If you’re on a mission to optimize your online content, you need to consider using testimonials as part of your strategy. Statistics have recently proven testimonials to increase effectiveness ratings by almost 90% when influencing buyers. Testimonials have been around forever, but information of their influence on conversion rates is relatively new. Here’s all you need to know on testimonial integration and what it can do for your conversion rates.

Reviews Build Consumer Confidence

Research suggests that reviews heavily influence buying decisions and that positive customer reviews give potential buyers more trust in the products and services they are considering. Around 63% of consumers also stated that they are more willing to purchase from select online stores when those sites have posted reviews of their offerings.

Testimonials Build Trust

Customers like to see vulnerabilities in the businesses and brands that they shop from. Take a look at the example from Trust & Will below.

Believe it or not, having a mix of both good and bad reviews is a positive thing. It gives customers a greater understanding of what the company is likely to provide and demonstrates the overall value. When testimonials are linked to the business social media accounts, it helps you gain customer interest and shows legitimacy.

Testimonials Show What’s Real

Some customers say that they are hesitant to trust reviews unless they specify that real people have written them. When all of the reviews are overwhelmingly positive or appear to have the same voice and tone, that’s a red flag for consumers and they might rethink their options. In contrast, when reviews are a unique blend of different voices expressing the things that they like and don’t like about the business, products, or services, customers are more likely to trust what the testimonials say and feel more confident in purchasing from the respective businesses.

Visual Testimonials Are Highly Effective

Visual testimonials are now a fundamental aspect of product lines for various home furnishings. Many websites will set up their testimonial sections to post real-life social media photos of customers with their purchased products. Seeing these products in someone’s home setting gives potential buyers the ability to imagine what the outcome will look like for them and enables a sense of trust in the company. These findings are particularly true for furniture companies whose site photos look more like computerized replications. Seeing “real life” elements in customer photos helps potential consumers decide if they want to proceed with their purchase.

The Good and Bad Reviews

Knowing that testimonials are both positive and negative, customers appreciate the honesty that brands are willing to share regarding their products and services. Having the integrity to show both the good and the bad sides of the business will promote customer loyalty and trust.

Testimonials Speed Conversion Rates

Testimonials help to increase conversion rates because they encourage constant traffic. As a result of reaching more people, more users convert, generating significant sales and revenue percentages. The possibilities are seemingly endless when it comes to including testimonials for conversion benefits. One source reported that a 50% increase could lead to a 500% increase in profits. There are many different ways to improve conversion rates, but no other method other than testimonials lines up with the statistics. The proof is in the pudding, as they say, and testimonials are no exception to this.

Be Mindful of the Specifics

It’s important to remember that just including testimonials on your website and social media pages is not enough to dramatically influence conversion rates. You need to find the perfect blend of good and bad reviews and mix in different types of testimonials for increased conversion rates to come through.

Use Different Types of Testimonials

Be sure to include a variety of testimonials from all forms of media. Ask satisfied customers to post comments, videos, and images for product and service reviews. As the saying goes, “There’s no such thing as bad press.” Having a few lousy testimonial reviews is not a bad thing either. You want to show your online users that your business is popular, for better and for worse. It is less likely that a consumer will not trust a brand if all of the reviews are positive. Everyone is aware of the paid reviews that businesses offer individuals to gain more traction and attention to their business. Having a mix of both good and bad reviews appears much more genuine and will give customers the insight they need to determine if your products and services are what they are looking for.

Reach for the Stars

If possible, include testimonials from influencers or celebrities (even on the local level) to review your products and services. Customers will be excited that those they emulate are interested in the same goods and services they are. Again, please do not overdo it with sponsors and figureheads. The key to winning customer trust, brand loyalty, and generating more leads is authenticity.

Speaking of stars, even testimonials that include star rankings create more leads than having no testimonials at all. Some people prefer sentiment over logic, but others prefer the opposite. Seeing a mix of high and low ratings will also provide these linear-minded consumers with the trust and confidence needed to generate sales and brand loyalty. You can also feature any awards your business has won on your site, as these act as additional testimonials. Here is an example from Intuit:

Testimonials are tricky in that they require a mix of different media forms to make a difference in your business or product line. However, they are much easier to implement than complex algorithms or search engine optimization techniques that are too advanced for the average person. Without extensive research or help from a professional, most conversion rate techniques will leave you scratching your head in confusion. So, take advantage of this more straightforward process and quickly increase your conversion rates with testimonials.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Matt Casadona

Matt Casadona has a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, with a concentration in Marketing and a minor in Psychology. He is currently a contributing editor for 365 Business Tips. Matt is passionate about marketing and business strategy and enjoys the San Diego life, traveling and music.

Need to Convert More Leads? Try Testimonials was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Across Google Play and the Apple App store, there are more than four million products for consumers to explore.

In today’s world, we do more with our phones than ever before. Users check their email, chat with colleagues, reach friends, play games, and watch videos on the move.

Apps offer a convenient way to extend the functionality of the modern smartphone.

They also provide an excellent opportunity for eCommerce business owners and online entrepreneurs. With the right app idea, you can appeal to countless customers at once, unlocking unlimited chances for brand growth and profit.

Unfortunately, there are a few hurdles to overcome on the way to success.

To get the best results from your app, you’ll need to ensure that there are no usability or accessibility issues.

Issue 1: Failure to Embrace Universal Design

Making your app as accessible as possible doesn’t just mean that you list it on popular app marketplaces.

To connect with the widest selection of potential customers, you need to consider the concept of universal design.

This basically means taking steps to make your user interface work for everyone, including people with disabilities.

If someone is unable to use your app because of an issue with their sight, hearing, or motor skills, you’re limiting your potential to connect with a substantial part of the population. In addition, this can poorly reflect on your brand image and reputation.

Exploring universal design is becoming a common trend in both web and app design, particularly as customers continue to search for businesses with good ethics to buy from.

When creating your app, ask yourself whether you could still achieve the same outcomes if you had trouble with your hearing, issues with color blindness, or other concerns. If you’re not sure, benchmark your app against some best accessibility practices and guidelines.

Issue 2: Complex Navigation

From the moment someone clicks into your app, they need to know exactly what they should be doing, and where they need to tap to progress.

Whether you’re designing an app that gives people their latest credit score, or you’re creating something to boost customer loyalty, the more complicated it is to navigate your solution, the more likely you are to fail.

It’s easy for designers and developers to get caught in the stream of inspiration and creativity when making a new app. They start adding features and elements and forget to keep simplicity first.

If you’re concerned that your app might be getting too complex for your target audience, consider asking a few different people to test it.

Can people swap between pages in your eCommerce store easily? How easy is it to find your navigation? How fast can they complete the transaction, and are there any steps you can cut to shorten the checkout process?

Testing and gathering feedback can save you a lot of wasted time and money.

Issue 3: Engagement Issues

People engage with the apps on their smartphones in a different way than they do with the websites and marketplaces that they visit on their computer.

One reason eCommerce apps are popular is that they create a nearly effortless shopping experience that sometimes requires no more than a few taps on the screen.

