With the holidays right around the corner, now is a crucial time to capture your customer’s attention and make your brand stand out from the competition. As shoppers are becoming more channel-agnostic, it’s important to create a seamless experience that meets their demands making their journey as smooth as possible, across all channels and devices. From an e-commerce website to traditional brick-and-mortar stores, offering more than one purchasing channel is an important first step, but it may not be enough to stand out from the competition.
Wondering how to get started?
Improve the shopping experience.
The smoother the shopping experience, the easier it is to gain loyalty and drive more sales. Be attentive to your customer’s needs across channels by responding to feedback and creating a more personalized shopping experience. Focus on streamlined and personalized online experience to get customers what they need faster than ever, since many customers do a majority of shopping via a mobile device. Queue up personalized emails based on browse data, location, weather and other data points to provide real-time personalization.
Make sure you offer in-store pickup within a few hours of purchasing to target the on-the-go shopper. Customers prefer in-store pickup fulfillment options for two reasons: because they don’t have to pay for shipping or because they can get their items faster. This method of shopping provides your customers with choice convenience, and instant gratification. It also increases foot traffic that can lead to upsell opportunities. Once they’re in store, grab their attention with a top-selling item at the pick-up counter. Besides, it’s never too late to get them to buy more.
Leverage social media.
From inspiration-seekers to well-prepared shoppers, social media plays a big role in choosing the perfect holiday gift. Not sure which social media outlet to use? Make it simple and fun. Engage your shoppers by giving them holiday tips, guides and fun articles to pique their interest during this hectic time. Pinterest is a big inspiration behind a lot of gift ideas and shoppers are creating their own “Wish Lists” on this wildly popular site and pinning products daily and driving inspiration for many holiday gifts for the season. Use this outlet to gain followers and pin ideas that inspire and promote your brand.
Another consideration is to create a holiday hashtag and use it across all your social media channels. Pick a hashtag that isn’t in use (do some research on Google to make sure your hashtag isn’t already trending) and make it fun and engaging. Get people excited about your products by having them post pictures and videos on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook to create brand awareness around your products. Another idea is to post special deals and offers driving your customers to shop online and in store to give them a seamless shopping experience. Lastly, boost engagement by promoting the hashtag and user generated content in emails.
Keeping customers engaged during the holidays is hard, so be sure to create a seamless, memorable and fun omni-channel shopping experience that they won’t forget. Watch out for future posts and be sure to check our Holiday Golden Rule Blog posts from previous weeks like: “How to Create Dazzling Content” and “Focusing on the New Customer Experience”. We’re here to make your holiday marketing memorable so your customers come back to shop, year after year after!
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