In today's dynamic and unsure landscape, commerce strategy – what we’d once have called e-commerce strategy – is so way more than it was once. Trading is a posh journey where the moment of truth – conversion – takes place. This reality implies that every brand in every industry and with every business model must optimize the commerce experience and subsequently the shopper experience with a purpose to increase conversion rates and sales. When done accurately, this process also includes critical activities that may significantly reduce costs and meet an organization's key success metrics.
The first step is to develop a technique that focuses on commerce, a channelless experience, slightly than e-commerce, a rigid, outdated notion that doesn't meet the needs of the trendy consumer.
“It's about experiential shopping in a seamless omnichannel journey that’s so wealthy it becomes virtually channelless.” Rich Berkman, VP and senior partner of digital commerce at IBM iX
A successful commerce strategy is a holistic enterprise-wide effort that focuses on personalization and driving customer loyalty even in extremely uncertain times.
E-commerce is dead
The idea of ​​an “e-commerce company” is an anachronism, a holdover from the times when people moved into the digital world and recreated product descriptions on a web site and called it an e-commerce store. In the early days of online shopping, ecommerce brands were categorized as online stores or “multichannel” firms that operated each ecommerce web sites and brick-and-mortar locations. This era was characterised by massive online marketplaces like Amazon, e-commerce platforms like eBay, and consumer-to-consumer transactions on social media platforms like Facebook Marketplace.
Early on, e-commerce marketing strategies touted the novelty of tax-free, online-only retail, encouraging consumers to decide on an internet channel for each convenience and higher pricing options. These marketing campaigns focused on search engine marketing (search engine marketing) and similar search-related tactics to extend awareness and sales. Personalization on an e-commerce site could have caused a retailer to recollect your previous orders or your name.
In a world driven by a lot of these eCommerce sales and touchpoints, an efficient eCommerce strategy could include releasing recent products on early versions of social media or retargeting consumers across all marketing channels with an e-commerce platform. Prioritize email marketing campaign. Later within the journey, tactics like influencer marketing and social media marketing promoted channel-specific messaging that also separated a retailer's digital operations from its in-person activities.
But the paradigm has modified. Today, consumers are exhausted by limitless options and tormented by perceptions of bad actors. They expect more. The modern buyer expects a unified and seamless buying journey with multiple channels involved. The idea of ​​discrete sales channels has develop into an imperative to create fluid, dynamic experiences that meet customers exactly where they’re.
This implies that every company, no matter industry or organizational plan, must prioritize the three pillars of an ideal commerce experience strategy: Trust, relevance and luxury. Experience is the north star of conversion. By cultivating these pillars, every retailer, from small businesses to multinational corporations, can improve their experience, increase relevance and stay competitive.
Building trust in an uncertain world
Research shows that today's customer is anxious and insecure. Most consumers imagine that the world is changing too quickly; Over half imagine company leaders are lying to them, which intentionally attempts to mislead people through gross exaggerations or by providing information they know to be false. And in 2024, brand awareness means little without trust. The integrity of an organization's fame stays certainly one of the highest criteria for consumers when they give thought to where their money goes.
Customer acquisition and retention are based on consistently good experiences that reward consumer trust. Making trust a priority requires constructing relationships through transparent trading experiences. It means implementing systems that treat prospects as valued partners slightly than a series of knowledge points and goal markets to use. The need for trust in a relationship-driven commerce strategy is probably most evident in how an organization handles the information it receives from its customer base.
But trust is gained – or lost – with every interaction in the shopper journey.
- Pre-order
- Can the shopper trust that an organization will maintain competitive pricing and generate digital marketing campaigns which can be useful slightly than intrusive?
- Can the shopper trust an organization to make it easier for them to regulate their very own data?
- Is the user experience intuitive and comprehensible whether a customer is shopping online or in a store?
- Buy
- Does the corporate robotically sign recent customers up for services they don't want as they appear at their shopping carts and prepare to envision out?
- Does the payment process frustrate a customer a lot that they abandon their shopping cart?
- After purchase
- Can the shopper trust that a package shall be delivered inside a certain time-frame?
- Does the brand make it easier to do business after the acquisition?
By addressing the problem of consumer trust at every stage, an organization can eliminate fiction and consumer concerns and construct long-term relationships.
Navigating Ethical Personalization
Personalization in commerce is not any longer optional. Just as search engine marketing is a vital common practice for making an organization's web sites accessible to people online, personalization is crucial for meeting consumer expectations. Today's consumer expects a highly customized experience that anticipates their needs.
However, these same consumers are also concerned in regards to the potential costs of personalization. According to a recent According to an article in Forbes, data security is a “non-negotiable” factor for baby boomers90% of them said that protecting personal data is their top priority when selecting a brand. And for Generation X, data protection is a top priority; 87% say that is the principal factor influencing their purchasing behavior. This puts brands in a tough position.
“You can’t create an experience that resonates with consumers – an experience that’s trustworthy, relevant and convenient – ​​without understanding the emotions and motivations of the audiences being served.” Shantha Farris, Global Digital Commerce Strategy and Offering Leader at IBM iX
The vast amounts of knowledge that firms collect could be used together with external data sources to present cross-selling and upselling opportunities that customers actually like. Using automation, firms can quickly create buyer personas and use them to enhance the shopper journey and create engaging content across all channels. But in a single world, data shouldn't just be used to tell FAQ pages, content marketing tactics, and email campaigns.
To create accurate and positive experiences, brands should synthesize their proprietary customer data – resembling purchase history and preferences – with third-party sources resembling data from social media scraping, user-generated content and demographic market research. By leveraging these sources, firms can gain each real-time insights into the sentiment of their goal customers in addition to broader macro perspectives on their industry as a complete. Using advanced analytics and machine learning algorithms, such data streams could be transformed into deep insights that predict the needs of a audience.
To make sure the success of this approach, it’s crucial to put a powerful concentrate on data quality, security and ethical considerations. Brands must ensure they collect and use data in a transparent manner, comply with regulations and respect customer privacy. This allows them to construct trust with their customers and create a positive, personalized experience that drives long-term growth and loyalty throughout the whole trading journey.
Creating delightful, enjoyable experiences
As previously mentioned, experience is the important thing consider conversion, and creating comfortable experiences with consistent features stays a key driver for a corporation's sustainable growth. In a channelless world, successful brands deliver holistic customer journeys that meet customers exactly where they’re, whether the touchpoint is a product page, an SMS message, a social platform like TikTok, or an in-person visit to a store.
The way forward for commerce, complemented by automation and AI, will increasingly offer packaged customer experiences. This may include personalized subscriptions or a spread of products, resembling travel arrangements, purchased together using natural language and considering the preferences of a particular customer.
“Once you’ve gotten the inspiration for a trusted, relevant, and convenient experience, constructing that foundation with the ability of generative AI allows businesses to deepen their customer relationships and ultimately drive more profitable brand growth.” Rich Berkman, VP and Senior Partner of Digital Commerce at IBM iX
The moment of conversion can take many forms. With careful planning, the trendy retailer has the potential to create a compelling shopping experience – one which strengthens customer loyalty and fosters meaningful brand relationships. And recent technologies resembling generative AI, when used accurately, offer a chance for sustainable and strategic growth.
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