A superior in-store shopping experience involves great customer service from a sales team with excellent product knowledge who make appropriate recommendations and know what would be perfect for you.
Behind the scenes, there are teams creating training programs, building, and monitoring KPIs, and setting clienteling and operational programs and standards.
In e-commerce, tech tools, such as AI-powered recommendation engines, accomplish the same objectives for the shopper. Data driven cross-sell, up-sell and checkout recommendations are your best ‘sales team’ for digital retail.
The power of cart and checkout customization
Checkout is among the most complex, strategic, and financially impactful components of a merchant’s technology stack,” said Neeraj Chandra, CEO of Untitled Investments.
During 12 years of usability testing, Baymard research has consistently found: “the design and flow of the checkout to frequently be the sole cause for users abandoning their purchase during the checkout flow.”
It is reported that 69.80% is the documented online shopping cart abandonment rate (This value is an average calculated based on 44 different studies containing statistics on e-commerce shopping cart abandonment). That is the equivalent of nearly 70% of your in-store clients saying “Just Looking”.
Baymard’s Check Out Usability Report has tested and re-tested checkout usability, running large-scale qualitative research studies testing the checkout flows of the world’s leading e-commerce sites, as well as conducting checkout UX audits for more than 100 leading e-commerce sites.
Reconsidering the in-store experience and recommendations, upselling and cross-selling: the sales team will have just tended to the client and will have enough information to make meaningful add-on recommendations. If the sales associate shows they have listened and subsequently made truly beneficial recommendations and suggestions, the client will begin to trust the associate.
This is the same process in e-commerce. If the AI is making meaningful upsell and cross-selling recommendations, the user and the UX experience is improved because of trust.
Accuracy is key and placement as well. The most effective place for recommendations is in the cart and also at checkout. The client that is ready to pay is the most highly engaged. The most powerful conversions occur here.
The checkout is the store’s most critical moment. It’s the gateway to a smooth customer experience and importantly, store conversions – Shopify
Three Characteristics to look for differentiated services:
AI-recommendations and cart customizations are a crowded field with a lot of apparent sameness. How do you differentiate and decide to achieve maximum cart conversion, minimal cart abandonment and exponential checkout growth.
API- First technology:
Look closely at solutions for API-First technology. Personalization engines that are not built on their own API do not excel in the world of headless. With migration to headless for a faster, more agile and consistent shopping experience – you’ll want to use compatible and portable solutions. According to John Erck, CEO and Co-Founder of Rebuy Engine who serves clients with headless sites like Something Navy and From Our Place/The Always Pan, their powerful API built AI-based cross-sell recommendations and smart cart customizations have driven exponential growth.
No code:
There are strong solutions that do not require code that give Dev-level customizations in the cart and at check-out.
Connectability:
Avoid having to duct-tape your solutions so you’ll want to ensure that your solution interfaces with the biggest ecosystem of apps – the ones providing the biggest value like Klayvio or Recharge. Shogun Front End and Tap Cart.
Cart and Checkout Customizations:
Intent and focus on the cart and checkout can drive conversion, reduce abandonment, increase AOV, build trust, improve CLV, and cultivate revisits.
RCCA 