If you’re designing a smartphone app for your eCommerce store, you need to remember how your customers will expect to be able to use it. Simple activities powered by taps and swipes are often a great start.

If there are any buttons or links on the page that your customers need to click, make sure that they’re easy to access.

Also, consider what fonts you’re going to be using and whether they’re easy to read on smaller devices. Think about the way colors interact in your app and how they draw attention to different features.

Everything, from the videos that play within your app, to the menu options for the service itself, should be simple and intuitive.

If buttons aren’t clickable, how can your audience add an item to their basket? If they can’t play the product videos on your eCommerce site, how can they see that a product is right for them?

Issue 4: Gesture Sensitivity

As smartphones and mobile devices grow more advanced, app developers are discovering new ways for users to engage with and experience various features.

For instance, instead of relying entirely on taps, you might experiment with features like voice control and gesture-sensitive layouts.

Unfortunately, while unique UI strategies are great for making your app stand out from the competition, they can also lead to frustration.

If your customers are constantly clicking away from the page they need because they’re making a gesture incorrectly, they’re going to get annoyed. If they accidentally leave at a checkout page, what are the odds that they’ll want to go through the whole ordeal again?

Experiment with the sensitivity of your controls, and check how tapping and swiping works on each part of your app. If your layout is too sensitive, you may need to dial it back a little.

Consider testing various forms of your interface on a focus group to see how they respond to different sensitivity levels.

Issue 5: Excessive Complexity

As mentioned above, it’s easy to get carried away by great ideas when you’re building an exciting new app. However, it’s important to have a detailed vision that you can stick to, which will prevent you from going too far off the rails.

Start by identifying the problem you want to solve with the app and concentrate on addressing that issue in the simplest way possible.

People fall in love with the apps that are convenient, intuitive, and effortless.

Don’t make the mistake of jumping into app creation with just a general idea of what you want to do in mind. Establish a clear goal. Strip away all features and extras that don’t support that goal, or at the minimum, place less relevant features somewhere they won’t distract the user from a purchase.

The lack of navigation often leads to a messy app with overlapping elements that your customers can’t use or understand. Plan your app carefully from day one, and make sure you regularly check for any signs of extra complexity.

Make the Most of Your eCommerce App

An eCommerce app is a fantastic way to connect with your customers and boost your chances of bigger profits.

In a world full of smartphone shoppers, apps offer a fantastic way to engage and delight people from all over the world.

Plus, they’re a chance for you to stay front-of-mind with your clients by earning a permanent space in their pocket.

Just remember that the best apps are the ones your customers love using. Therefore, always put accessibility and usability first.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Joe Peters

Joe Peters is a Baltimore-based freelance writer and an ultimate techie. When he is not working his magic as a marketing consultant, this incurable tech junkie devours the news on the latest gadgets and binge-watches his favorite TV shows. Follow him on @bmorepeters

Usability and Accessibility Issues That Ruin eCommerce App Conversions was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

There is a reason why customer experience is the main priority of all businesses nowadays and a very good reason too. People shop online more than ever and it is not a secret that consumers are often willing to pay more for a product or service if their customer experience is great. In fact, 86% of them, which is not a surprise because after all, satisfied customers are loyal customers.

What this means is that you’re missing out on sales and possibly returning customers by not keeping your customer service at the highest standard. Besides, it’s a known fact that acquiring a new customer is five times more expensive than retaining an existing one. Therefore, improving customer experience is not only desirable, it is crucial.

Businesses that have not yet realized this have a lot to do to keep up with successful companies worldwide. As something that can make or break your business (especially now when more people are shopping online than ever) customer experience is the most important aspect that you should focus on in 2021 and the future. Below, we have listed 5 ways to improve your online customer experience.

Solve Your Customers’ Problems

Negative customer experiences can and should be used to identify issues, resolve them, and improve the overall experience of your online shoppers. With customer feedback, you will gather valuable data on the areas that need improvement and work on them. Know what your consumers really want and make it possible.

This is the only way to really know whether your customers are satisfied with your product/service, why not (if customer feedback is negative), what would they change, etc. Besides, when you seek customer feedback, it shows that you care about what your customers think of your product and whether it has benefited them and in what way, etc.

Shoppers appreciate such an approach and are likely to return to your website to browse and purchase more products.

Invest in Redesigning Your Website

This is the key to success for every business that sells products or services online. Studies show that 74% of users are likely to return to user-friendly websites. If you don’t have a functional, easy to navigate website, then no matter how great your product or your service is, you’re likely to lose many potential customers.

Why?

Because in this day and age of the digital transformation and with the abundance of options, online shoppers want an impeccable experience and won’t compromise. They don’t have the patience for poorly designed, outdated, slow websites.

They want to be able to easily navigate a website, browse products and find the information they need quickly. If your website is hard to navigate or worse, it’s not optimized for mobile devices, you’re set to fail in the eCommerce world.

Online shoppers use different devices to browse products and shop such as mobile phones and tablets, which means that your website needs to load quickly and be very easy to use regardless of the device in question. Hence, redesigning and optimizing your website is essential if you want to be able to compete with the big names.

Design Matters

People are visual beings and react to images, logos, etc. A study revealed that 94% of users form a first impression of your website based on your design. They form an opinion about your brand in less than a second. This shows just how powerful great design is and how important it is for online retailers, especially during this COVID-19 crisis.

By redesigning your website, you can improve it both visually and technically so that it not only has an appealing design but is also very user-friendly, fast, and responsive. You can fix what didn’t work, remove outdated parts, update content and products, and improve the overall functionality of your website.

This is a chance to implement the best practices and technical solutions to create an impressive website and facilitate an impeccable customer experience. Win customers over with fast load time, attractive design, and a functional website, and they will keep coming back.

Offer Free Benefits

It’s not a secret that people love receiving free things. You can use this to your advantage and attract new and retain your existing customers by offering them certain benefits such as loyalty points or free shipping. Both of these offers have become increasingly popular and most webshops now feature them.

Online shopping is becoming prevalent, sped up by the ongoing pandemic which forced us to stay at home and browse products instead of going to physical stores. But even though they are willing to pay a significant amount of money for a product, users love it when they don’t have to pay the shipping. Discounts and loyalty programs are also quite beneficial as they invite customers to continue purchasing your products to gain even more benefits.

Implement Live Chat Support

When they have a problem and reach out to your customer support, users expect a response quickly. Providing help fast can make a difference in whether the customer will continue with their purchase or abandon your website. And they do expect that you’ll be able to answer their queries 24/7.

While some users prefer to use email or social media for their complaints, the majority of them favor live chat, 42% of them to be precise. This is because they don’t have to wait. The live chat function allows them to get their questions answered in real time which is essential for your overall customer experience success.

Build a Knowledge Base

Another way you can improve customer experience is by building a knowledge base, something that users can turn to in order to find answers to their questions or solve a problem. A knowledge base or a self-service function includes answers to frequently asked questions (FAQ), how-tos, videos, guides, screenshots, etc.

