How to Use Customer-Centric Marketing to Increase E-commerce Sales

What makes a business’s success sustainable? Is having a steady capital flow and unique products enough? No. Customers will turn to other brands if their experience on your website or with your campaigns is not smooth and relevant enough. 

Your marketing must reflect that you know your customers and want to give them the best possible shopping experience. This is the best way to retain existing buyers and acquire new customers through word-of-mouth. 

That’s why, a Forrester report found that 41% of companies that prioritized customers the most achieved at least 10% revenue growth in their last fiscal year compared to only 10% of those who didn’t.

7 Ways to Use Customer-Centric Marketing to Increase E-Commerce Sales

There is more to being customer-focused than sending a few surveys every once in a while and trying to adjust your marketing accordingly. Here are 7 solid ways you can try:

1.Add Personalized Product Bundles Based on Customer Preferences

See, we all like deals. Your regular and even new customers may be willing to stock up on your products if you bundle and discount them properly. But what does it do for your brand? It helps to: 

Increase average order value and sales

Reduce shipping cost

Satisfy or even delight the customer

The buyer may even spread the word about your product bundles, driving more shoppers to your website. 

For example, On Etsy, brands bundle complementary items to sell more products. Even though the rate is discounted, they make money on Etsy with increased order value and volume. Plus, customers don’t have to look for the items separately, offering a more convenient and enjoyable customer experience.

The key here is to personalize the bundles according to customer preferences. Analyze buyer history, demographics, and psychographic data and segment them accordingly.

Suppose you run a pet care brand that gets frequent cat food and treats orders from a specific demographic. You can bundle their favorite food and treat brands together and offer the bundle at a discounted rate.

2.Use Customer-Driven Storytelling in Your Brand Campaigns

Your campaign stories must speak the customer’s language. From ads to social media content, customers should be the hero of everything you put out. It shows that you understand them and makes them believe that your product will fit their lifestyle. 

Sportswear company Hoka’s mission is to make their apparel inclusive and accessible for everyone. That’s why their posts often feature real people sharing their stories of resilience and success in athletics despite hardships. 

For example, in the above post, Hoka Athlete Ahmed Muhumed describes his mistakes and how consistency has helped him achieve his dreams. It’s simple, tells a relatable story, and inspires the audience. Plan more content like this and centralize it in a social media calendar to align all your ideas. 

3.Include Ugc in Product Pages and Ads

Customers are often skeptical about trying a new product. You can eliminate that by adding user-generated content on ads and product pages. 

86% of customers like buying from brands that showcase authentic customer content. It gives credibility to your brand. Plus, real people using your product offer social proof of the product’s value. 

Collect UGC videos through contests and hashtags. You must look for the ones that highlight your product’s best features. If it has transformative results, try to gather some before and after pictures as well. Then use them on social media ads and embed them on relevant product pages.

For example, Colorescience features carousels with product images and videos of real customers using them.

4.Create Interactive Feedback Loops for Product Development

Customers preferences change rapidly due to the sheer number of available options for the same product. Your business’s sustainability depends hugely on how fast you can accommodate these demands. 

One proven way to do this is by creating interactive feedback loops. This way, customers can communicate what they want from your brand. You can implement the most popular ones to design wireframe design examples and upgrade new products. Customers feel heard and valued, boosting satisfaction. Plus, it showcases a customer-centric brand image. 

You can create polls on Instagram and ask customers for feedback on Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit. Running a community page also helps in collecting valuable customer suggestions. 

For example, the Lego Community lets the brand collect actionable feedback to make product design more customer-centric. Members post their designs and discuss new Lego ideas. If a submission gets 10,000 supporters in a specific time, the company reviews it. Once approved, they design products accordingly. Bonus? The customer who designed it gets a part of that profit!

You should also train your customer support team to understand and identify specific issues from generic complaints. For that, you must provide skills-based training regularly. That way, your team will be familiar with the current industry norms and customer preferences and can collect feedback effectively. 

5.Develop Community-Driven Loyalty Programs with Exclusive Rewards

Another way of making customers feel valued is running a loyalty program focused on building a community of your most ardent fans. Your customers can sign up for the program and collect points for every purchase. They can redeem it for their next shopping spree. 

Such initiatives keep your customers coming back for more, improving retention. It improves brand reputation, boosts word-of-mouth, and also increases AOV.

For example, Beauty Insider is Sephora’s loyalty program that offers members points depending on their order value. It also offers perks like free standard shipping, birthday gifts, and seasonal savings events.

6.Offer Predictive Customer Support to Solve Issues before They Arise

Customers won’t always contact you with their problems. They will just stop shopping for your business. You must offer predictive customer support to solve problems before the customer’s complaints. 

That way, you have enough time to seek the right solution, maintain customer satisfaction, and prevent churn. It also shows that you are in sync with your customer’s experiences and willing to go the extra mile to improve it. 

Monitor customer activities carefully to notice unusual behavior. Has a regular buyer not shopped from you in a while? Are they not engaging with your marketing communications? These are generally signs that the customer is becoming disinterested. 

Run root-cause analysis and examine customer journeys to identify roadblocks and eliminate them. Contact and ask the customer if they are satisfied with the updates and if there is anything you can do to make their experience better. 

7.Design Immersive Virtual Try-Ons or Product Experiences

Customers often shy away from shopping from an online store because they don’t know what the product would actually look like in real life. Let them overcome this doubt with a virtual try-on feature. l

For example, Warby Parker lets customers try on their glasses virtually to ensure they fit their style. Buyers can just click on the lens icon on the product, give access to their device camera, and try on the product online. The Warby Parker app also offers a virtual try-on feature. 

Conclusion 

A customer-centric marketing approach isn’t a one-day practice. You have to keep at it to make it a company-wide practice. Follow our strategies and tweak them according to changing customer preferences and feedback.  

A reliable and vetted e-commerce marketing agency can help you run customer-centric marketing easily. But finding the right marketing partner isn’t easy. DAN can connect you with the top marketing agencies that will keep your campaigns customer-focused.

So what are you waiting for? Join DAN today to find the perfect marketing agency for your brand.