Business Strategy

How To Give Your E-Commerce Customers A Five-Star Experience
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How To Give Your E-Commerce Customers A Five-Star Experience As a business owner, you need not step into your customers’ shoes to understand their feelings. You are a customer yourself first before you are even a businessman. And that has been true since the dawn of businesses and long before e-commerce was even a thing. All along the line, if there has been one thing static, it is customer experience and its influence on the growth of your business. But what exactly does customer experience mean? Is it really that important? How can you ensure that your customers experience a satisfactory time on your website? Let’s get to it. What is Customer Experience? Customer experience in e-commerce is how your customer feels about their journey from your website to the end of the transaction. Your target is to ensure an outstanding customer experience. It involves smooth browsing, a safe checkout, and of course, on-time delivery, and quality of products. A happy customer is more likely to become a loyal one. What Makes A Wholesome Customer Experience? The most important factor that influences your customer is, obviously, the quality of the product that you offer. A close second would be a safe transaction. No one wants to make a payment on a platform that looks ‘shady’. Besides, when you sell something online, you can’t give your customer the personal attention that they would get if they were to walk into a traditional store. To compensate for that, you can make personalized gestures honoring bulk orders and offering special stock for festive seasons. At the same time, ensure easy browsing through relevant keywords and proper filters. Here are a few ideas that can help improve your business’s CX. 1. Design & Development How does a customer land on your website? Through an advertisement or a reference or because of your reputation. So, make sure that your landing page has the qualities that deliver the promises made in the advertisement; make sure that the page lives up to the reputation of the reference. To make the right first impression, you need a fast-loading website and a design that welcomes visitors. 2. Website Browsing Experience Say you Googled “last night sports results,” and it shows you a piece of news from last year or shows an advertisement for beauty products. How would you feel? Now, if your customer searches for, say, a helmet and your website shows results of shoes, how would he feel? Or maybe the result shows helmets but also includes helmet-printed t-shirts, helmet keychains, or wallpaper of a sportsperson wearing a helmet. While the relevant result is displayed, it is still cumbersome for your customer to select the right product from the cluster. So, there are two things you need to optimize – keywords & filters. Relevant keywords will make searching easy and good filters will help them pin down the exact product they were looking for. 3. Product Description Many merchants limit their product descriptions to product specifications only. The idea is that a rational person only needs hardcore details to decide. But what every business person must understand is that no matter how intelligent a person is, emotions always get the better of them, which are generally backed up with logical reasoning. That is why a wise merchant crafts their product descriptions to represent the beliefs and lifestyles of their target customers. Your customer will feel more at home if they can relate to the product description. 4. Provide as Much Product Information as You Can  How many times have you seen a product, say a phone cover, and wondered how it would look on your phone and in your hand? It often happens that even if we like the product on its own, we are doubtful if it would look good on a set or if it would suit our personality. Note that your online customer is going through the same dilemma. You can ease a customer’s selection through a size guide or contextualized photos or by setting them up with related products. In fact, this way you will not only achieve a good customer experience but also may instantly increase your sales if your customers purchase your recommended set. In addition, you can also plan for a chat box and grievance platform to communicate with your buyers on a more personal level. However, if you do opt for this feature, make sure that you use this feature actively. 5. Offer Personalized Discounts One very significant difference between an online store and a traditional store is that in an online store, the personal ‘touch’ is unavailable. You cannot greet your customer with a warm smile every time he visits your website. There can’t be any friendly negotiatory conversation (which undeniably has its own charms). You can’t really compensate for that but you still can make small gestures to connect with your customers on a personal level. For example, you can offer some store credit the first time they make a transaction or you can give them a discount on bulk orders. Even better, surprise them with a birthday discount or personalized merchandise once in a while. Another good way to make a personal connection with your customers is to restock your store during festivals with festive merchandise. 6. Provide a Safe Checkout Reflect on your exit pages. Do your customers bounce off right before they make a transaction? There may be two reasons behind it – your payment gateway is ‘faulty’ or you do not have a convenient payment option. The choice is simple here – patch your payment gateway with safety rules and give more payment options to your customers. Once the order is successfully placed, sent your buyer an email confirming the same. If you want to ensure safe transactions, our team at Exinent can help you achieve the highest level of security through your Magento store. 7. Never Compromise on Quality Nothing assures loyalty more than the quality of your product. Marketing can help…