A knowledge base can also be in the form of a forum where other customers have asked questions and received answers. When a user encounters an issue, they can refer to the forum or FAQ to check whether someone has already provided an answer to their question before they decide to reach out to a customer support agent.

Most websites now have a knowledge base as users expect it. However, to be useful, your knowledge base should be updated regularly with new information, photos, and videos.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Alexander

Alexander Hunkin is an Australian based startup advisor with in-depth
experience in growing business. His meaningful and strategic advices have
helped in setting and growing many startup companies in Brisbane and Perth.
Alexander is also a content creator for different niches. The top ones are
business, career, finance and marketing. He aspires to share his
experiences and is always on the lookout for the next opportunity to
enhance his skills. When he isn’t busy working, you can find him cooking
exotic meals, scuba diving and cycling.

5 Ways to Improve Your Online Customer Experience was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Any growing business will experiment with various techniques to gain better revenues. From multiple channels of marketing to product development and gaining expertise in customer care; companies go through the drill of building strategies to cover the myriad aspects of business. However, it is easy to miss taking note of one of the most important structures that form the spine of your company: your employees.

While hiring and talent acquisition falls under the scope of the Human Resources department, it is only sensible to recognize how hiring affects sales. Hiring is not as straightforward as simply filling vacancies or check-marking skills on resumes. Hiring policies and plans, now, have to be much more comprehensive. Not only are companies measured by diversity, but they are also judged for a lack of it.

But is diversity just a metric?

Research by BCG shows that in fact, diversity is not just a metric, but rather translates into better financial performance and increased innovation. One of the reasons for this is that diverse employees also means diverse solutions to every problem. If we dial back, it can also avoid certain problems altogether. In 2020, as a whirlwind of conversations about racism began and eventually led to the topic of diverse workforces, many organizations went through major changes and setbacks. Man Repeller’s founder, Leandra Cohen, stepped down upon accusations of a non-diverse standpoint of the magazine. Bon Appetit hired people of color in its team. These controversies were less likely to have happened if a diverse workforce was already in place.

A diverse workforce

Does diversity simply mean hiring people of color? Or does it mean hiring more women? It is both and more. It’s important to remember that the “diversity box” cannot simply be checked off by having a board that is 40% women. Yes, this is one step in the right direction, but not nearly enough. Rather, a truly diverse workforce has people from different backgrounds, different ethnicities, different genders, biases, education, and even sexual orientation. A diverse workforce brings a diverse skill set to the company as a whole, making it richer in not only anticipating and preventing problems but also solving them.

If you’re planning on diversifying your workforce it is best to account for many different kinds of people and make cultural changes that will help them in adjusting to your company.

What are the benefits of having a diverse workforce?

Diverse workforces everywhere can impact society at large by the tolerance and acceptance that comes with the notion of diversity. Furthermore, diverse workforces have a range of business-specific benefits, both for employees and employers.

As an employee

For employees, a diverse workforce creates an environment conducive to creativity and collaboration. If teamwork isn’t your best suit, a diverse workplace is the best place to get better at it. When you work with people from different walks of life, teamwork becomes more difficult but also much more rewarding. If you belong to a minority community, then diverse workplaces can be a boon.

As an employer

The most important decisive factor for hiring any new employee is whether they will add to your revenue or not. A diverse workforce, as stated in the BCG article, can increase revenue by up to 19%! This is true for companies that focus on creating teams with multiple areas of diversity, as opposed to focusing on one specific area of diversity. Additionally, having a diverse leadership team — such as one that consists of minority-status individuals — can lead to new streams of revenue and/or funding altogether. Minority-owned businesses have access to a range of resources to help support their business plans.

Secondly, inculcating a diverse workforce into your business model can get you the best talent, which is also more loyal. Many a time, the best talent might not belong to a majority community. But if your company’s policies make them comfortable, there is a higher chance of them joining you. The work culture could also make them stay around for longer and remain loyal to you for a long time to come.

Finally, and to put it plainly, diversity makes you look good. Consumers today, especially Gen Z, can be won over by centralizing your marketing around them. Gen Zers are looking for brands that hire diverse employees and stand for the values they believe in. To get noticed, being a company that stands for diversity is key.

How to make the change

If you want to have a diverse workforce, your company will have to make adjustments to accommodate it. There are many changes you can make to suit a diverse work environment. However, these have to begin with your recruitment process that should account for different kinds of people. Interview questions should be more sensitized and qualifying factors may have to be amended as well.

Importantly, your recruitment processes should aim to maintain balance among your teams. This means that your team should ideally be a mix of people that can complement each other. One member’s weaknesses should be balanced by another member’s strengths. A good, diverse team is one that covers for each other and is stronger as a unit rather than individually. As stated in Re:amaze’s downloadable e-book, “pay close attention to the few right people, right personalities, and right ideas that will foster healthy cultures, communications, and processes later down the road.” This balance can look different for every company and therefore, has to be decided by the top management. But don’t forget to ensure that your top management is a team of diverse people as well so that they can effectively voice the concerns of different groups.

Another thing to keep in mind is that diversity extends well beyond one’s cultural or ethnic background. A diverse workforce includes people from disabled groups as well. This means you have to consider how open all aspects of your business are — from web accessibility to your physical office space.

For regular business owners, the time is here to accept and normalize a diverse workforce. It is time to let go of older biases and notions and welcome the differences that also bring us together as humans. Both consumers and prospective employees today appreciate and actively look for diverse companies. As a bonus, there’s a high probability of improving revenue and sales through the implementation of a diverse workforce.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Noah

Noah Rue is a journalist and content writer, fascinated with the
intersection between global health, personal wellness, and modern
technology. When he isn’t searching out his next great writing opportunity,
Noah likes to shut off his devices and head to the mountains to disconnect.

The benefits of Having a Diverse Workforce For Your Business was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

In our day and time, influencers can play a very important role in a company’s success. Because of the influence they hold over their audience, they can easily promote a business’ products and help increase its sales. Collaborating with the right people will help your eCommerce grow and connect with more potential customers.

In most cases, people don’t know how to use video marketing to their advantage. If you are new to this, you will most likely need some guidance. Here are some of the best tips to help you learn how to use influencer video marketing to grow your eCommerce.

1. Work with the right influencers

Finding the right person to work with can be tricky for every niche. While there are many that will promise a lot of things, only a few influencers will be able to meet your expectations. This is exactly why you should make sure to reach out to a lot of people when you are starting this new chapter. The best way to reach out to an influencer is through their social media platforms.

Sending a direct message about a potential collaboration will allow them to see your company’s profile. Many influencers might ignore your messages if they are not convinced you are a legitimate business. This is exactly why you should include images and links to your profiles and work towards gaining some followers.

When you are looking to work with a new influencer, there are some things to keep in mind. These will help you ensure that the collaboration will be a success. Some of these are the following:

● Make sure the influencer is in your niche

● Ask to see their previous work

● Set clear expectations and goals you want to achieve

● Be clear about the terms of the collaboration and the payment methods and sums

These are just a few of the things you should consider before reaching out to someone. Also, just because someone has hundreds of thousands of followers, they will not necessarily be able to help you gain more customers. Not only that, they might actually ask you for a bigger budget.

