Understanding customers and their behaviors is a critical element of any online retailer’s success. With the emergence of new devices and platforms, retailers must optimize their strategy across more customer touchpoints than ever.
What to do with all the information
The abundance of touchpoints can result in a highly fragmented view of the customer. A lack of understanding of those fragments hinders marketers’ ability to personalize their communication and approach to each customer. As a result, many retailers are turning to customer intelligence to get to know their consumers better, increase sales, and optimize the customer journey.
– They can use it to find out what channels work for their audience, what are the demographics, their themes, priorities, problems, and create a memorable experience tailored for their psychology.
– E-commerce businesses can use CI to examine what engages visitors well before placing an order so they know how to stimulate more profitable engagement and increase sales.
– CI can also help online retailers examine the general flow of interaction with their website to identify missing points like a more visible FAQ page, support/contact form, terms, and conditions, etc.
– Shopping personas are avatars of customers that describe the customers’ needs, preferences, motivations, and just about anything else we know about them. The buyer personas can help create website content, marketing campaigns, products and are the foundation of a smart marketing strategy.
– An old rule claims that about 20 percent of your customers produce 80 percent of your sales. Therefore it is essential to track and determine who are your best customers to stay in touch with them and to ultimately convert them into your most loyal customers.
– With the help of customer intelligence interactions with shoppers can be automated and personalized at different touchpoints in the customer journey.
E-commerce is not (just) about the transaction. People can buy identical products from many sellers online and offline at competitive prices. Customers buy experiences. In fact, studies show that 42% of people say they’d pay more for a friendlier service and 52% would pay a premium for faster service.