The importance of customer engagement in ecommerce businesses has grown manifold ever since the expansion of technology. The new-age customers have a plethora of options for anything and everything. That is why for the steady growth of the ecommerce business, a high-end customer engagement strategy is essential.
Over the years and more importantly, we have seen a tremendous explosion in the ecommerce business in the past decade. Moreover, customer engagement in ecommerce websites has become one of the essential criteria to become successful. Ecommerce businesses need to understand that the online customer is a moving target. It means that their buying habits and patterns are constantly evolving, and they have no qualms in relentlessly jumping from one app to the other.
As far as stats are concerned, around 73% of the customers believe that the overall shopping experience is a significant factor in their purchasing decisions. Thus, it is clear that you cannot succeed in the ecommerce business without satisfying your customers.
Thus, in this blog, we will study the importance of customer engagement strategies in ecommerce. Moreover, we will also see how leading ecommerce app development companies can help enhance the overall engagement ratio by delivering state-of-the-art apps.
What is ecommerce customer engagement?
Ecommerce consumer engagement is defined as the level of emotional connection and loyalty that a brand has with its customers. If the customers are engaged appropriately, they show more eagerness to buy things and are more inclined to do positive ‘word-of-mouth’ publicity.
If you have solid customer engagement strategies, it contributes more to the total revenue than the average. Thus, if you miss opportunities to interact with your customers, you eventually lose a chance to do business with them.
Statically representation of the growth of the ecommerce realm
Below are some emphatic stats that represent the growth of the ecommerce industry and its future perspectives:
- According to research done by eMarketer, the overall retail ecommerce sales are predicted to increases at the rate of 14.6% for the coming three years. Moreover, ecommerce retail sales have an estimated growth potential of 18.7% by 2022
- Internet Retailer did a study on the growth of B2B ecommerce and found that it will grow to a whopping $12 trillion in global sales by the year 2022
- The in-depth analysis of Big Commerce found that the entire ecommerce space is growing at 23% Year-on-Year (YoY)
- Analysts at Research Gate believe that the B2B ecommerce sales are projected to increase by more than 50% over the next five years.
Looking at these stats, we need no rocket science to understand that the horizon of the ecommerce industry is increasing by leaps and bounds. Therefore, it becomes even more necessary to maintain high levels of customer engagement on your ecommerce platform.
Why ecommerce customer engagement matters more in the current environment?
First, engage customers in your ecommerce website is a vital cog if you wish to have complete success for your ecommerce business. Because, no matter what kind of business you do, ‘Customer will always remain the king.’ And if you do not follow this rule, your ecommerce or mcommerce business will fail at the market sooner than later.
With the expansion of technology, the customers have a myriad of options for anything and everything. Thus the importance of customer engagement in ecommerce has become even more; here is why:
It helps in reducing the sales cycle
With proper ecommerce consumer engagement, businesses can render the important information proactively to the customers. In addition, it will help the customers to understand whether your services or products are a good fit for them or not.
Since the flow of information is streamlined, the customers can quickly find their best fit, reducing the overall sales cycle. Thus, you will be able to make more sales in comparatively lesser time duration.
Increasing the customer loyalty
As mentioned before, the value of ecommerce customer engagement is not limited to mere transactional purchases. It is vital as it creates an emotional bond between the product and the customer. Stats also show that adequately engaged customers in ecommerce websites are inclined to stick five times more to the brand than the new ones.
A loyal customer is tough to find and even tougher to maintain. Thus, as an ecommerce business, you must only hire the top ecommerce developers to leverage the complete benefit of customer engagement.
Enhancing customer retention
As ecommerce consumer engagement increases loyalty, it positively escalates the customer retention rate as well. Statically speaking, a good and profound customer retention strategy can keep almost 84% of your customers from leaving our ecommerce platform.
Moreover, emotionally connecting with the customer can go a long way as a company; you can have a personal touch with the customer. As you render more personalized services to the customers, you will have more chances to retain them for extended periods.
Developing the brand ambassadors
Proper customer engagement in ecommerce website will help in making the customer closely engaged with the brand. Thus, they will share this with their family and friends when they have a good experience shopping from your platform.
Moreover, they will also share their positive experience across their social media platforms. Thus, in hindsight, your customers will become the brand ambassadors of your product.
Deliver valuable customer reviews and insights
Authentic customer reviews will be critical in generating credibility to the product on your ecommerce store. Moreover, it is also necessary to have an accurate product description to have a complete idea before investing their money.