Smaller influencers have tighter bonds with their communities, and this means that people trust them more. Therefore, you should not choose someone based on their follower count but rather their dedication and hard work.

2. Ask influencers to review your products

If you do not want to work with someone for a long time but prefer shorter collaborations, product reviews can be a great choice. In order to do this, you will once again have to reach out to the influencers of your choice on social media. After starting a conversation, you can ask them if they would be interested in a short collaboration.

The influencers that you work with will then have to create a video where they will be reviewing your products. Most influencers nowadays know how to film and edit videos, so almost everyone you contact will be able to do this. The video can be posted on any social media platforms that they or you use.

During the review, the influencer will have to show the products and how they use them to their audience. By doing that, more people will be interested in giving them a try and buying what their favorite influencers have tried. Therefore, more customers will come your way.

3. Think of the right concept for the video

When asking someone to create a short video promoting your brand, you should have a concept in mind. Depending on the previous work an influencer has done, you should try and ask them to do something similar. This will help them stay in their element and do what they do best.

For example, if you have an eCommerce store that sells clothing items, you should ask the influencer to show their shopping experience first. After that, they should show the products they have gotten from your store, and depending on your agreement, their prices. Lastly, they should model the clothes and show how they would put together an outfit based on what they got from you.

These are usually the steps followed by every influencer who creates a video for a marketing campaign. Making sure they are on board with the content they are about to create is essential. This is why you should always talk about these things with the people you work with. Communication will help you avoid issues and mistakes in the future and allow for a great result to come out of your collaboration.

4. Host giveaways through the videos

Everyone online is interested in the prospect of winning something for free. Giveaways are gaining more and more ground on social media platforms such as Instagram, and companies use them daily. This is a great idea to help you gain a bigger following and customer base in a short amount of time.

Influencer video marketing can once again help you greatly with this situation. Since audiovisual content is the best at keeping the audience alert, you can use this to your advantage. Instead of posting a picture about the giveaway, ask the influencer you work with to make a video.

In that video, they can show the products you will be giving away by modeling them or arranging them in an aesthetic way. By adding some nice music and visuals, they will be able to reach out to even more people. This way, more people will be interested in purchasing your products, even after the giveaway has ended.

5. Proofread and edit the content

The way you present your written content to your followers will play an important role in your company’s success. Many people will believe that a company that presents content with editing and spelling errors is not professional or trustworthy.

Whether you want to create something as important as online research papers or content for your social media profiles, proofreading and editing are essential. You can easily use free tools such as Grammarly and Hemmingway editor to improve the written content you put into your videos.

You can also ask the influencers you work with to do this step when they use any written content. This can include the video as well as the captions and descriptions they use. The more careful you are of such little mistakes, the more your audience will follow you and trust your business.

6. Ask the influencers for their honest opinion

Last but not least, it is essential that you always ask for the influencers you work with to be honest about their reviews. Showing real excitement about your products will always be perceived better by their audience. People tend to know when someone is showing forced or not genuine feelings about something they are reviewing.

Even when someone you work with makes some not so positive comments on your products, you should always thank them for the feedback publicly. This is important as it will show their audience that you take their ideas into consideration.

A company that is willing to accept honest feedback is one that will work hard to improve itself. Therefore, more people will trust your eCommerce business. This can easily be visible through the videos the influencers will make for your business.

Making your eCommerce store a success the right way

Working with the right influencer can help you grow your business quickly and effectively. While there are many ways to achieve that, video marketing can help you reach many potential customers. Audiovisual content holds great value and can keep the audience interested for longer.

This is exactly why you should invest in creating video content for your eCommerce sales. An influencer can help you put less effort into the content you need to create. As long as you find someone hard-working in your niche, you will be able to help your business grow effectively.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Estelle

Estelle Liotard is an experienced guest post writer. Throughout her career, she served as a journalist, professional essay writer at essaysupply writing site, and editor in many digital marketing publications. When Estelle is not writing content, she is meditating, practicing public speaking, or learning PR. You can find Estelle on Twitter.

How to Use Influencer Video Marketing to Grow Your eCommerce was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Every business owner dreads seeing one-star reviews pop up on their website or social media pages. At face value, a poor review can seem like a big hit to your brand’s reputation — but it can have a positive effect too, depending on how you handle it.

If you allow reviews on your web or social pages, it’s a harsh reality that you’ll garner some bad reviews from time to time. Whether you have a physical store, an eCommerce business, or a combination of the two, it’s impossible to please all of your customers, all the time.

However, negative feedback is not something you should try to brush under the rug. By responding, you can use it to your benefit! Read on as we break down how to best use negative reviews to give your business an unexpected boost.

Understanding Poor Reviews

It’s impossible to guarantee your business will only ever receive 5-star reviews. Bearing this in mind, why are businesses so fearful of negative feedback?

Bad reviews carry many concerning connotations for businesses, but these connotations don’t always reflect the truth. Receiving a poor review doesn’t mean your business is substandard, your products are lacking, or that your company is doing something wrong and will suffer.

In short, the best way to combat negative reviews is to attract more positive ones. Anyone who’s ever owned a business in the modern age has had to deal with their fair share of bad reviews. If every business who had garnered a poor review closed up shop, the growing eCommerce industry wouldn’t exist.

If you receive a bad review, the most important thing to remember is that it doesn’t mean you offer ‘bad’ products or services. In most cases, 1-star reviews result from mismatched expectations from customers, or perhaps even reflect the fact that the reviewer was having a bad day themselves.

Why Bad Reviews are Important for Businesses

It might seem hard to believe, but 1-star reviews can bring with them many positive aspects if you harbor the right mindset around them.

Bad reviews can make good reviews seem more authentic. When a business is willing to display all of their reviews — good and bad — they show their customers they have nothing to hide. People will trust reviews far more if they see a balanced mix of feedback.

Many customers know that fake reviews are rife in the eCommerce industry. If they see nothing but rave 5-star reviews, they may become suspicious of a company and its products, and avoid them altogether.

Bad reviews also guide customers in making the right purchases for their needs. They give shoppers a genuine picture of how your products and services perform. One of the primary reasons customers leave poor reviews is that the offending products did not meet their expectations — but this can be helpful to future shoppers.

Say an online clothing store receives a review on one of their jackets; several customers have complained the fit of the jacket is smaller than they expected. Future customers can read those reviews and know they need to order a size up, allowing them to make more informed purchases.

A Chance to Build Trust

When customers see bad reviews for products they’re keen to purchase, they’ll keep an eye out for how your business responds to that feedback.

You can build trust in your brand by interacting with shoppers who have had poor experiences and showing that you’re willing to be proactive about dealing with problems.

Poor Reviews Boost Your SEO Rankings

It may seem counter-intuitive, but it’s true: poor reviews, just like positive or neutral ones, can still positively affect your SEO rankings.

Even negative reviews can contain important keywords that pertain to your brand, which will help consumers to find your products during their web searches. If you don’t publish your 1-star reviews, you could miss out on a great opportunity to boost your website traffic and sales figures.

