Gear up to face the challenge with a refreshing approach driven by technology!
The eCommerce landscape has hit a massive new high thanks to the pandemic-induced lockdowns years of change occurred in a matter of months – business transformation led to the rise in the digital ecosystem. The rapid rise of digital-first brands is now leading the immense competitive digital marketplaces.
During the times when everything seems hunky dory, there are challenges that behest the brands and retailers in the digital ecosystem.
Let’s dig a little deep and find out the eCommerce challenges posed in 2023 and ways to move past them.
According to a study conducted, by 2040, it is estimated that 95% of purchases will be made online. Thus, this is the perfect time for retailers to confront challenges and seek solutions to edge ahead. With the increasing dependence on online shopping, eCommerce is breaking the door open with enormous opportunities.
As there is no rose without its thorns. Here are some challenges with the new opportunities.
1. Targeting the right customer
The options for shoppers are immense with a flurry of offers. Pampered by options and impulse buys. It is imperative to target customers at the right place with the right product. So, how do you make sure they pick your product? And how will make sure your product is among the option.
Solution:
The solution is digital marketing with targeted customers and geographies paired with digital commerce intelligence to boost product discoverability and visibility. Optimize product display pages, and monitor pricing, availability, and other KPIs vis-à-vis competition to reach out to the right customer.
2. Optimising Customer Experience
User experiences or customer experience is one of the major challenges in the digital ecosystem. The shopper looks for a more convenient shopping experience and personalization based on their preferences.
Solution:
Brands are recognizing the need of optimizing the customer experience for 2023 and beyond. The data-driven business decision could optimize the customer journey at multiple touchpoints. This includes tracking customer sentiments – acknowledging their feedback and concerns. The practice to track positive and negative segments will enhance brand trust and loyalty.
For example, let us consider a use case – of an Indian multination brand known for its products like water purifies tracked customer sentiment with mScanIt, Feedback analysis. The brand tracked genuine customers with negative reviews and connected with them to rectify their issues. Such positive initiatives bring a lot of positive value to the brand.
3. Build Brand Trust Loyalty
The challenge of building brand trust loyalty is eminent for every brand.
- The cost of acquiring a new customer is multi-fold higher compared to retaining an existing one.
- Selling to a current customer is much easier with a 60-70% success rate as compared to a new customer with a 5-20% success rate.
The above-stated facts are a testament to the importance of customer retention. So, how can Brands need to build trust and loyalty to retain customers?
Solution: There could be multiple ways to customer retention. Providing quality services is of course paramount. The key is staying connected with your current customer and leverage their positive feedback to build trust. Make sure they know about your products, promotions and provide exciting offers to the existing customers. To build trust brands should ensure clarity, accuracy, and transparency in product display page content.
4. Convert visits to purchases!
One of the biggest challenges is boosting conversions. Turing the visitors to paying customers. There could be multiple reasons for not converting like pricing, delivery time, and not enough information on the product page. How can a brand make sure once shoppers view the product, they could easily make a purchase?
Solution: The answer is quite simple yet complicated – First and foremost understand why your shoppers aren’t converting. What do they seek? Turn to digital commerce intelligence to get actionable insights on multiple KPIs with customized tools to find out what needs to be done to boost product performance on eCommerce platforms. Optimize the shopper’s journey and target the right demographic sentiments.
5. Competition Competitor Analysis
How do they stand out from the crowd with so many options available to the customers in your segment? What makes them buy a similar product from a competitor instead of buying from you? Do you know your competitive performance across the platform?
Solution:
Know your competition! The cut-throat eCommerce market needs brands and retailers to be a step ahead and updated on market changes. The key is to stand out – having a good product is not good enough – your need to tell why you are that good with refined product page content and set the right price and discount in line with trends. Brands need to gear up with solutions like mScanIt, a digital commerce intelligence to set the right content with auto-generated content recommendation, boost the brand share of the shelf based on keywords, optimize SKUs, and track product availability across platforms. Every phase of the customer journey needs to be optimized to stay ahead of competitors.
Final Thoughts
The growing smartphone penetration and new geographies opening up to online shopping have led to a massive influx of opportunities. To cash in on the opportunities the brands and retailers need to combat challenges at every touchpoint of the customer journey.
eCommerce has propelled rapidly in the last few years and conducive conditions of 2023 will push it further. Do not get left behind switch to digital commerce intelligence and pave your way through challenges. It’s a year full of exciting and positive changes, but there are still multiple businesses going online or starting digital-first that struggle with the challenges that eCommerce brings. There is no quick fix, but tech-solution are fixes that can help any eCommerce business inch closer to its ideal customers and achieve target sales.
