Retailers are constantly striving to create meaningful customer experience journeys. However, they face the struggle of adapting to dynamic endpoints because of increased customer engagement, tech, widespread product selections, easier brand switching costs and intense market competition.
In order to prosper, retailers must be willing to be flexible and adaptable to the ever-changing demands of future customers, new tech and new marketplace competition.
These three practices will help retailers gain a better grasp on customer experience, and stay ahead of the curve where they can.
1. Keep data at the heart
Retailers need to recognise the data that they have available to them – from primary to third-party data – and how they can use this to inform their customer experience strategy.
Data gives the retailer the opportunity to gain an understanding of the consumer including what they care about, what channels they use, when they purchase, what interests them, to name just a few.
By mapping back to end goals and objectives, when done right, gathering, analysing and using data can be naturally integrated into the customer experience without feeling invasive, leading to higher customer satisfaction and ultimately loyalty.
2. Hyper personalisation and being there in the moment
Rather than focusing on customer re-engagement strategies that serve everyone, when looking at customer needs today, retailers will find more success through serving customers at the moment they need them.
Processes can be configured and customised in order to reach customers in these moments and mapped back to customer data so that, for example, they are hit right at the moment they are looking at similar products or services across various different channels.
This hyper personalisation is where we are seeing the move towards the customer experience economy.
3. Consider investment in line with goals
In order to get the most from your data, and effectively personalise the customer experience, investment in the right technology to enable this activity such as cloud platforms, AI, personalisation tools, marketing solutions and customer engagement products, is key.
Retailers need to make sure these tools integrate with their overriding goals and objectives, whilst also ensuring there is an element of flexibility and agility so that strategies can be adapted as customer needs and expectations change, and new technology is introduced to tackle this.