5 Customer Experience Marketing Strategies To Boost Sales
In this highly competitive digital market, there are plenty of opportunities as well as potential pitfalls that every business should be aware of, one of them being customer experience. Keeping the consumer happy and satisfied should be the number one priority for any business, as quality products and services can considerably catapult their growth. To build an effective customer experience, it’s vital to delve into customer experience marketing.
What is customer experience marketing?
As is evident from the name, customer experience marketing focuses on creating a positive image of your brand or business in the eyes of the customer. Of course, this is a rather broad term and there are several touchpoints where a customer interacts with a brand, such as the sale of a product or service, browsing their website or newsletter, coming across advertisements of the brand, and reading other customer testimonials, and more.
Hence, customer experience marketing is an umbrella term that encompasses monitoring and optimizing all the above-mentioned aspects, so that every customer has a pleasant, memorable interaction with the business from start to finish. Thus, rather than being geared towards making sales, this side of marketing is more consumer-centric.
Importance of customer experience marketing
There are many benefits of investing in effective customer experience marketing. Here are 2 fundamental merits:
- Improves Your Operation: Since this style of marketing is focused on pleasing the customer, it will inadvertently improve the quality of your overall operation. Be it the products or services you offer, the layout of your website, the content, or perhaps even customer service, the constant feedback will help you in the long run.
- Retain Customers: While acquiring new consumers is necessary, retaining customers is an often neglected part of modern-day businesses. However, with effective customer experience marketing, you can maintain or even boost your goodwill in the eyes of repeat customers, thereby generating more revenue and a loyal consumer base.
Now, with the basics out of the way, it’s time to explore 5 time-tested strategies that can help you achieve these benefits.
5 CX marketing strategies to boost your sales and conversion rates
1. Map Out A Customer Journey
Any business in the current climate is well aware that most customers don’t directly convert to sales when they first come across a brand. In the digital age, the customer journey is often quite convoluted, with the consumer interacting with a business across various touchpoints. As a result, for optimal execution of customer experience marketing, it’s vital to observe and think like a patron.
For example, once a customer is first exposed to your brand, they might do their own research. This includes visiting your website, browsing through your social media platforms or even looking for reviews on a search engine or other aggregator sites. Thus, to convert this prospective customer into a guaranteed sale, you as a business owner need to predict their journey and optimize these points so that they develop a good image of your brand across all these aspects. Once this is accomplished, it’s much easier to draw them into the sales funnel.
2. Offer Adequate Trial Periods
Offering trials in physical stores have been a part and parcel of modern-day consumerism. The same applies to the digital medium as well, where services are offered on trial for the customer before they make a decision. An idea popularized by Software as a Service company (SaaS), these trial periods are essential and often beneficial, as it has a high conversion rate, as long as the product or service in question offers good value.
However, online trials face a unique problem, which is the length of this transitory period. If it is too short then the customer might be dissatisfied with the service and might be unable to reach a decision. Conversely, if it’s too long, then it fails to create a sense of urgency to purchase the product. Thus, it’s absolutely vital to figure out an adequate trial period, which might take some experimentation, as it can vary for every business. For example, a 3-day trial might work for one, while for another business, even 14 days might not be enough.
3. Optimize And Redesign The Website If Required
The company website is often the first touchpoint between a prospective customer and a business. As a result, it’s fundamental to have an optimized website that can offer all the information to the customer with ease. There are several ways to create a responsive web design:
- Ensure that the site is mobile-friendly, as the majority of users access it through this medium.
- Check if the call to action buttons (CTAs) function correctly and are placed strategically throughout the page.
- Streamline the check-out process by opting for single-click purchase options.
- Make sure that the website layout is simple, easy to navigate and concisely offers all information.
- Keep your loading time as short as possible, as a long loading time is one of the biggest contributors when it comes to higher bounce rates and losing potential customers.
- Make your website accessible keeping in mind the ease of use for differently-abled consumers. Follow accessibility guidelines while choosing colours, font style, font size, etc.
While these are some of the most basic ideas to optimize the website, you should ideally opt for a more thorough analysis to identify and improve your specific weak points.
4. Predictive Personalization
One of the biggest applications of artificial intelligence is its integration in the marketing sphere, especially in the form of predictive personalization. For the uninitiated, predictive personalization can be defined as a feature wherein the software can accurately predict your preferences in products and services based on your search queries and browsing history. It is an integral part of fine-tuning customer experience to the highest possible level.
Two excellent examples of corporations that use this technology are Amazon and Netflix. While the former suggests products based on your search, the latter showcases movies and TV shows that you might like based on what you have been watching. Predictive personalization is crucial for improved CX marketing because it increases the convenience factor for the customer and therefore, leads to better conversions. Hence, it would be wise to invest in this feature for your website.
5. Implement A Customer Satisfaction Survey
While new technological features are great in terms of improving customer experience, some old-school practices are still quite relevant. One such practice is gathering customer feedback or survey. In the end, the best way to improve your interaction with the consumer is by directly listening to their suggestions or feedback. The challenge, however, is to conduct this survey without taking too much of the customer’s time.
Hence, there are a few different ways to conduct surveys without being too intrusive or causing inconvenience. Firstly, you can send these questionnaires via email, as customers who have provided their information will be more inclined to interact. Another avenue is social media, where it is easy to leave feedback or conduct polls to understand the pulse of the audience. Apart from Facebook and Twitter, this polling feature even extends to Instagram stories. Thus, there is no excuse to not make use of this excellent tool to glean valuable information from your patrons.
You can also consider adding new-age online survey tools to your website. SaaS companies like Typeform specialize in online form-building and online surveys that are more interactive and personalized than standard feedback forms. And the great thing is that they are very easy to integrate with your website.
Conclusion
To conclude, by implementing these 5 basic yet effective customer experience marketing strategies, you are bound to improve your operation as well as retain more customers. Moreover, it is also not necessary to bind yourself to these 5 methods, as CX marketing is a constantly evolving field. Hence, innovation and improving a user’s overall experience should be at the forefront to achieve incredible results.
