How to help your ecommerce customers when they’re stuck for gift ideas
It’s a feeling that we’re probably all familiar with on some level: a friend, relative or colleague’s birthday, anniversary or another special occasion – such as Valentine’s Day – is fast-looming, and you need to buy them a gift. But your mind’s drawing a blank – and you can’t just buy that same thing you got them last year, surely?
Now, swivel from your customers’ point to view, to your perspective as the owner of an ecommerce store. If your online store offers goods that make for suitable gifts, you could be missing out on custom if you don’t appeal to such stumped and exasperated customers in the features and messaging across your website.
So, let’s take a look at some of the ways you could attract and capture gift shoppers – to such an extent that even once they’ve found that ideal gift, they will keep coming back to you in the future.
Come up with gift guides for a wide range of circumstances
Any given person who is on the lookout for a suitable gift from an online store could be in a very different situation to the next person who is also seeking to buy a gift. One person’s small budget is another person’s big budget – and recipients naturally vary greatly in their preferences as well.
So, there’s a lot of scope to put together ‘gift guides’ on your website or blog that approach the gift-buying process from various angles.
The right decisions here will likely depend on the specifics of your online store. So, if your store largely focuses on one category of product, but those products vary a lot in their pricing, a ‘gift guide by price’ could be a good idea. This could spotlight great gift ideas in your store for less than £10, gift ideas for between £10 and £20, ideas for between £20 and £30, and so on.
Or perhaps you could write gift guides focusing on the category of recipient – ‘the best gifts for Mum this Mother’s Day’, for instance, or ‘5 potential presents for your bookish friend this Christmas’?
Link to your gift guides around – and beyond – your site
It’s the kind of thing that might seem obvious, but which too many online stores fail to do – once you’ve done all the work of writing excellent gift guides, be sure to link to them in the main navigation menu of your store.
Don’t forget to reference your gift guides in any relevant blog posts on your site too, and across your marketing emails and social media channels. Shoppers shouldn’t be left fumbling around for gift ideas, having not even been made aware that there are gift guides on your site.
Offer personalised touches for gift shoppers
You may or may not feel that you have sufficient resources as a business to provide personalised help to those seeking out gifts, but there are still likely to be certain steps you can take.
One thing that many stores can do with relative ease is offer gift wrapping and personalised messaging, so that the gift can be sent straight to the intended final recipient. Or you could heighten the sense of luxury slightly, by presenting shoppers with a questionnaire to complete, the idea being that you would then suggest potential gifts to them in an emailed reply.
Give the option of gift cards
Sometimes, even the most determined prospective gift buyer just can’t quite decide on an item. But they might be sure that the recipient would appreciate the general offerings from your store. So, making available online gift cards specifically for your e-tail shop, in denominations such as £5, £10, £20, and upwards, could help cover this possibility.
For great numbers of shoppers, it can sometimes feel as if picking out a gift for that special someone becomes more difficult every year. But your online store can help make this task much easier for them, which will also help you retain their custom for months and years to come.
Are you on the lookout for the best ecommerce, website design, and bespoke system solution companies in Gibraltar, the UK or Spain, so that you can take advantage of the services that would help your brand grow? If so, please don’t hesitate to reach out today to the Piranha Designs team.