How to Handle Bad Reviews

The golden rule for handling negative reviews about your business is never to ignore them. Instead, handle them by:

• Remaining calm. Remember that bad reviews don’t spell the end of your business, and can help it in the long run. Don’t argue, hurl insults, or threaten to sue over a review, this will only reflect badly on your brand.
• Publishing your poor reviews. Don’t remove them! Posting negative feedback signals to other customers that you have nothing to hide.
• Responding publicly. Show your customers you care about their experiences and are willing to resolve negative ones by responding to their reviews. Responding respectfully to bad reviews has shown to boost business’s revenues and could help to keep customers.
• Learning from the feedback. There’s something you can learn from every poor review received. Take the feedback on board, use it to address core issues, and make targeted changes to your products and services.
• Following up with reviewers. After interacting with dissatisfied customers, follow up to ensure they’re happy with how you resolved the issue. Your diligence will impress them, and may even come to regard their negative experience as a positive one.
• Gaining more positive reviews. Ask customers to review your product. People will review positively unless there’s a major issue and this will detract from previous negative feedback. Garnering more positive comments for your business takes time, dedication, and patience!

The Takeaway

A 1-star review doesn’t spell disaster for your business. Each negative review you receive gives you a golden opportunity to improve your customer experience and renew your shoppers’ trust in your services and products.

The most crucial trick to handling bad reviews is never to sweep them under the rug or ignore those who leave them. Handle issues head-on with diplomacy and tact, and you may win over even the most demanding customers!

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Jill

Jill Goodwin is a content champion for a variety of online publications. She mainly covers topics that cater to business owners and entrepreneurs with a strong focus on finances, productivity and management.

Using Poor Reviews to Your Business’s Advantage was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The methods of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization) are two crucial resources to leverage in the digital age.

This is especially true with B2B eCommerce where you are often dealing with a lot of competition, high price points, and potentially numerous decision makers in your B2B clients’ organizations.

Whereas SEO brings passive, free traffic that allows you to grow your leads and online presence, it cannot do everything for you.

However, if you combine it with CRO, you can ensure that the traffic you are capturing gets converted at a higher rate — boosting your bottom line.

Therefore, in this article, we will discuss several tips to use both of these important online strategies for growing your B2B eCommerce business instead of letting your competition take a large market share. Let’s dive in!

Understand Your Market

You can use both SEO and CRO to understand your market better — their desires, the language they use, and what makes them tick.

Here are some tools to help you:

Keyword Planner

This free tool created by Google is invaluable to your SEO efforts. It helps you see what your target market is searching for. You can see which keywords have the highest volume.

For instance, you might want to create different content after discovering that “industrial lathe machines” has more keyword searches on Google than “lathe vendors”.

SEMRush

This is a paid tool, however, it goes further than Keyword Planner.

With SEMRush, you can almost spy on the competition and see estimates for their traffic numbers, as well as what keywords they are using and how much they are paying to acquire leads.

Customer Actions

Use your CRO data to see what customers are responding to. While they might click through to your website, you might find that you have some conversion aspects to clean up on your sales page.

Leverage Analytics

There is no excuse for not having an analytics platform integrated into your B2B eCommerce website in today’s day and age.

If you aren’t analyzing your data, you aren’t learning from your traffic and marketing — therefore, you are wasting your budget.

At a minimum, consider using the following analytics platforms.

Google Analytics

This is yet another free SEO tool that Google offers, and every B2B eCommerce company should be using it.

It allows you to see your traffic numbers from different sources — organic search, social media, direct searches, and more.

Google Analytics allows you to focus your efforts more strongly on the right methods to drive traffic.

Crazy Egg

This paid platform is a goldmine for sales and marketing. It allows you to test your website and see how visitors are acting.

It includes a feature called heat maps. This is a powerful graph that shows you where customers were moving their mouse on your site. It helps you understand what interstate your target market focuses on the most.

Analytics are concrete data sources that show you exactly what is working and not. If you ignore analytics, you can’t improve upon your online presence in the most productive way.

Create an Attractive Design

Long gone are the days where you could simply put up a basic webpage with web design “1.0” and expect to have the respect of your marketplace. Web technologies that make up websites have changed in the past few years.

Here are some modern design tips to use that help SEO and CRO work together:

• Simplicity. You don’t want too many elements on your page. Remember that your landing page is supposed to provide your clients with information and drive them to schedule meetings or sales calls, or even purchase, directly with one visit.
• Speed — The backend technology of your website should load your digital resources (such as Javascript) quickly. This makes the user experience faster and easier — leading to more conversions and less bounces (visitors leaving right away due to frustration).
• Sales Copy — There is no substitute for a great sales message. Make sure that you address pain points upfront and feature the types of benefits that your eCommerce product has to solve your B2B clients’ problems.
• Calls to Action — Don’t expect your visitors to know what to do on your website. Include direct, simple calls to action that tell your prospects how to purchase, find information, or contact your team.

To sum up, be straightforward in communicating your message to the clients and make sure your website is appealing, yet easy to navigate.

Test, Test, Test

Testing is the true mark of any B2B eCommerce business that takes their revenue seriously. Constantly testing your website allows you to gain the following benefits:

Lean Innovation

This is a concept borrowed from startups, who had no other choice but to innovate on their products quickly in order to match their market demand before funding dried up.

You can use this in your organization to iterate on products rapidly and scrap designs that don’t sell well.

A/B Testing

A/B testing involves creating two versions of each page on your site. Half of your traffic will be directed to version “A” and the other half to version “B”.

This way, you can see which headline, call to action, or other element needs to be adjusted to improve your CRO.

Create a Social Presence

Leveraging social networks helps with your online reputation and presence. Customers will discover you, understand what you’re about, and grow to trust your expertise.

Here are some social platforms to use toward this effort:

• Facebook and Instagram — With some of the largest user bases in the world, these two platforms can expose your brand to clients who otherwise might never have heard of you.
• Twitter — You can use the short form messaging on Twitter to drip product promotions, tease new releases, and drive clients to directly message your team.
• LinkedIn — Build authority by having a solid LinkedIn profile and writing weekly industry updates that add credibility to your B2B brand.

It can be a challenge to manage these multiple profiles. However, by using different B2B sales tools, you can make your team’s job easier and allow them to produce more effective results that filter down to your bottom line.

Integrate Omnichannel Strategies Into Your Website

Modern B2B marketing means that you need to use every channel available and integrate CRO and SEO to leverage them to the maximum effect.

Here are some tips for omnichannel strategies.

Organic

Use social and search engine marketing to drive free traffic online. Let your CRO efforts take it from there, optimizing the traffic that you generate.

Paid

Local businesses, in particular, can benefit from paid local marketing.

When someone is near you, your business will show up before others on the map. This positions you before your competitors to get initial traffic at a higher rate.

Conclusion

If you are running a B2B eCommerce business, you are already facing competition from around the globe. The last thing you want is to fall behind because you aren’t using the online tools available to you in the right way.