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E-commerce SEO Tips That Skyrocket Your Sales in 2022
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E-commerce SEO Tips That Skyrocket Your Sales in 2022 It is no secret that the only way to increase your e-commerce website’s sales is by driving more traffic. While increasing the number of visitors to your online store is essential, we also need to keep in mind that the traffic you generate must be relevant to your store’s niche.  There are several ways to drive targeted traffic web traffic. Search engine optimization is undeniably the best technique because it is comparatively inexpensive and offers better ROI. On the downside, optimizing your e-commerce store for search engines is tricky. We shared six e-commerce SEO tips and best practices to help you drive a lot of organic traffic to your website.  Here we go!   1. Speed up Your Website Fact: The visitors that come to your website from Google are not your customers but Google’s. Since Google is a customer-centric company, it hates sending its customers to slow websites. Quick question: Would you prefer to go for a spin in a Chevy Corvette or Toyota Prius?!  Just like how an average person loves riding a sports car, an average internet user enjoys browsing a website that is lightning fast. Google has long been considering page loading time as a ranking signal. Therefore, you must make sure that the pages of your website take no more than a couple of seconds to load. The faster the page loading speed is, the better the rankings are. Great content and an ocean of backlinks can’t save your website from plummeting deep into Google’s SERPs (Search Engine Results Page) if your site is too slow and sluggish. Fun fact: According to a funny internet saying, the best place to hide a dead body is the second page of Google results. Nobody ever goes there! Anything not on the first page of Google results can’t be considered a ranking.  Key advantages of a fast-loading website: Better ranking in search engines Improved conversion rates  Increased customer loyalty and reputation  Boost in sales Customer acquisition from competitors.  2. Devise a Search Engine Optimization Strategy As Alan Lakein said, failing to plan is planning to fail! You must prepare a well-thought-out SEO strategy to be successful.  The following are the five major components of search engine optimization.  Keyword Analysis                                                                                           Content Development and Marketing Link Acquisition Competitor Analysis On-page Optimization Keyword Analysis  Keywords or key phrases are the search queries that your potential customers enter into search engines to get relevant results. Let’s say you own and run a jewelry business in San Jose, CA. What do you think your targeted audience search on Google?  Their search queries look like the following. San Jose jewelers San Jose jewelry store Wedding rings in San Jose There are thousands of such keywords and key phrases your potential customers use to find a store or website that sells the items of their interest.  How do you analyze such keywords? Anyone who hasn’t had hands-on SEO experience may find the task of keyword analysis a little tricky. With that said, it isn’t rocket science.  The following free keyword analysis tools help you list all the keywords and key phrases that can drive a lot of traffic to your website. SEMRush Ahrefs Google Ads keyword planner (Helps estimate search volumes) Ubersugges Google search suggestions. You should use those keywords in your product titles, descriptions, blog posts, etc., for better search engine visibility.  Content Development and Marketing Content is king! It will continue to be king in the coming years as well. Content doesn’t necessarily mean blog posts. Content includes titles, descriptions, images, videos, social media posts, and even the transactional or promotional emails you send to your customers. Have total control of your content and make sure it speaks to your audience.   Five golden rules of content marketing Analyze keyword gaps and choose your keywords wisely Create a content calendar and stick to it Write content that helps your audience in one or the other way Avoid stuffing too many keywords Distribute content in social media channels  Link Acquisition Link building is a popular search engine optimization technique that web admins and SEO professionals use to rank their or their clients’ websites on top of the Google results. Simply put, the number of backlinks to your website helps search engines like Google determine the popularity of your site. Websites with many backlinks are highly likely to perform well in search engines than sites with fewer backlinks.   The Murky World of Backlinks Building backlinks is like skating on thin ice. Poor link-building strategy or trashy backlinks don’t add value. They can get your e-commerce website removed from Google’s search index altogether. Therefore, you must take great care to ensure that your link-building strategy is white hat and follows best practices.  You need to build quality backlinks. Quality matters more than quantity here. What is a good backlink? Let’s talk about that San Jose jewelry store example again. An ideal backlink for the online store would: Be a do-follow link (No-follow links don’t count even if you build a million of them) Comes from a relevant website or blog (E.g., a blog that discusses fashion or jewelry) Comes from a blog or website with high domain authority/popularity Have a relevant and meaningful anchor text  If you build a link that doesn’t satisfy any of the four rules mentioned above, your link acquisition efforts are going down the drain.  Remember, easy backlinks from junk forums, comments, social bookmark sites, etc., are dead a long time back and add zero value to your link-building campaign. Competitor Analysis Analyzing the competition is essential for SEO success. This part of the strategy may be confusing unless you’re a digital marketing or SEO guru. Here are some factors you need to consider while analyzing your competitors. Factors Free tools to use Website and platform  Builtwith.com Design, UI/UX flow, and information architecture N/A Page loading speed GTMetrix, tools.pingdom.com, Google Page Speed Insights Mobile responsiveness N/A Traffic SimilarWeb No. of web pages and blog…