Tips to boost customer engagement to your ecommerce website
Since the new-age ecommerce customers are moving targets, you need to ‘move’ them with your product to make them buy it. For this, you have to experiment with a bunch of ecommerce promotion ideas and see what works for your targeted audience.
Here, we will run you through a list of proven tips that will helps to boost your ecommerce engagement Engage the customers with a contest.
Use various social media platforms to conduct contests with the customers related to your product and services. Moreover, you can use recent or essential events in history and engage with the customers regularly.
Instagram and Facebook are some of the best platforms where brands can generate awareness, boost their sales, and build a community. The ingredients that can make your contest successful on the social media platform are:
- Have a unique hashtag for promotion.
- Do not forget to implement all the rules and regulations before posting the contest.
- Use micro-influencers and make an engaging video to announce your contest.
- Make sure to include such content that inspires the user to participate in the contest.
Cross-sell and up-sell
Cross-selling of products helps in increasing sales. For example, if your customer purchases a laptop, you can offer a bag or a screen guard. Cross-selling is a simple process, but it has all the potential to reap rich results for your ecommerce business.
Up-selling, on the other hand, works 20 times better than cross-selling. Here you suggest a superior product to the customers for the item they are purchasing on your platform.
Showcase your best products
The ecommerce platform needs to grab the attention of the customers at the earliest. For this, you need to show best-selling products according to a particular genre and in general. By displaying your best outcome, you will generate a feeling of authenticity in the customers, increasing their interest in buying the product from your ecommerce platform.
Present testimonial reviews and other product plugs
As an ecommerce business owner, you should never underestimate the power of thoughts. A formal assessment of an ecommerce product can go a long way; moreover, if you include a photo or video review, it would be the ‘icing on the cake.’
Also Read: How to use the customer feedback you have collected.
Always have user-centric content
Always have a user-centric definition of your products, as it will help in getting better SEO ranks. In today’s rapidly evolving world, ‘out of sight means out of mind.’ Thus, it is essential for the ecommerce platform always to have relatable content to keep the customers hooked for longer durations.
Don’t forget to cash on special occasions
Special occasions like festivals, holidays, important days and weeks, etc., are the best times to enhance the customer engagement of your ecommerce platform. Thus, always plan for these special times and implement the definitive strategy well before your peers.
You can also study your peers’ work in past years during the special occasions and analyze what worked for them and whatnot.
Make the most of the social media platforms
If we say that social media platforms are as essential as ‘oxygen for life’ for ecommerce businesses in the present day and age, we’ll not overstate anything. Moreover, as the world of social media is very dynamic, having a mere presence on the platform will not be good enough.
So for starters, you need to build a community by posting regularly about your products, offers, new releases, etc.
Having a solid base on social media will also allow you to understand the needs and wants of your customers in a better way. Moreover, you can use Google Alerts to get updated about the things people have to say about your platform. Also, with Google alerts, you can monitor social media sites like Twitter and Facebook as well.
Set up triggered marketing emails
Reignite your email marketing using marketing automation to send personalized emails to your targeted audience to keep them updated with your new products and offers. For example, for customers who have abandoned your carts, you can trigger an email to them about the things they would miss if they didn’t complete their shopping.
On the other hand, the customized emails can be about the products they are shopping for customers who have logged in.
Leverage AI for value-add push notifications
The impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is enormous for customer engagement. However, for taking significant benefits of this technology, you should always opt for the best ecommerce website development company for your project.
With AI, it becomes easier for businesses to understand the customers’ buying patterns and their likes and dislikes. Thus, by using this information, the ecommerce company can send neatly strategized and personalized push notifications to the customers and increase their user engagement rate.
Co-browsing for higher engagement
Information security is the most vital thing in today’s digitally driven world. So using collaborative browsing or co-browsing will help protect your customers’ sensitive information and increase the level of their trust in you.
“Adding a human touch to your customer’s experience can help you distinguish your brand. Visual engagement tools such as co-browsing and video chat can help build an emotional bond with customers.” – Venesha Brooks
For using co-browsing, the customers don’t have to download any software. Moreover, it plays a massive role in enhancing customer satisfaction and their loyalty towards your brand.
Closing Thoughts
Customer engagement in ecommerce has all the potential to take your ecommerce business to newer heights. The catch here is to implement the engagement techniques according to your needs and requirements. Moreover, it is also advisable to consult leading ecommerce app development companies if you want long-term benefits for your business. Because focusing on customer retention is always the best way to expand your business.
