The e-commerce sector has experienced unprecedented growth in recent years, accelerated by the pandemic that has created new digital shopping habits. The changing customer profile brought new priorities to the top of retailers' lists: providing integrated omnichannel experiences, reaching a wider geographic area, expanding into new sales channels such as marketplaces, or providing fast and reliable delivery services.
But now, in a global context marked by inflation, economic downturns and diminishing consumer confidence, retaining customers and attracting new ones is more challenging than ever. In order to thrive in 2023, retail and e-commerce companies will need to be more aware than ever of their customers' needs.
In the article "The Essential 5: Must-Have Attributes for Online Shopping and Delivery to Meet Customer Expectations", we explored what people specifically want when they order online, but also how they expect it to be delivered. In this article, we'll explore why and how your company should adopt a customer-centric approach, and what the benefits are.
With markets stagnating or even declining in some categories, retailers are under increased pressure from increased competition for market share and higher customer expectations. Shoppers are demanding quality products and premium services for less money as they realize the power they have in their relationship with brands. According to PwC's Customer Loyalty Survey 2022, released in June 2022, more than half of respondents said that getting good value for the price of a product or service is a top reason for continuing to use or buy from a company.
But prices cannot be discounted indefinitely and do not necessarily create long-term commitments, so retailers are looking for alternative methods to build brand equity and drive loyalty. Companies that focus on delivering a differentiated, seamless, personalized customer experience are more likely to retain customers and see repeat business, even in a challenging economic environment.
Last-mile delivery is a critical component of the overall customer experience. It's the final stage of the buying journey and can make or break a customer's perception of your company. If the delivery process is smooth and efficient, the customer is more likely to be satisfied with the overall experience. Offering a range of delivery options that fit a variety of lifestyles and enabling customized journeys based on customer preferences is critical to successfully closing the sales cycle and setting the stage for a new one in the future.
Being customer-centric and delivering a great customer experience has many benefits for your entire business. Let's explore some of the most important ones:
We already know that customer experience is critical to building and maintaining brand loyalty. Studies show that trust is very fragile and can be broken after just one bad experience.
The PwC Barometer shows that more than half (55%) of respondents said they would stop buying from a company they otherwise liked after several bad experiences, and 8% said they would stop after just one bad experience.
More interestingly, 32% of respondents say they're willing to give up on a brand if it delivers inconsistent experiences. In a flat market, losing customers from the existing base is a cost that no company can afford, especially when facing a highly competitive landscape.
With the Postis Platform, we can help you build customer loyalty and deliver consistent and predictable experiences through automated processes, delivery option diversification, and experience personalization. For example, your customers can choose a delivery service that best fits their lifestyle. They can choose the location - home delivery, PUDO/locker network, pickup location, curbside delivery, in-store delivery - or the speed - express, same day, next day, scheduled, 3-day locker hold - right from your site's shopping cart. And it all happens seamlessly, because our AI algorithms always choose the best delivery option for each individual delivery context, taking into account more than 100 selection criteria.
Reduced customer acquisition costs (CACs) mean increased profitability for your business. And everyone knows that the cost of acquiring new customers is significantly higher than the cost of retaining existing customers, especially now that more competitors are fighting for market share and the media landscape is cluttered.
Increasing customer retention and reducing churn have a huge impact on a company's margins, leaving more room for short-term discounts or long-term investments in new tools and technologies. Delivering a great customer experience also helps reduce the cost of creating new buying opportunities.
With the Postis Platform, you can keep your customers close with constant, real-time communication about delivery status updates via SMS, email or the Parcely by Postis mobile app. Built-in promotional banners turn delivery communications into opportunities to promote personalized offers and generate new sales cycles with your existing customer base.
Providing a personalized experience, knowing your customers' preferences, and tailoring your offerings to their needs is critical to increasing your average basket value. By providing personalized product recommendations and creating a smooth process from the first click on your site to the moment the product is delivered and used, you can increase your sales.
This process includes cross-sell and upsell rates. If a customer trusts your brand, he or she will be more likely to purchase a more expensive version of a product.
What does it take to achieve customer centricity? In simple terms, it requires that every business decision be made based on customer needs and preferences.
Knowing your customers' habits, preferences, and buying patterns is key. Meeting their needs is essential, especially for retailers and online stores. It involves tailoring offers, recommending products, providing value-added services and creating experiences that fit their own lifestyles.
At Postis, we believe that adopting an integrated omnichannel approach, where customers move seamlessly from online to offline and back again, providing a great experience from the first click on the website to delivery and post-delivery interactions, and being there for your customers are key to becoming customer-centric.
To achieve optimal customer journeys, it's important for companies to have integrated IT ecosystems. These include the e-commerce platform, online stores, warehouse management system (WMS), transportation management system (TMS), and customer relationship management (CRM) system. They allow companies to have a complete view of the customer journey, from the moment they start browsing products to the moment the product is delivered and used.
All IT systems need to talk to each other, and open digital platforms like Postis can allow companies to aggregate data about processes, performance, and customer options and satisfaction. This information, when collected systematically, can be used to make real-time, AI-powered decisions to optimize and personalize journeys, ensuring that the delivery process is smooth, efficient, and relevant.
By using the Postis Platform, companies can improve the customer experience and differentiate themselves in a challenging market.
Becoming customer-centric takes effort, but it can be done easily, quickly and cost-effectively with the right systems, tools and processes.
Postis has the knowledge and tools to provide you with insight into your customers' behavior and preferences in the last mile delivery segment. Our consultative approach will provide you with the right technology solution and capabilities, taking into account your current IT infrastructure, as well as your future development plans and customer experience.
You can choose from more than 200 European carriers already integrated into our platform and activate, test and scale the right delivery option for your sales channels, logistics ecosystem, products, brand experience and customer profiles.
Process, performance and cost data is systematically collected, organized, orchestrated across systems, analyzed and used by AI algorithms to continuously improve your efficiency.
Real-time status updates keep delivery predictable and your customers close, even after they leave your site.
What's more, you can continually improve because you can hear your customers' voices and get their feedback on the order right after it's delivered. If there is a problem (the order was damaged, the order was late, the courier was rude, etc.), you can respond quickly before you lose their trust and loyalty.
A seamless delivery process means lower refusal rates, so you can optimize all of these costs with Postis solutions.
In conclusion, customer experience is a critical component of success in the ecommerce world of 2023. Companies are more likely to retain customers and see repeat business if they focus on delivering a high-quality customer experience. The last mile of delivery is an important part of the overall customer experience, and companies will need to adopt a customer-centric strategy to ensure that this stage of the journey goes as smoothly and efficiently as possible. In order to achieve an optimal customer journey, companies need to have integrated IT systems in place and use digital platforms to bring these systems together. Customer data is also crucial to improving the customer experience, and organizations must collect and analyze customer data to make informed decisions about how to improve the customer experience.
Anticipating consumer needs, becoming fully customer-centric, and focusing on the differentiators that a personalized experience offers will help your company stay in the game no matter what times we're in.
Find out more about effective deliveries from one of our colleagues. We are happy to help!
Photo by Kira auf der Heide on Unsplash
