How to Improve Ecommerce Customer Experience on Your Website

   Kathy Banach

Guest post

May 6, 2024
0

Could improving customer experience be the key to unlocking greater revenue for your WooCommerce site? With a few simple upgrades, you can make a significant difference in how customers perceive and interact with your Toolset-powered website.

Your customers are the very lifeblood of your business. After all, if they weren’t buying products and/or services from you, your business wouldn’t exist. It’s not just a case of attracting sales though, you want those customers to be happy with your brand and to become loyal customers and thus increase their CLV (customer lifetime value).

Of course, the quality of your products or services is a major factor. But, you also need to provide good customer service and ensure that their customer experience (CX) is at the highest possible level, regardless of whether you’re using Toolset to build WooCommerce sites and improve CX for yourself or for clients.

With the commerce market forecasted to reach $3,647 billion in 2024, there are a lot of businesses competing for a slice of that lucrative pie. How can you improve your ecommerce customer experience to ensure that your plate is as full as possible?

What is ecommerce customer experience?

1 in 3

Customers would leave a brand after just one bad experience

65%

of customers say CX is more influential than great advertising

46%

will abandon a brand if employees aren’t knowledgeable

Data sourced from eduMe

Customer experience (CX) covers every step a customer takes when purchasing from you. It includes that first visit to your website and landing page, the gathering of information about you and the product, the purchase itself, and any post-purchase experience. 

Poor CX is something that many businesses are struggling with. A recent CX report highlighted that around 47% of customers claimed to have had ‘lackluster’ experiences when engaging in e-commerce activities. When there are major issues with even one step in the buyer’s journey, it could affect their overall perception of your brand. In fact, an estimated 32% of consumers would stop doing business with a brand after just one bad experience.

The issue here is that poor CX can lead to lost customers and cause high bounce rates and low conversion rates, two metrics you likely track. There can also be a knock-on effect in that disgruntled customers may leave negative reviews, thus putting off potential new customers from even visiting your site.

How to improve your ecommerce customer experience 

Top Reasons For a Visitor to Leave a Website

Web Design Survey

Slow loading

88.5%

Non-responsive website

73.1%

Bad navigation

61.5%

Outdated design

38.5%

Poor content structure

34.6%

Obtrusive use of audio/video

3.8%

Data sourced from Business2community

So, you can see that good CX is important, but how can you improve that CX to ensure your customers are happy? 

1. Mobile optimization

The first thing to understand is that close to 60% of global internet traffic comes from mobile devices. By having an unoptimized website, you are immediately alienating more than half of your potential customers. Someone browsing from a mobile should have the same CX as someone browsing from a desktop.

There are several things you should be focusing on when it comes to mobile optimization.

  • Loading time. People want sites to load quickly so you should ensure that your site loads well for mobile devices. 
  • Responsive design. Have your site read well no matter what sort of device the customer is using. 
  • Use pop-ups sparingly. While pop-ups can be a great tool, overuse on the mobile version of your site can be disruptive to CX. Use them for important things such as CTAs (calls to action).
  • Think local. Searches using the phrase ‘near me’ have been growing 5 times faster than other searches. When building your mobile SEO, try and include local keywords where possible.
  • Easy navigation. Remember that there is a huge difference in screen sizes. Make your site clear and easy to navigate for all devices. 
  • Consider a mobile URL. Given the potential number of mobile users on your site, it may be worth considering a separate URL so you can optimize CX. 
  • Customize content. While you may want to convey the same messages, it can be worth customizing shorter content for mobile users.

2. Website navigation

One of the first things many first-time visitors to your site will do is look around. If your website navigation is poor and cluttered, they will quickly get confused and frustrated. In many cases, this will ultimately lead to them looking elsewhere. 

Optimizing your navigation will provide better CX at the first step. Use categories and sub-categories to separate your different products and services. You could also add filters (for example, size, gender, etc.) to make it easier for visitors to search for things. 

Take Sephora for example. They have thousands of products, but their site is easy to navigate as users can search for what they’re looking for or browse using their extensive categories and subcategories. 

Screenshot taken from sephora.com

3. Make checkout easy 

While cart abandonment can vary by sector, the average in 2023 was 70%. Much of that abandonment is caused by issues during the checkout process. This can be very frustrating to businesses as they are losing customers at one of the last steps in the CX journey. 

