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Ecommerce Personalization for Enhanced Online Experience: Be Helpful, Not Invasive
Editor's note: Personalization remains one of the most important trends in the ecommerce industry and plays a huge role in achieving great customer experience. If you are not sure how to personalize your website and create a better environment for your audience, you are welcome to request the assistance from ScienceSoft’s experts in custom ecommerce development.
Studies show that 80% of buyers are more likely to buy from a company that has a personalized website and delivers personalized communication, and tend to avoid generic messages that don’t resonate with their needs.
In this article, I will explain the essence of ecommerce personalization, share which elements of customer interaction in a web store can be tailored and illustrate the ideas of personalized shopping experience with website examples.
What is online personalization?
First of all, ecommerce personalization is not an obtrusive technique when you annoy customers with endless attempts to initiate a dialogue or sell stuff. It’s rather smart targeting when you first collect customer data and draw conclusions upon customers’ interests and needs, and then create logical recommendations. The ultimate goal of the approach is to achieve a longer dwell time and increase conversions from your website.
Companies that are interested in creating personalized shopping experiences should be technically mature and have personalization software integrated with their web store to capture data about the behavior of users, their history of interactions with the web store, and the context of these interactions. Such data may include:
- Geolocation.
- Type of device.
- Time zone.
- Items abandoned in shopping carts.
- Recently viewed products.
- Wish list.
- Past purchases.
- Frequency of visiting the web store.
- Purchasing frequency.
- Average order volume.
- Social media interactions with the company.
Personalization in action
Home page
It is important for a brand to create an environment where visitors will feel heard and appreciated. Online shopping starts on the homepage of your website. That is the perfect moment to collect data about users and offer tailored experience every time they come back. This process should be transparent, and your visitors should decide if they want to allow you to use their data (location, gender, age, etc.).
If you wonder what kind of content can be personalized on the homepage, start watching our ecommerce demo. It illustrates ScienceSoft’s vision of effective ecommerce personalization and gives a cool idea for the homepage.
Product recommendations
By offering personalized product recommendations, you help customers find the best match and increase a chance of conversion – a double win for both parties! When a customer is surfing the website, the personalization engine analyzes their previous buying choices and offers similar items. I must say, fashion brands have mastered this personalization type perfectly.
Source: asos.com
Product catalog
You will recognize websites that have done proper product catalog personalization by the currency, language and size charts changing based on the location. Nike, for example, offers you to choose the country when you visit the website for the first time. Next time, you will instantly see products in the catalog available for delivery to your location.
Email marketing
For well-executed email personalization, the two most important things are timing and friendly tone. No one likes spammers, but friendly reminders about a new release of a favorite product, or an abandoned cart are welcome. A good email strategy based on the accumulated customer knowledge can spark interest in your brand, and exclusive tips and offers can trigger a prospect to return to your web store and make a purchase. Tailored emails can create stronger connections between you and your audience. Make sure to include in emails personalized product recommendations described earlier, but also don’t forget to greet your clients by name, just like Sephora does.
Social media
On social media platforms, you can create stories that speak to your audience directly. The benefits of using these channels are cost-effectiveness and a wide range of options that you can play with. In Instagram, you can use polls to ask your audience about important topics and collect relevant data. People love being involved, so this will give you active audience engagement as well as data for future content planning.
Add your brand to personalization success stories
Brands all over the world are already aware that personalization is something that is bringing them higher engagement rates and more conversions. It is easy to get accustomed to good things, and we can't blame customers for having high expectations of your brand too. There are many website examples that you can look at and get inspired. The hard part of it is execution, and here we can be of real help! ScienceSoft’s experts are ready to create customized journeys for your clients, just let us know.