Navigating the e-commerce waters successfully, during the pandemic and beyond
Momentum is a funny thing. Without it, you can’t sail your ship. With it, you must navigate carefully to ensure the wind stays in your sails. In the world of digital commerce, there are often many ships-a-sail requiring careful navigation.
With the acceleration of e-commerce created by the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses must work harder than ever to keep the wind in their sails.
They are challenged with understanding each shopper’s unique behaviors, creating appealing offers, and offering them at the right time to the relevant shopper to convert a sale. They must do this in-the-moment the shopper is engaged on the site, and do so with a high degree of accuracy. And they must engage seamlessly across many channels to ensure that each customer is engaged when and where it matters the most.
For example, say Sally now shops for groceries online exclusively. Busy with work and children at home, she sometimes requires home delivery while other times she picks up at the curb. Brands that want to engage with her effectively will need to know when and how to enrich her journey. For example, should they send her last-minute offers? And when? Should they send the offers the morning before she is scheduled to pick up her order or the night before it ships to her home?
They will learn that half of her weekly order is the same and have that ready for her when she opens the home page. They won’t send a list of irrelevant coupons to her email because they respect her time, but they will make a 20% discount offer to incentivize her to try the new plant-based meat substitute (because they know she has been considering it). These types of intelligent interactions engage shoppers and win fans.
All of this requires a skilled captain and crew at the helm. One that understands there is data-a- plenty, but knowing how to use it is the key. And when you do this, passengers will continue to book passage on your ship, you’ll control your profit margins with greater clarity, and begin to relate to your customers in a new and appealing way.
