How to optimize the customer journey for an e-commerce business?

E-Commerce customer journey

E-commerce customer journey describes the phases that a customer experiences with an online e-commerce store, from the time they first become aware of the products to the moment they purchase. With so much noise on the internet, it is difficult for brands and e-commerce stores to captivate the target audience's attention. Hence, the customer journey should be smooth for people. A bad experience could lead to visitors bouncing back and shopping cart abandonment. Thus, it is crucial to optimize the customer journey for an e-commerce business.

As experts in digital marketing, we understand that today's marketing is all about providing the right customer experience to potential buyers. It could be said that experiences are more important than products now, and some marketers even say that the experiences are the new products.

A customer goes through various stages before purchasing from any brand. Hence, the customers must enjoy the experience of shopping with you. Some of the examples of the right customer experience include having the products available in stock, making personalized offers for the customers at the right time, and you have answers to every query of the audience along with having a focused customer support team. Find this resource on customer onboarding.

You could work with us, the leading digital marketing agency to assist you in optimizing customer journey.

Customer Journey Layers:

Customer Journey Layers

Awareness: 

Customers don't know about your existence yet. Broadcast and social media channels could help come in front of the right audience.

Interest:

Customers are interested in a product, but they need more information. Here comes the role of content marketing.

Desire:

Customers know that they want a product, but they are evaluating who to buy from. Digital marketing could help win the trust of audience. CodeDesign is a leading digital agency and we could you connect with the prospects. Read this guide on PPC campaign strategy.

Decision:

The target audience is ready to take action. Be visible to them and smoothen the buying experience. 

Post-action:

You have sold the product, but there is a tremendous opportunity to show that you care for your customers and build loyalty. Emails could be a great way to confirm the customer about the transaction, or send additional information about the product.

How to increase brand awareness for your E-Commerce Store?

Brand Awareness

The success of your e-commerce store depends on the factors like the products you sell and the financial elements of the business. However, one more factor must be taken into consideration: how aware your potential buyers are about the existence of your e-commerce brand. Digitalization has allowed entrepreneurs to connect with potential buyers all across the globe, but, more opportunities mean more competition. Hence, brand awareness becomes a major factor for your brand's success.

Customers always look forward to get the best value for the money spent. Hence, as an e-commerce store owner, you must consider both factors, i.e., to meet your business goals and fulfill the customer's expectations.

To increase brand awareness, you could use social media for its huge audience base to get your brand noticed via various social media strategies. Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok are prominent digital marketing channels to carry out content marketing and promotional approach to get your store noticed. You would also like to get an email list of the potential buyers through pop-ups to send valuable digital assets and promotional emails to your audience. Email marketing is one of the most prominent channels to stay in the audience's mind.

Even if you have successfully brought the audience to your website, retaining them and making them navigate your website is still a challenge. Make user experience work for you. Also, ensure that you include your own experience in storytelling to connect with the audience.

Enhance the interest of your potential customers in your product

Trigger your consumers' interest

1. Sell the benefits

People generally don't care about the product. Instead, they are more interested in how their pain point could be solved. Your marketing copy should not be focused on the technical advancements or features of the product. Instead, it must be around the empathy map and the customer persona to solve the user's problem.

2. Sense of urgency

Social media is crowded with advertisements from brands all over the globe. Every single marketer is trying hard to let its voice reach its target audience. In such a competitive world, creating a sense of urgency can be a helpful approach.

• Limiting your discount time and incentive
• Focusing on the immediate benefits your product would bring to your audience

3. Use customer reviews, testimonials, badges, press-mention, etc., to boost your credibility and authority

Let us assume that you were trying to enter the new market with your new product. It is possible that in such a case, your ads would reach people who have never heard about you before. It isn't easy to sell your product during the first touchpoint between you and the customers in such a case. To get the customers excited about your brand, you could use customer reviews, testimonials, badges, press mentions, etc., to boost your credibility and authority in your niche. Read more on e-commerce SEO services.

How to sell products to the customers at the desire stage?

Desire stage

At the desire stage, the customers are thinking about purchasing from your e-commerce store. These customers are the most important people in the marketing funnel as they are the most qualified leads. This stage of marketing should be benefit-focused. You must be crystal clear in communicating your message to the customers about how your product solves the pain point and what they can expect if they sign up(or purchase) for your product or service. 

The biggest mistake that an e-commerce store could make at this stage is to have a complicated action page. Also, your brand must accept payments from most of the methods possible. Some customers might want to pay with their debit card, others might want to pay with a credit card, and some would like to use online services like PayPal, Stripe, GooglePay, etc.

Also, have a look at your checkout page from a customer's perspective. If your process is several pages long or if you ask for too much information, you might frustrate the customer and lower the user experience, ultimately leading to a loss in revenue and sales.

How to turn leads into profitable actions? Optimizing the Action Stage

Turn leads into profitable actions

If a customer is ready to purchase from your e-commerce store, you must be visible to them at the right moment. Most people generally turn to Google for their queries, even with the commercial intent. Hence, you could use search engine marketing(SEM/PPC) to enhance the user experience and let them come to the desired landing page as quickly as possible. 

The action stage is crucial for the success of any e-commerce business. Researchers show that the average shopping cart abandonment rate is around 70%. It means that people put the product into the cart but don't buy it. There could be many reasons for this loss; however, unoptimized checkout pages could be a big reason.

To optimize your checkout page: 

-Avoid any hidden costs on the checkout pages.

-Include multi-payment options.

-Highlight how you would carry out the transaction safely.

-Offer guest checkouts, and don't force people to create an account as it may frustrate them.

-Reduce form fields and simplify the checkout process with services like autofill.

-Try to keep single-page checkout.

How to improve post-sale customer experience?

 post-sale customer experience

It is easier to sell to an existing customer than to acquire a new customer. Hence, it would help if you had a good focus on the post-sale customer experience.

1. Greet with a Thank You Page:

 

Thank You Pages are an excellent opportunity to surprise your customers with pleasant surprises just after performing a call to action on your site. As the prospect has walked the first milestone, there is a massive potential for you to upsell them with your upgrades and build loyalty by showing that you care for your audience.

2. Confirmation Email with gratitude:

 

You must send a confirmational email to your prospects after they have purchased from your e-commerce store. It shows that you care for your audience and you have taken their purchase into account. The confirmation email also brings an opportunity to show gratitude to the buyers, making them feel special and turning them into loyal customers.

3. Designate Post-sale Team

Customers deserve to be treated with serious support. As an e-commerce store, you must designate team members for handling any issues that come in after the sale is complete. You should take support seriously and be available for customers when they need help.

Conclusion

Customer journey optimization focuses on connecting and mapping customer interactions across multiple touchpoints to directly influence the end-to-end customer experience. A customer journey optimization strategy is important to remain afloat in this competitive atmosphere and compete. 

As an e-commerce store, you must focus on omnichannel customer engagement and providing personalized interaction to enhance the overall customer experience. You should gather customer feedback and bring improvements in products that fulfill the expectations of the customers. Once you help your customer at their query stage, you earn loyalty.

Feel free to contact us to see the unprecedented growth of your business.

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