Whereas SEO can help you increase your presence in a general way and generate traffic to your website, CRO can help you optimize this traffic and convert it into actual leads and sales.

Combining them will grow your revenue to increase salaries, shareholder earnings, equity, and company profitability.

So review the tips above. Then, select one or two to start with and implement a strategy to combine your SEO and CRO efforts, so they feed into each other, creating an online sales and marketing machine that is unmatched in your industry.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Jasmine

Jasmine Williams covers the good and the bad of today’s business and marketing. When she’s not being all serious and busy, she’s usually hunched over a book or dancing in the kitchen, trying hard to maintain rhythm, and delivering some fine cooking (her family says so). Contact her @JazzyWilliams88

Tips to Align SEO and CRO Efforts in B2B eCommerce was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

There are many ways you can promote your brand and products online. One of them is through social media.

Social media marketing has numerous benefits, making it an ideal marketing tool for running an e-commerce website.

It is an excellent thing that doesn’t need too much time and resources to get done. That’s why you must test and refine your marketing strategy to know what channels are best for your brand.

With that in mind, we have listed down eight ways social media can boost your e-commerce traffic and sales:

Creates Brand Awareness

Social media is known as one of the most efficient digital marketing methods that you can use to boost your visibility. By implementing a robust social media strategy, you can increase brand recognition. That’s because you’re engaging a broader target audience.

So, why not get employees, sponsors, and business partners to “share” and “like” your page? By getting people to interact with your content, you can enhance brand awareness and build your reputation as a business.

At VoyMedia Advertising Agency NYC, we always tell our clients that every post you share will be introduced to a network of people. And these people can be your potential customers.

So, the more people who are aware of your business, the better.

No doubt that regular use of social media will benefit your e-commerce business, letting you generate a wider audience.

Drive Website Traffic

When posting on social media sites, do remember to insert a link for your site with the main keywords.

Your site is the one who creates the first impression of your brand to your customers. So, whatever you post on social media should relate directly to your site.

To send traffic to your site, you need to use the 80/20 rule. This means 80% of your content is intended to educate and inform your audience. Meanwhile, the remaining 20% is composed of promotional content.

Doing so helps drive traffic to your site and boost your rankings by optimizing keywords vital for SEO. Similarly, you can also tap to paid traffic. Unlike what others like to believe, paid traffic is affordable.

After you’ve created a winning social media campaign, paid traffic can help take your e-commerce business to the next level.

Here are some of the best platforms for paid traffic marketing:

• Twitter
• Facebook
• Instagram

Boost Conversions

Having a robust social media strategy allows you to generate conversions on your brand, partners, and products.

The best way to do that is to engage with your audience each time they comment on your social media.

See to it that there’s a person that they’re talking to when they reach out to your brand, and not just merely a robot. Doing so allows them to have a much better perception of your company and make them feel valued.

Impact Buying Decisions

How your customers interact with your account on social media can play a factor in their buying choices. That’s why you need to come up with compelling content during every phase of shoppers.

Ensure that this is within your niche, and come up with something that can grab your audience’s attention. You can also use the platform to create hype on an upcoming product before launch.

Give them a clue of the next thing coming to your store, and create hype around that.

Create a Solid Brand Image

Social media allows you to build your brand effectively.

One way that makes it better than traditional media is that you can use your brand in front of many people quicker and easier. It also allows your audience to look at your brand even if they’re not thinking about your product.

You also need to focus on your profile elements, such as your logo and cover photo. Have you been using these strategically? Ensure that this doesn’t overwhelm or distract users from your main goal.

Connect and Listen to Your Audience

Social listening allows you to monitor what your audience says about you and your products online. Doing so enables you to understand what your potential customers expect from your brand.

You’ll learn what they’re struggling with and how you can develop content that addresses these pain points.

If you’re a bit unsure of how you can match your audience’s style and tone, social media listening helps.

So, make it part of your routine to integrate social media listening to gain insight into what people say in your niche or industry.

Provide Exceptional Customer Service

These days, there are a growing number of customers who transact with businesses through social media. Hence, it would make sense to use your social media presence as a customer service tool. This allows you to build meaningful relationships with your customers.

Now, with social media, providing excellent customer service is as demanding as ever before.

That’s because social media requires immediate customer feedback and interaction with your customers. With nearly half of U.S. customers using it to ask questions on products and services, crafting a strong social media strategy is vital.

But let’s say that you have separate teams for your customer service and social media. You must create a strong line of communication with the two. That way, you’ll be able to provide a streamlined user experience to your customers.

Tools such as Re:amaze, which is an integrated customer service tool, allows e-commerce businesses to provide customer satisfaction.

Build Customer Loyalty

The thing is, people love interacting with brands that they enjoy.

Another interesting fact: 53% of customers who follow you online are likely to be specifically loyal to your business.

Meaning, if a customer follows you, they’re more likely to choose you over the competition. Moreso, if they’re loyal customers of yours, they’ll also increase your traffic.

To keep people engaged and happy with your brand, here are a couple of helpful ideas:

• Provide them with promo codes for discounts.
• Ask open-ended questions that allow your target audience to reply.
• Offer freebies and giveaways on inexpensive stuff, which helps create a lasting impression on your brand.

Regularly Update Customers

Social media is one of the best platforms to keep your followers updated with upcoming events or new product launches.

If you make a significant announcement on an upcoming event or new product, people will quickly catch on and feel excited.

Here are some of the best types of updates that you can share:

• New services
• New products
• New updates
• New departments/expansions

Or basically, anything that is new.

The benefits of social media marketing are indeed promising. You might not get your goals early on, but with hard work, grit, and commitment, you’ll eventually craft a successful social media strategy that wins leads and drives revenue for your e-commerce business.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Kevin Urrutia

Kevin Urrutia of Voy Media. Voy Media believes in the power of social media advertising in helping businesses to boost their sales and improve their conversions

8 Advantages of Social Media Marketing for Your E-commerce Business was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

This is a re-post of an article originally published by Salesforce

Digital commerce grew by 12% in Q2 of 2019, while also becoming more efficient. Shoppers’ average visit duration on ecommerce sites dropped to just four minutes and 12 seconds. Not surprisingly in this lucrative and fast-paced ecommerce market, customer expectations are also rising at an impressive rate. Keeping up with ecommerce trends can be challenging, but doing so helps your brand win in the highly competitive ecommerce space.

To help you stay on top of the latest developments, here are the top ecommerce trends you need to know for both B2B and B2C brands. They include how shopping behavior is changing, the experiences your customers crave, and how retailers are leveraging ecommerce technology to stay ahead of the curve.

The Shopping Experience Is Changing

Customer tastes are constantly shifting. According to researchers at Deloitte Consulting, consumers’ preferences today are driven by economic constraints and the “abundance of competitive options available to them, made possible by technology.”

Customers have more power because of those options. For example, “nearly six in 10 are now willing to switch to a competitor with quicker and cheaper shipping,” and customers will often use their phones to compare prices while shopping in physical locations. When they find a better price, a discount, or a coupon online, even if they’re already at a physical store, they may leave empty-handed in order to save on their purchase.

