4 Ways to Grow Revenue by Personalizing the Ecommerce Experience

Your online business is up and running. Great! More and more consumers are relying on ecommerce and it’s easy to see why. Compared to brick and mortar, the benefits of ecommerce are many: It’s expedient. It’s convenient. It’s cost-effective. And with a great, intuitive design, it’s simple.

But often the missing piece when you have an online platform is giving your customers a personalized experience. Providing that tailored experience can make the difference between having repeat customers, and “bouncers” who leave your site without making a purchase. Personalizing the experience has been shown to reduce bounce rate, which directly correlates to increased revenue, and creates loyal, happy customers. A few personal touches have been shown to go a long way toward generating more revenue.

Personal Touch #1: The Greeting

It’s November, and a customer in Florida came upon to your website looking for walking shoes, but the first thing she finds is a banner advertising your winter moccasins. Perfect for your Michigan customers, but you’ve just lost this one who will likely go elsewhere for more beachy footwear.

The solution? Track your site’s Average Order Value (AOV) and personalize your page for individual customers based on their viewing history and location. Using personalized metrics will allow you to target your customer with relevant promotions. Clean, bold banners with promotions and product recommendations at the top of the page will immediately let the customer know they are in the right place.

Personal Touch #2: The Tailored Shopping Experience

So you’ve got your customer’s attention with a promotion or a product recommendation. Awesome! Let’s make sure they get march into their shopping carts. There are a few simple ways to use what you know about your customers’ behavior that result in improved AOV and Conversion Rate:

• Bundle your products and offer discounts to do so. Bundles are a great way to increase revenue while making your customer’s life easier by giving them a personalized one-stop shop!
• Create loyalty programs. Customers love getting rewards, like Sephora’s successful Beauty Insider program which gives members a free birthday gift, and discounts on recommended products based on their viewing and purchase history.
• Offer personalized product recommendations. Use social networks or emails and use what you know about your customers to deliver individualized service. Your customer will feel like you know them and they are more likely to buy from a company that customizes their business just for them. Don’t be afraid to engage your customers through social media channels and make connecting to those networks easy and intuitive.
• Create Scarcity: You can do this by having limited offers, or by showing how many units are left of a product when it is low (“Hurry! Only 5 left in stock!”).Use a tool like Evidence to create scarcity. 
• Offer free or branded shipping. Consumers often abandon their shopping carts without a purchase when they are surprised at checkout by the shipping costs. Let them know up front that their shipping is either free, or discounted.
• Provide Live Chat. Shoppers love being able to interact with a real human being should they have a quick question. This allows for a friendly introduction, and you can now communicate and offer support on a first-name basis. Recording and tracking Live Chat conversations further allows you to gather metrics that can inform an FAQ page or make adjustments. Feedback is always great!

Personal Touch #3: The Easy Checkout

Reduce shopping card advancement, where customers place items in their cart only to abandon them. As mentioned above, part of that is due to unexpected costs in shipping or tax, so be upfront so that you don’t surprise your shopper. Make sure your checkout process has intuitive design so that it is easy and pleasant to use.

You can also add a Wish List button. Perhaps your customer didn’t purchase products that day, but if they are given the option for later purchase with a wish list, they are more likely to come back and buy it in the future. Remember to create urgency using limited offers so that they don’t move on for too long.

Personal Touch #4: Follow Up

If your customer does abandon their cart, another personal touch is following up with an email that has intuitive design for easy access to their saved items direct from their email. This is also an opportunity for providing additional personalized recommendations.

Implementing these features will give your customers the personal shopping experience that translates into increased revenue. The bottom line: Get to know your customers’ behavior so that you don’t miss opportunities to improve your ecommerce business and stand out from the rest.