and add a new dimension to customer engagement, companies must leverage evolving digital marketing capabilities to cater specific content, communications, and experiences to each particular customer. Whether it’s targeted emails, gamified rewards programs, or personalized Web experiences, eCommerce brands need to start diversifying and customizing their customer experiences.
As connected technology continues to evolve and new platforms emerge, businesses need to keep their fingers on the pulse of where and how customers are finding and interacting with their brand. But establishing a consistent and compelling brand message across all relevant channels is easier said than done. In the second part of this Conquering Connected Commerce series, we will explore the back-end technologies businesses need to design and support top-notch omnichannel customer experiences.
About the Author:
Brandon Levey is the CEO of Stitch Labs. He holds a BSE and MSE in electrical engineering from the University of Michigan. While working on domestic nuclear security systems analyses at Sandia National Securities, he started two retail businesses on the side. Through his experiences in the design and manufacturing world, he identified many problems faced by small businesses, leading to the eventual launch of Stitch Labs. Follow him on Twitter at @brandonlevey.
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