More people are shopping on mobile devices, but how and when they use these devices varies across generations. Keeping up with technology trends and generational preferences is key to staying up to date with ecommerce trends today and in the future.

Generations Continue to Shop Differently

As customer expectations evolve, their tastes are also growing more complex. There’s a clear separation between generations when it comes to ecommerce preferences, especially when customers complete transactions. Among millennials and Gen Zers, for instance, 55% are more likely to make a purchase if it’s accompanied by a charitable donation, while 42% of Gen Xers and 31% of baby boomers and traditionalists (the generation before) are influenced by this option.

Not surprisingly, 87% of baby boomers and traditionalists prefer to bring their service queries to a brick-and-mortar store. Millennials, on the other hand, are nearly evenly split between physical stores (32%), computers (35%), and smartphones (33%) in their preferences for customer service channels. Meanwhile, all generations prefer purchasing in a store to buying online.

Preferences may differ by generation, but ecommerce retailers that master these three shopper-first mandates are seeing success with customers of all generations:

• Make it fresh. Fifty-nine percent of the top 5% of products sold are less than one month old.
• Be where I am. Customers expect a seamless experience when switching between channels and devices.
• Give it meaning. Shoppers reward brands that create personalized relationships with them.

Current trends with each generation and their shopping habits are expected to continue. As the Deloitte research concludes, consumers are still driven by three important attributes when making decisions: value, product, and convenience. “This finding is in line with the values that have been held by generations of U.S. consumers.”

B2B Customers Want the Same Ecommerce Experience as B2C Customers

Even with the differences in the sales process between B2B and B2C industries, B2B clients can still have the same user experience afforded to B2C customers: online stores, interactions with chatbots instead of salespeople, online payment portals, and more. Powerful ecommerce systems give B2B clients the same ease of online retail that B2C consumers enjoy, but with built-in capabilities that account for contract pricing, account hierarchies, and other distinctly B2B attributes.

The trend of B2B buyers migrating toward a more online experience will continue. As The B2B Ecommerce Playbook notes, “The customer relationship is no less crucial, but the kind of relationship the customer wants is evolving.” Driven by the ease of shopping online for their personal use, B2B buyers want the same consumer-like ecommerce experiences, and B2B ecommerce sales departments that integrate this trend will see increased sales.

The User Experience Is Enhanced with Advances in Technology

Customers have more ways to connect with brands than generations before. Artificial intelligence (AI) and augmented reality (AR), for example, allow ecommerce retailers of all sizes to create memorable, convenient touchpoints.

From a retailer’s perspective, current ecommerce trends present complex challenges that require finesse and agility to navigate. Brands that lean into data transparency and invest in technologies such as mobile, voice, and AI will lead the ecommerce pack. Collectively, these ecommerce trends speak to a broader movement toward a direct-to-consumer (D2C) business model similar to Amazon’s.

Artificial Intelligence

AI improves the customer experience — and e-retailers’ bottom lines — during the purchasing process. Over the 2018 holiday season, AI-powered product recommendations averaged 14% higher order value than other sales. Shoppers are becoming accustomed to scrolling through ecommerce sites’ “You may also like…” recommendation widgets.

Augmented Reality

Top companies are investing in AR, too, to create unique, useful customer experiences. Amazon’s AR mirror virtually dresses users in the comfort of their homes, for instance, while ecommerce brands such as Gap, Adidas, and Lacoste all use AR apps that allow shoppers to try on new clothing anywhere. While few customers expect to virtually try on clothes before making an online purchase (for now), retailers that invest in up-and-coming technology, including AR capabilities, will stay competitive.

Voice Technology

As ecommerce becomes more popular and easier to use, consumer behavior is shifting. Consumers are adopting other technologies that aid them in their purchases. Voice technology is expected to grow by 127% over the next year, while the use of artificial intelligence will grow by 70%. Shoppers want faster, easier purchase journeys, and many retailers already harness an ecommerce platform to provide that experience.

Mobile Advancements

Meanwhile, customers are making more purchases using mobile devices. Mobile and desktop are now neck and neck, each accounting for 46% of ecommerce orders in the first quarter of 2019. Traffic share, however, is much higher on mobile (64% compared to 29% on desktop), which suggests that some shoppers start researching on mobile or through an app, but fire up their computers to finalize a purchase.

Retailers can take advantage of this trend, which was apparent during Cyber Week 2018. More shoppers bought on their phones this year than on any other device, with mobile order share the highest on Thanksgiving Day at 54%.

Multichannel Communication

Ecommerce is putting the consumer in charge of retail. Increasingly smarter technology, additional ways to complete a purchase, and a focus on the customer journey help make retail a more customer-centric industry. All of these improvements have caused an increase in the number of channels consumers use to interact with a brand, which in turn gives brands more opportunities to grow.

Customers want to connect with ecommerce brands on multiple platforms and channels, and those channels change and update regularly. Today, your customers may share your Facebook posts, tomorrow they may reply to an email marketing campaign, and next week you may send them a text to update them on the status of their order.

Unified Data

With multiple channels come multiple, disconnected sources of data and new abilities, such as the option to make purchases without leaving social media (think Instagram Shopping). All these data sources means it’s more important than ever to collect, organize, and analyze that data.

On average, brands use 39 different systems to manage consumer data, making collecting and recognizing insights across channels difficult if you don’t have the right technology in place. To stay agile amid an expanding array of channels and touchpoints, retailers need a single system that can consolidate data from many sources. As brands adapt to customer expectations for interacting and purchasing across numerous channels, ecommerce leaders need to be able to use their data to their advantage.

Retailers Refocus on Building Trust

Eighty-four percent of customers want personalized treatment that businesses can provide only by collecting and analyzing personal data. A full 64% of shoppers say they feel retailers don’t truly know them, and businesses will need more and better data to improve that metric.

To achieve that improvement in data collection and analysis, brand leaders anticipate hiring 50% more data scientists by 2021. A full 88% of retail and consumer goods marketers say data helps improve their overall marketing program by allowing them to personalize touchpoints. Many e-retailers can now inject personalization into every step of the customer journey, from targeted email campaigns to AI-powered recommendation engines.

Unfortunately, data collection is a sensitive subject. Data breaches seem to regularly make headlines, and trust has become a top concern for customers. More than half (59%) of customers believe their information is vulnerable, and nearly as many (54%) don’t believe companies are looking out for their best interests.

Customers crave personalized communications but are understandably wary of sharing their information with companies. The only way forward is to foster trust with your customers. Provide transparency about how you use their information and offer the option to control their privacy settings.

Retailers Look to Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) and Private-Label Models for Growth

As retailers handle concerns about customer trust, Amazon and brick-and-mortar giants such as Costco are shifting traditional thinking on brand loyalty. Two-thirds (68%) of consumer goods leaders believe customers are more loyal to Amazon than to individual brands. Furthermore, a full 79% of consumer goods companies agree that Amazon has increased consumer expectations.

Meanwhile, giants with their own proprietary brands are driving competition as well. Kirkland, Costco’s private-label brand, earned $40 billion in 2018, an 11% increase from the previous year.

