The Role of Customer Service In Ecommerce Success

Ecommerce or online retail has become a staple in today’s highly digital world. As online shopping becomes a norm, online entrepreneurs and business owners recognize the importance of exceptional customer service in ensuring growth and success.

Customers play a pivotal role in how a business builds a loyal base, generates sales, and encourages repeat transactions. Therefore, it is essential for ecommerce businesses to pay particular attention to the quality of customer service they provide to the market.

To give you a better idea of the role of customer service in ecommerce success, we’ll provide a comprehensive overview of quality customer service and its benefits. Aside from that, we will also offer some tips, tricks, and strategies you can use to improve your current customer support service.

 

What Is Customer Service?

 

Before we dive any further into the topic of exceptional customer service in the ecommerce industry, it is essential to understand what customer service truly is.

Unlike the common misconception, customer service isn’t only provided after a successful purchase or transaction. Instead, customer service is defined as the support businesses provide to both potential and existing customers. This means that anyone can experience and avail of a brand’s customer service even without successfully purchasing from their shop.

The primary goal of customer support services is to provide customers with the help and assistance that they need to ensure good customer experiences. Therefore, this includes all one-on-one interactions between a customer and a brand representative before and after a purchase. 

But why does this matter? 

 

Benefits of Exceptional Customer Services

 

Customer service is essential to business growth as it is one of the most powerful and effective ways to gain and retain customers. It is also a tool used to ensure buyer satisfaction that can encourage or discourage other customers from buying from their online store.

In a highly competitive industry, customer service can be one of the means ecommerce businesses can build loyal customer bases and experience growth. But in what other ways can online businesses benefit from providing customers with exceptional support?

 

Foster customer trust and build brand reputation

In the ecommerce industry, one of the ways online stores can foster trust with their customers is not only through the quality of their products but also through the quality of their customer support services. 

Generally, customers who experience good customer service, regardless of their position in the buying process, are more likely to remember the brand and their interaction. Prompt customer assistance makes them feel valued, while bad customer service can leave them feeling unsatisfied and unhappy. This dynamic is more significant when it comes to customer support after a client successfully purchases from their online store.

One of the biggest mistakes a business can make is disregarding customers once they have purchased from their shop. They would spend so much time and energy wooing customers to buy from them but won’t share the same enthusiasm when it comes to questions or requests for assistance once a purchase has been made. 

Doing this can leave a bad taste and can hurt the brand’s online reputation. Customers who experience bad customer service will lose trust in the brand and can also share their encounters with others. 

Considering this, businesses need to provide consistent quality services before and after a purchase. They should show an eagerness to provide amazing customer service and ensure that their potential and existing customers have a good experience from start to finish. This can leave customers feeling valued and satisfied to continue supporting the ecommerce business. 

 

Boost customer lifetime value

The customer lifetime value (CLV) is an indicator used to measure a particular customer’s expected value over the course of time. It uses the customer’s buying habits, such as repeat purchases, and level of brand relationship to gauge the value they offer to the online business. A higher customer lifetime value is proof of the customer’s loyalty and support for a brand or business.

Considering this, providing customers with exceptional post-purchase support service is one way to extend and increase their CLV. Aside from offering amazing digital products, goods, or services, providing high-quality customer support can turn customers into repeat buyers. Good customer experiences can also encourage them to refer and recommend your products to others.

 

Avoid cart abandonment

Abandoned online shopping carts are one of the biggest challenges in starting a business online. You will have many interested customers who have spent time browsing your ecommerce website and selecting the products they want to buy. But suddenly, they decide not to push through with their purchase. 

At this stage, your business customer support services can tend to their doubts and needs by alleviating any possible concerns. You can also use customer support as a means to encourage them to check out your other products and, ultimately, encourage them to complete their purchase. 

Considering that customer support services are typically one-on-one interactions, doing this can also establish reliability and trust between you and your customers.

 

Effective Ways To Provide Quality Support Services to Customers

Ecommerce businesses can utilize an array of techniques and strategies to ensure that customers are well taken care of whenever they interact with their brand.

 

Make customer support lines accessible

When it comes to exceptional customer support, the first thing that any ecommerce business needs to tend to is to make their services as inclusive and accessible as possible. Typically, customer support services are found on ecommerce websites and are contacted via email call or text if you’re within the local area. However, this practice is not the most inclusive, as ecommerce caters to a global market.

Considering this, one of the ways to make customer support lines accessible to most customers is to make them available on various digital platforms and channels. First, make the customer support page on your website easy to locate and navigate. 

But aside from your ecommerce website, open your social media business profiles to inquiries. Channels such as Facebook Messenger and Instagram DMs are some of the most accessible means of communication for social media users. 

 

Provide a FAQs page

One of the biggest challenges an ecommerce customer support team can face is the customer’s tendency not to ask questions. Some people are simply too shy or anxious to talk to someone and ask for help, even if they desperately need to.

Considering this, one solution to continuously provide customer support and assistance is to provide customers the ability to find the solution to their problems themselves. Having a frequently-asked-questions (FAQs) page on your website allows anyone on the site to learn more about their circumstances and find solutions based on other customers’ experiences. 

 

Leveraging automated chatbots

Generally, anyone with a question would want their inquiries answered as soon as possible. The same concept goes when it comes to customer service. Prompt and timely responses are key for good customer service as they immediately tend to customers’ needs and concerns.

However, it is nearly impossible for a sole business owner to be available and provide customer support around the clock. Luckily, online entrepreneurs can use automated chatbots to cater to initial customer inquiries during off hours. 

AI chatbots are programmable to provide assistance via voice or text communications. They are typically used to answer frequently asked questions with a list of automated responses. Customer concerns not included in the chatbot’s list of responses are then forwarded to an actual customer support representative during working hours.

 

Use a more personal approach

One of the purposes of customer support services is to make customers feel valued. Considering this, take into account the nature of how your support services are being delivered to customers. Take the time and effort to acknowledge and treat customers as individuals rather than mere transactions.

Show genuine care and concern towards their situation and acknowledge what they are going through. For a more personal approach, start by using the customer’s name when communicating with one another. Keep track of your conversations and ensure that you show empathy to create a more positive connection with customers.  

 

Bottomline

When it comes to running a business, it is critical that business owners put emphasis on the quality of experience they provide to customers. Electronic commerce is more than just selling digital products, goods, or services online. An important part of this endeavor is to provide customers with a safe and seamless online shopping experience from start to finish.

Considering this, customer service is one of the most pivotal factors that can influence the customer’s perception of a brand or online business. A customer can end up not fully satisfied with their purchase, but quality customer services and support can still effectively encourage them to continue supporting the brand despite its shortcomings.

On the flip side,  bad customer service experiences can easily turn off customers, regardless of how amazing the brand’s products or services are.

With that in mind, it is important for business owners to pay close attention to their customer support services and maintain positive experiences from the moment they discover their brand and even after they have successfully purchased a product.

Doing this will not only help build loyal customer bases but also encourage and empower them to actively refer and even promote the brand to others. 

 

Want to know more about effective ecommerce marketing strategies? Sidekicks is an on-demand virtual company, and we’re eager to help visionaries and entrepreneurs like you. Get a free ebook and learn more about how we can help you by signing up for our newsletter. We also offer a free 30-minute consultation if you prefer something more personal.