When your potential and existing customers are accessing your site or content from different devices, it can be nearly impossible to keep track of their customer journeys. Is the person who looked at an item on a desktop the same as the one who looked at it on a phone three hours later?
Abandoned carts and poor re-engagement rates may be the indicators of poor customer experience (CX), but there are opportunities that will, if taken, benefit not only your customers but your organisation’s revenue. What’s more, the steps you take now will help you in years to come as new CX trends such as the Internet of Things (IoT) come into their own.
1. Gather More Data
This may seem obvious, but you will need to gather as much data as you possibly can to optimise your multi-channel experience. We’ve talked before about the importance of having goals to underpin your CX strategy, but without useful measurement you’re unlikely to achieve real success in improving your CX or your bottom line. Gathering a range of intelligence can help you start to see the key metrics that you will need to track for the term of your project, and going forward.
Even if you have the perfect setup for your website analytics, adding tools for website heatmapping and cursor tracking or multivariate testing can help you gather more intelligence about what is and isn’t working for your customers. If nothing else, consider running a survey about your multi-channel experience with existing customers.
2.Use Single Sign-On (SSO)
From SaaS companies to social networks, more and more organisations are offering customers the option to log in using an existing ID such a Facebook, Twitter or Google. This isn’t simply limited to commercial spheres - as those with a keen eye on the B2B space may have spotted the rise of LinkedIn logins for recruiters and the like over the last few years.
The benefits are obvious – identifying your customers and potential customers on Facebook or any other channel offers you the perfect opportunity for retargeting advertising. You should also have an email address right off the bat, ready for your marketing automation to kick into gear. Your customers may feel the option is lower hassle, and less invasive, making it easier for them to have an account with you.
3. Put ‘Dark Social’ to Work
One area that may always prove problematic in terms of traceability is so-called ‘dark social’, the social sharing of web content via links in emails or instant messenger chats. As visitors are clicking directly on shared links, they will count towards your site’s direct traffic, even though their origin is social. An option that could give you some visibility would be to create a referral scheme, encouraging your existing customers to use specially generated links to share content with their friends in order to give you traceability on who is successfully referring visitors to your site. Providing rewards for top performing referrers could increase loyalty and create measurable brand advocacy
4. Save to Wishlist for Mobile
In eCommerce, abandoned cart rates are a key concern, and it’s likely that you will find these rates are higher on mobile, or on certain devices than anywhere else. If you can’t afford a better mobile payment experience, it might be worth finding another way to prevent cart abandonment. The option to ‘Save your basket’ or create wishlists by logging in on mobile could help your customers remember what they were planning to purchase, or help you to remind them once they’re back at their desk.
5. Create a Multi-Channel Customer Journey Map
Once you have the right data, and you’ve put your analytics to work,your insight into issues faced by customers who access your content across multiple devices should form the basis of a powerful customer journey map. Matching device use to stages in your customer journey, from initial visit to purchase and retention, should empower your organisation to make the changes necessary to optimise customer experience, and increase your revenue.
Our complete guide to customer journey mapping can help you understand the steps needed to create a map that works for your whole organisation, or our experts can take you through the process.
