Online stores and physical stores have more in common than you might think. In both cases, customers value presentation, speed and customer service. Here are 5 ways in which you can improve your online store by adopting similar strategies to a physical store.
By Team Savant
Image: Shoper
Create a good first impression for visitors
Customers are more likely to step inside a store if it looks attractive from the outside. Eye-catching window displays, salient signage, bright lights and fresh decor can all capture people’s interest while also building trust.
A visually striking homepage can have a similar impact. Eye-catching images of products, clear text and a sleek design can all encourage customers to take a look around. An important similarity is keeping your storefront/homepage fresh! Paying professionals to help with ecommerce website development could help you to create a website that feels exciting and current.
Have staff available to answer questions
It’s normal for shoppers to have questions about products. In a physical store, they can walk up to a staff member and ask for help.
But what about an online store? Installing a web chat popup can allow customers to similarly ask questions, but virtually instead. This is typically placed in the right hand corner of a website. You or a staff member can answer these questions via an instant chat app, or you can set up an AI assistant. Including your email address and your phone number on your site can meanwhile give visitors another way to contact you if they don’t want to use the instant chat feature.
Make sure your products look presentable
In a physical store, products need to be displayed in an attractive way. Poor positioning, poor lighting or lack of product information will put customers off.
The same goes for an online store. Your product listings need to come with well-lit professional quality photos and they need to be accompanied with plenty of product information. It’s possible to hire a professional photographer or copywriter to help you create these listings.
Allow customers to interact with your products
One of the biggest benefits of a physical store is that shopping can be a multi-sensory experience. Customers can touch products, smell products and even taste products in some cases.
You can’t mimic this online. However, you can still make online shopping an interactive experience. How? Playful features like 360 photos allow customers to virtually rotate products to see them from all angles. These could be worth investing in when selling certain types of product. Meanwhile, some online perfume companies and food companies will send out free samples if you create an account and subscribe to their mailing list. This could be a way to potentially attract extra sales by allowing customers to sample your products.
Don’t make customers wait too long to check out
When it comes to physical shopping, some customers are put off by long queues. If there is another store that sells the same items, they may head there instead to avoid waiting.
Online stores typically don’t have queues (aside from high-demand items like ticket sales). However, a lengthy checkout process can be just as intimidating. Make sure that you are not requiring customers to complete multiple long pages of information in order to check out. While having people create an account can have its benefits, allow customers who are in a hurry to checkout fast using a guest account that requires only the most necessary information. This could lead to less abandoned shopping carts.