Cultivate repeat purchasers for your online store, with these 5 tips
Creating repeat customers is key to success in any business – that much is well-known. But is it possible to make an art out of “growing” repeat customers for your e-tail store? And if so, what steps should you be taking to achieve that?
It might seem almost too obvious a statement to make, but if you want to grow your store’s base of repeat customers quickly, you will need to give shoppers something that your competitors don’t offer. And that “something” could very much be the experience that your website itself gives them.
So, with that in mind, we thought we would take a look at five ways in which you can help capture repeat customers, to support your ecommerce store’s growth over months and years to come.
Simplify, simplify, and simplify
Or as the famous quote of Lotus Cars founder Colin Chapman goes: “simplify, then add lightness”.
There will almost always be scope to simplify such fundamental elements of your website design as its navigational system, search functionality, and checkout process.
The aim should be to make it feel intuitive and effortless for a shopper to find items in your store, complete purchases, and request help from your customer service team.
Confirm the customer has already bought the item
You might have noticed when browsing certain product pages on Amazon, a notice reading “You last purchased this item on…”, followed by the date of that previous order.
Well, you can do a similar thing with your own online store’s product pages. It can easily slip our minds that we might have ordered a certain product in the past, so an “already purchased” label can alert the customer to this – in the process, saving their time and helping to minimise returns.
Notify the customer if a given product has been restocked
Most of us have had that frustrating experience of seeing a much-wanted product listed as “out of stock”, despite the product page still being online. Indeed, the situation might have caused us to wonder why the given product page actually was still online.
There is, though, at least one way to immediately make such “out-of-stock” notices useful; including an option for the shopper to be notified in the event that you receive fresh stock.
And what about going even further than that, by giving customers on the notification list first access to that new stock? You could even highlight restocks of popular items on your store’s social media channels, to give those customers who have been waiting a further ‘heads-up’ of the good news.
Reward customers for actions beyond just purchasing a product
In articles like this one about how businesses can attract repeat custom, a loyalty or ‘VIP’ scheme tends to be mentioned at some point. And yes, we’re entering that territory here – although we particularly suggest that you consider ways to reward customers even when they aren’t buying from you.
After all, such customer actions as reviewing your product(s) with their own photos and video, or posting about their experiences of your products on social media using your brand’s favoured hashtag for this, can help your store to build its profile and grow.
Nor do the VIP or loyalty rewards necessarily always need to be discounts, as shoppers also tend to appreciate such perks as free ‘express’ shipping, priority support, and early access to the given store’s latest sales and products.
Offer free add-ons at the checkout stage
Who doesn’t love being offered something a little extra for free, when they were already intending to purchase something anyway?
Your own store might look to do this by offering free products or add-ons guided by the customer’s own purchase history, so that they are likelier to appreciate it. It could be a particularly interesting way to reward your customers if you do not presently have a fully-fledged loyalty programme.
As the above tips go some way to showing, there’s a lot that even an already very successful online store can do to further optimise the experience it provides to its shoppers, which can mean good things for the longer-term growth of the business.
Naturally, we can help you get more from your brand’s online presence here at Piranha Designs. With our services including the likes of website design, graphic design, search engine marketing (SEM), and the development of mobile apps and CRM systems in Gibraltar, the UK, and Spain, we are excellently placed to assist you in boosting your store’s ease of use and impact on its target audiences. So, why not reach out to us now to find out more?