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How to Choose a Negative Feedback Removal Agency
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How to Choose a Negative Feedback Removal Agency If negative feedback on the internet about your product or service affects your business, partnering with a negative feedback removal agency can help improve your business’s online reputation. Since there are quite a few negative reviews removal solutions available, it can be pretty challenging for business owners to pick the one. If you are actively searching for a negative feedback removal service, we recommend keeping these 5 points in mind before signing up. 1. Must Support a Wider Range of Business Review Platforms A good negative reviews removal agency must support a broader range of business review platforms such as Google My Business, Facebook, Amazon, Trustpilot, etc. The ability to support multiple business review websites is a sign of professionalism and expertise. Most businesses have a presence on more than one reviews platform. For instance, a typical e-commerce seller who sells products on their website and Amazon has their customers leaving feedback on both the websites. Similarly, a local car dealership gets reviews on their Facebook, Google My Business, and other dealership-specific review platforms. Hence, it’s always good to partner with an agency that supports many online reviews and rating platforms. 2. Should Be Capable of Removing Negative Reviews Quickly Negative reviews are terrible for any business. They affect a business in many ways besides affecting its revenue. Negative feedback is one of the main reasons small businesses want to work with an online reputation management company. When reaching out to a negative feedback removal agency like FeedbackClarity, check their capability of removing negative reviews quickly. Keep in mind that many online reputation agencies don’t offer negative feedback removal as a feature. They rely on generating new reviews to hide the negative reviews and reduce their impact. 3. Must Generate a Lot of New Reviews Negative feedback removal is good, and it solves some of your business woes. Generating more reviews is better. A lot of positive reviews for your business help you get many phone calls. They also help increase your business’s visibility on the internet. Your new online reputation management partner should be able to generate new reviews periodically that are positive and real. Remember, some agencies use black hat techniques for getting reviews. Fake reviews will get deleted ultimately, and they increase the chances of getting your listing permanently removed. 4. The Service Must Be Affordable Most negative feedback removal services are affordable. If you come across a service that quoted an exuberant amount of money to fix negative reviews problem, you need to reconsider your decision to work with them. Please make sure a solution’s pricing offers good value for money before partnering with them. We recommend that you go with services that offer their service in a recurring plan over fixed. It ensures that you don’t have to invest huge money upfront. Such a service also allows you to terminate the contract whenever you want. 5. Choose a Local Service Provider You will come across many ORM service providers from different parts of the world, especially from Asia. If you are an American businessperson, we recommend choosing a service provider based in the States. Working with US-based reputation management professionals is that they know customer behavior and sentiments better. Furthermore, they are easy to work with and are available during your work hours for a quick review or discussion.

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How to Deal With Negative Reviews That Are Ruining Your Business
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How to Deal With Negative Reviews That Are Ruining Your Business Negative reviews affect your business in many ways besides hurting revenue and profitability. Poor online reputation discourages an average customer from contacting local businesses. Most business owners know how detrimental negative reviews can be, but not many know how to deal with them. If you are one of those businesspersons hit by negative feedback, find out how you can deal with it effectively. 1. Reach Out to Unhappy Customers Research and list all negative reviews your business have on the internet. Consolidate them in a document or a spreadsheet and scrutinize each one. The next step is differentiating fake and genuine reviews. You can identify real either by looking at the names of reviewers or the way they described their experience. Now make a separate list of fake and genuine reviews. Go through each review and understand why they are unhappy. Check if you can identify reviewers using your customer database. Start responding to those negative reviews very politely. Acknowledge genuine customer reviews and apologize to them. Inform them gently of the reason behind the bad experience and offer them ways to correct it. Explain how you prioritize the customer experience. Remember, prospects will see and read your response, not just those who left reviews. Reach out to unhappy customers via an email or phone call if you manage to find them in your database. Explain the scenarios that led to their bad experience and assure them that it will not repeat. Once you believe your explanation satisfied an unhappy customer, request them to update their review and explain how their online review affects your business. 2. Get More Positive Reviews Do you know what a swarm of positive reviews can do to your business? They can drastically increase your business’s overall rating and bury negative feedback. Most small businesses follow this strategy to nullify the effects of negative reviews. This strategy yields excellent results. On the downside, it can be very challenging and time-consuming. Here are a few tips from FeedbackClarity that will help your business drive positive customer reviews. Use coupons and discounts to encourage customers to leave positive feedback. Run social media contests and campaigns. Reach out to happy customers directly and request their reviews. Make reviews an integral part of your marketing processes. 3. Flag and Report Fake Reviews Every customer reviews platform on the internet, such as Google My Business, YellowPages.com, etc., offers a way to flag and dispute fake reviews. If you believe the negative reviews about your business are fake or a result of a smear campaign from competitors, you can report them directly to review websites. However, you are less likely to get those reviews deleted successfully. The majority of the business review platforms don’t have robust processes set up to expedite business owner reports. 4. Fix Business Processes That Are Resulting In Poor Customer Feedback Perhaps, this is the crucial thing you need to focus on if you don’t want your customers to leave negative feedback. Understand what is making your customers unhappy. It could be because of the quality of service, service delay, longer wait times, poor customer support, etc. Find ways to improve the business process, and the customer experience will automatically improve. If you find it challenging to fix business problems, you can probably hire a business consultant to solve pressing issues. 5. Hire an Online Reputation Management Agency Most business owners are already pretty busy with their day-to-day tasks. It can be challenging to focus on online reputation due to the lack of time or skills. If many negative reviews hit your business, we recommend that you work with an online reputation management solution like FeedbackClarity. FeedbackClarity, a Chicago-based ORM solution, improves a business’s online reputation by removing negative feedback and driving new positive reviews. We can remove negative reviews from: Google My Business Facebook Page Reviews Amazon Store Reviews DealerRater TrustPilot Vitals and many other review platforms Who can benefit from FeedbackClarity services: Doctors and dentists Lawyers and attorneys Auto dealerships Hotel and restaurant owners Other small business owners Do you want to know how FeedbackClarity helps your business? Get in touch with us.

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