In response to retail giants’ strategies, more companies are embracing a direct-to-consumer (D2C) business model. With this model, merchants sell goods directly to customers, rather than relying on retail intermediaries to bring their products to consumers. In fact, 99% of surveyed ecommerce leaders say they plan to increase investment in D2C sales strategies. This trend is true in a number of industries and business types, including manufacturers, consumer goods, healthcare and life sciences, telecommunications, and more.

Ecommerce Trends Often Become the Standard

Technology will continue to fuel trends in ecommerce, and so will customer expectations for their interactions with companies. Understanding these trends is the first step in keeping ahead of them. Stay updated on the technology and trends that affect your customers and adopt strategies that keep them at the center of your operations. That’s how an ecommerce brand will stay successful amid the changes and trends.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

Ecommerce Trends That Are Shaping the Way Businesses Sell Online was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

When it comes to growing a business, it is easy to fall into the trap of getting laser-focused on gaining new customers. More customers equals bigger growth, right?

Well, it is not as clear cut as that. In order to continue to grow, a business has to nurture its existing customer base. Otherwise, the process becomes a revolving door of gaining and losing clients without any real value.

Establishing long-lasting relationships with consumers not only helps you expand the numbers of your customer base, it actually grows profit margins for each customer.

It can cost almost five times as much to secure a new customer than to retain a current one. Improving customer mention rates by just 5% can increase profits by anywhere from 25% to 95%. With these numbers in mind, it’s clear that it pays to improve your customer loyalty.

5 Tips for Improving Customer Loyalty

So, what can you do to nurture relationships with your consumer base? Let’s take a look at some strategies.

1. Reward Your Customers for Loyalty

In addition to providing a quality product or service, you have to create incentives for customers to keep coming back to your business. This means going beyond merely exchanging their money for your products.

A rewards program is the most obvious way to increase the value of your offerings.

With today’s technology, it is easy to enroll your customers in a loyalty program that tracks their purchases or visits. You are probably enrolled in similar loyalty schemes yourself with businesses you frequent.

Another way is to create a VIP experience for your most faithful customers.

By throwing VIP events or offering better incentives for customers that reach VIP status, you can build a real community. Not only does this help forge stronger bonds with your VIP clientele, but it also provides something to aspire to among your new customers.

With that example to strive for, the more recent patrons will continue doing business with you in exchange for the perks.

2. Be Reliable

The easiest way to lose a customer is to provide a bad experience. One negative incident can taint a customer’s view of a business for the rest of their life. Those consumers will talk to their friends too, or leave a damaging online review.

Therefore, if you want to foster loyalty, reliability must be integral to your company culture, from the first contact with the customer and throughout the services you provide.

This often entails maintaining quality communication with clients even after that initial contact and purchase.

For example, do your salespeople regularly follow up with customers to ensure they were satisfied? Do you have a marketing email list to keep customers in the loop on sales or promotions you are running? Is anyone managing your social media and responding to questions or complaints?

If you have answered no to any of the above questions, it is time to reconsider how reliable your business actually is in the eyes of customers.

3. Be Honest

A customer is giving your business their hard-earned money and time. So, if your salesperson is more focused on the sale than whether the product or service is a good fit for their needs, your customer will feel swindled and violated.

Therefore, your company and all its sales representatives need to have honesty as the baseline. Being misleading to get the sale will only benefit your business in the very short term.

For example, let’s say that your representative discovers that the potential customer needs product A for their lifestyle during a sales consultation.

If all your company offers is product B, it would be dishonest for the salesperson to allude that product will provide the same solutions when they know it will not.

When reality sets in, your company will lose not just that customer, but also any potential clients the original customer speaks with. So it’s best to keep in mind that honesty is always the best policy, even if it loses you a sale.

4. Use Technology

One of the biggest ways to improve loyalty is to have responsive and comprehensive customer service. Utilizing technology will broaden your company’s capabilities in that area, and improve communication in general.

The emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) has significantly changed the way businesses operate and connect all aspects of the business. For client service, AI has also resulted in a variety of business benefits. Chatbots top the list of AI tools for customer care.

Bots provide a spectrum of benefits in maintaining excellence and promoting customer loyalty, including:

• Allowing your business to be contacted at any time. Offering support 24/7 is expensive if it means employing a team around the clock. Chatbots provide an opportunity for customers to interact with the support service on their own timelines.
• Streamlining finding the information. An AI bot can answer a vast majority of customer questions. Instead of skimming long FAQ pages, customers can get an immediate answer by typing their questions into a message box. When the chatbot is unable to field the question independently, it will escalate the issue to a live employee.
• Reducing time spent on minor issues. If only complex issues reach a human representative, those employees will be less overwhelmed with the volume of questions. Instead, they will be able to spend quality time making real, loyalty-boosting connections with each caller.

To sum up, with artificial intelligence, consumers receive fast answers to simple questions from a chatbot as soon as they need them, instead of sitting in a phone queue for a long time to reach an employee.

Speed and accuracy are integral to the customer’s positive perception of the service you provide, so improving them with the latest technological solutions will benefit your company’s overall image.

5. Expand the Customer Relationship Beyond Business

Creating lifelong loyalty in customers goes beyond being considered their favorite business. Take the example of the Harley Davidson brand. They are more than just a quality motorcycle manufacturer; they represent a community of people.

Harley Davidson has built this community by branding their motorcycles as a lifestyle.

The company organizes social events where Harley owners get to interact with each other. The bonds that those customers build with each other then serve to strengthen their ties with the brand. For a Harley owner, the brand conjures emotional connections that go far beyond business.

In this case, that community has become so large that it recruits like-minded people all on its own because they are drawn to the lifestyle.

By associating your business with particular lifestyle choices, you can get your brand to mean more to your customers than just the products or services it provides.

To do this, start by identifying what your company represents. Then, help your employees to embody those values in their daily customer interactions.

In addition to that, interactions with customers need not always feel formal.

The more personable your employees are with the customer, the more the customer will felt cared for. Getting to know customers on a personal level also provides deeply valuable insight into their likes and dislikes. That insight can then be leveraged to improve offerings and customize the customer experience for greater loyalty.

Conclusion

Establishing connections with your consumer base is at the heart of doing business. Nurturing relationships with existing customers is more profitable than having to build new ones from the ground up.

Make sure to identify the values your company stands for and get the customers to associate them with you. Those values should include honesty, even at the expense of making a momentary sale, and reliability.

One way of nurturing your relationship with consumers is by offering timely and dependable customer service, especially by leveraging the latest technology. Another is implementing different loyalty programs to reward repeat business.

By implementing the strategies above, you will be able to increase customer loyalty and improve your business.

About Re:amaze

Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.

About Joe Peters

Joe Peters is a Baltimore-based freelance writer and an ultimate techie. When he is not working his magic as a marketing consultant, this incurable tech junkie devours the news on the latest gadgets and binge-watches his favorite TV shows. Follow him on @bmorepeters

5 Simple Ways To Improve Customer Loyalty was originally published in Better than sure. on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.