Customer needs and expectations are constantly evolving, but these expectations go beyond price. Modern consumers want a tailored online experience that’s unique to them, a simple, user-friendly website journey, and impeccable customer service.
Businesses must keep up with and adapt to these changing trends to encourage long-term customer engagement. Unsure how to do this? The UK’s leading telephone answering service, Bizik, outlines five ways below.
1. Personalisation
Personalisation is vital to customer engagement. But if you have hundreds of faceless online visitors a day, understanding how to tailor each of their experiences can be challenging. Luckily, the answers are in your data.
If a returning customer logs into their account on your website, you should greet them directly. For instance, when they go into their dashboard, they should see ‘Hi, [first name]’. This simple touch can go a long way in making that user feel like that journey is all about them.
Another easy solution is to suggest products or services they might like based on their purchase behaviour. Analyse each customer’s shopping trends to understand their trends and habits, and use those insights to engage them by highlighting complementary items.
Not only do tailored suggestions streamline their experience with your website, but they also facilitate customer engagement by showing that you pay attention to their needs and wants.
2. Deliver an easy user experience
A simple and frictionless user journey is crucial when a customer lands on your website. Easy navigation makes visitors more likely to convert into sales and facilitates greater customer engagement.
Firstly, ensure great usability. This refers to how easy products, answers, and information are to find.
Secondly, perfect your website’s visual design. Colours, graphic design, and even text fonts and sizes impact the overall user experience. Ensure that the aesthetic matches your brand identity and makes the user journey appealing.
Thirdly, functionality is crucial for customer engagement. You should conduct regular website audits to ensure every action responds quickly and correctly. Nothing kills customer engagement like slow loading times, delayed reactions, or pages failing to load.
Lastly, be sure to optimise your website design, format, and functionality for different devices. This will ensure that your online visitors have the same user-friendly experience no matter how they access your website.
3. Consistency is key
Brand interactions can start in many places, not just via your website. It could be via social media, a search engine, and even platforms like Google Maps.
Regardless of how a customer finds you, it’s essential that you present them with a consistent brand voice, look, and feel to boost customer engagement and create a cohesive experience.
Remember to apply the same personalisation elements and easy functionality features (as we discussed above) across all channels. That way, customers will know that your brand is reliable, consistent, and trustworthy and will be more inclined to interact with it again.
4. Offer impeccable customer service
The quality of your customer service has a direct impact on customer engagement. Reliable, instant responses are key.
In a Salesforce study, 77% of consumers said they expect to speak to a support team member immediately when they contact a company. Therefore, you should strive to respond to your online users as quickly as possible to improve customer engagement.
For instance, if you have a live chat feature, users should immediately connect to a support team member. If your team is too busy to respond straight away, a brief chatbot interaction is a great way to keep customers engaged without frustrating them with virtual queues.
Great customer service builds strong relationships. The better your support, the greater your customer engagement levels will be.
5. Shout about your brand values
Genuine and lasting customer engagement depends on your brand values. While consumers look for competitive prices and good quality products, they also care about the brands that they shop for on a moral and ethical level.
Therefore, you should focus on what personally matters to you and demonstrate that your business is a force for good. For example, if you care about sustainability, dedicate a part of your website to demonstrate your company’s sustainable practices and why they’re important to you.
Or, if you support a certain charity, showcase your impact and work with them on your website. That way, you’ll foster customer engagement based on shared personal values, which is a powerful way to encourage customers to stick around for the long term.
Summary
There’s more to customer engagement than your prices and what you sell. Long-term customer engagement is influenced by value and reliability, which come from personalised, seamless online journeys, consistent brand interaction, unrivalled customer service, and deeper brand values.
If you need help improving your website’s customer engagement, speak to the experts at Bizik. Their team of virtual PAs is made up of the UK’s best support people, who will answer calls and online chats promptly and empathise with every customer. Give them a call on 020 3917 7444.