Make checkout as simple as possible to reduce cart abandonment or look at tools that allow you to customize your checkout process. And for future improvements, you can email or use a pop-up survey for departing customers to identify issues they encountered. Some things to consider for your checkout step include:

  • Highlight security. Consumers want to be sure that their payment information is secure, so highlight what you do to ensure that.
  • Guest checkout. People often don’t want to go through lengthy registration so offer guest checkout options.
  • Transparency. Don’t have hidden costs added at the final stage. Include all costs on the landing page and if possible, have a shipping cost calculator they can consult. 
  • Payment methods. If people find their preferred payment option isn’t available, they may go elsewhere. Offer as many different payment methods as you can. 

For example, the image below shows how Zara makes payment easy. They include guest check-out, dedicate a different page to each step, provide clear instructions and allow a variety of payment methods. 

Screenshots taken from zara.com

4. Test your loading speeds

Fast speeds > Video and other media

These are media that users are willing to give up if it help websites load faster

Data sourced from Find Stack

An estimated 40% of customers will abandon a site if it takes more than three seconds to load. This can also be a factor in cart abandonment and can lead to high bounce rates for your website. 

Test your loading speeds using tools such as Google’s PageSpeed Insights and, if slow, identify what factors may be causing it. There can be many causes that could be the reason your site loads slowly for example:

  • Unoptimized or too-large images
  • Too much Flash content
  • Too many ads
  • Problems with JavaScript
  • Network and/or server issues

5. Virtual assistants

Many people like the personal service that you find in brick-and-mortar shops. While you may already be offering great customer support, what do you do for people who are browsing your site? Virtual assistants (VA) can be a great way of assisting them while shopping. 

You might be using chatbots and other AI-powered systems to offer support, so why not extend their use to being VAs? You’ll find a lot of VAs in contact center solutions and using them on your website can vastly improve your ecommerce customer experience.

6. Listen to your customers

If you are seeing issues with your CX, then there is little point in flailing blindly in the dark. The quickest – and easiest – way to identify what’s not working is to listen to your customers. They can identify any problems and pain points they have experienced. 

Asking for feedback on their experience can take several forms, including pop-up surveys or email questionnaires. If you find you’re struggling to gather feedback, you can consider incentivizing the process. As well as getting good data to analyze, you also show your customers that you value their opinions. 

Like the example below, remember to also give customers the option to report any issues with the survey or questionnaire. This can be a great help for building future surveys and for if you discover your response rate is less than you expected. 

Screenshot taken from tv.apple.com

7. Have clear product descriptions

Customers like to have information at their fingertips. That can mean ensuring that you clearly describe every product. Having a concise description, with more detailed information available, can mean a smoother CX journey. 

Descriptions should not just be textual, including good photographs of the products can also help influence purchasing decisions. List the main features and list any previous, positive reviews. 

The Nike example below does just this. There are a variety of photos from different angles, a product description and the more specific product details as well as customer reviews, all easily available from one product page. 

Screenshot taken from nike.com

The other advantage of clear descriptions is that it can make it easier to upsell and cross-sell. By having a product’s features – ideally, in a bulleted list – customers can instantly see the added benefits that may come with a more expensive product.

8. Loyalty programs and rewards 

Your customers like to feel appreciated, especially if they are regular buyers. Not only are reward and loyalty programs a good way of recognizing existing loyal customers, but proactive outreach can also be a great way of attracting new customers and building loyalty. 

In some ways, you could view this as more of an “enhancement” than anything else, but it is still improving your customers’ experience. You could offer a range of incentives, from free shipping or discounts to free trials when you’re rolling out a new product update.

The takeaway

Why prioritize customer experience?

Increases customer loyalty

1 in 3 customers would leave a brand after just one bad experience

Generates higher revenue

Brands with outstanding CX generate 5.7 times more revenue

Drives business growth

Companies with excellent CX stand a 17% higher chance of growing Y-on-Y

Boosts employee retention

Businesses with CX initiatives see a 20% increase in employee engagement

Data sourced from edu Me

Good ecommerce customer experience can lead to high customer retention rates. And when your customers are happy with every aspect of your service, from the website itself to customer support, they are more likely to recommend you to family and friends. 

You have to look at each component of the CX and see where any problems arise. Even one component falling short of customer expectations can cause negative perceptions. In the end, one can say that CX is a journey where the ‘road’ must be as smooth as possible.

Join the conversation


As you explore ways to enhance your WooCommerce site’s customer experience, we’re eager to hear from you. Have you implemented any of these strategies? Are there other tactics you’ve found effective in improving customer experience on your Toolset-powered website? Share your thoughts, success stories, and challenges in the comments below!

Please note, this post contains contributions from the 8×8 team.