The customer is generally correct is a phrase that has been around since the beginning of retail. Traditional retailers will do everything to keep the customer cheerful and encourage them to buy.
It seems logical that this would follow through into online retail. An e-commerce customer journey ought to generally be designed considering the customer’s happiness and satisfaction. It’s an easy decision, surely.
The thing is, this isn’t generally the case. Not enough e-commerce businesses center around customer-centered design.
It’s About Customer
Customer-centered design is tied in with putting the customer at the forefront of everything you do and continue being the champion of the customer in their decisions in general. It’s not just about UX or front-end design, it ought to permeate through every piece of an e-commerce business; end to end.
When designing a new feature, service, or product it is easy to zero in on how something will find a place with your existing processes or systems, not necessarily what is best for the customer’s experience.
This might be in the design of your promotions, your returns process, or the delivery options you offer. This is where startup digital businesses have an advantage. They aren’t constrained by expensive legacy technology, internal processes, or even ingrained company culture.
They can design their business from the ground up and generally put the customer front and center. This can be more of a challenge for a traditional retailer who might have large legacy systems, for example, POS or ERP, and staff working with a specific goal in mind.
End to End Process
Customer-centered design isn’t just about the UX of your website. It’s about checking out the entirety of your digital business and designing it according to the point of view of the customer. This covers everything from your digital marketing and social media through to your returns process and everything in between.
Customers have multiple touchpoints with a brand and their experience does not end at the order confirmation page. Even your choice of the courier will impact the customer’s experience.
Imagine how your customer will perceive your brand assuming their package ends up crumpled and torn when delivered. It’s tempting to go for the cheapest option, yet this may adversely affect your customer’s experience and impact your brand.
The packaging that your product comes in is likewise really significant as this represents your brand. Even opening the package ought to be an experience that matches your brand.
One of the biggest areas where customer-centered design is often missed is in the returns process. Rather than designing a process that turns out best for you, ponder what the customer ultimately needs and make that as easy and pain-free as could be expected.
Managing returns is certifiably not an easy process yet is one that can have a huge impact on the experience of the customer. Every single touchpoint that a customer has with a brand ought to be designed with the customer at the center.
Design Research
Most brands think they realize their customers really well. A ton of the time, this is true, yet I’m often surprised at the amount UX and design take place with next to no involvement from a single customer.
- A decent customer-centered design will involve consulting with a blend of different customers throughout the process so you can create a successful e-commerce customer journey.
- As a feature of your UX design, you ought to create a clickable prototype utilizing apparatuses. To get the most value out of this, you ought to consider getting actual customers to test the prototype. It’s quite easy to recruit a testing team, as loyal customers will often be very keen to get involved in working with their favorite brand.
- Maybe you’re designing a new checkout. Surely it’s a good idea to get some actual customers to test such a fundamentally vital piece of your e-commerce site. The insight you can get by utilizing your customers can be invaluable.
- You probably do A/B testing on different changes to your website. This is definitely a very sensible thing to do. However, A/B testing does not give you the feedback that an actual group of customers will.
Make Your Own Design
This is the sort of thing that I see a ton. A ton of UX designers will take a gander at what the competition is doing and use that for ‘inspiration’. Because your biggest competitor has a new one-page checkout, this does not mean that it is appropriate for you to make it happen.
Numerous designers take inspiration from bigger sites like John Lewis or Amazon.
They are definitely right to aspire to these sites as they do a very great job with their overall customer experience however their customers are not necessarily your customers.
The Success of Disruptors
Assuming you take a gander at all of the hugely successful digital disruptors over the previous decade, they have one thing in like manner:
They designed their business and the e-commerce customer journey around the customer.
Amazon permits its customers to buy nearly anything at a great price and often on a same or next day delivery. I live quite far from the nearest city yet can order something at 9:30 on a Saturday evening and it will be delivered on Sunday morning.
Uber permits customers to flag down a taxi on their phone, keeps them updated on where it is, and permits them to pay to utilize their card. There is a huge measure of resistance to Uber from taxi firms however a large number of customers use Uber because it was designed around them, not the company. Uber designed their entire business to give customers the best experience.
Apple has consistently provided technology that is about usability and single-handedly changed the digital music industry forever. Before the iPod, MP3 players were techy and essentially designed to play music. That’s what apple changed and looked at what the customer wanted first and made the technology work for that.
