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Powerful & Profitable Series: Customizing the Shopper Experience
See how to personalize your checkout flow and customer portal to provide your subscribers with more purchase power.
About
Personalization has always been key to the shopping experience. In the past, customers could only encounter this in brick-and-mortar stores, interacting with a concierge who would guide them through the purchasing process. Today, as the direct-to-consumer movement continues to grow, ecommerce stores must adapt by customizing the digital shopping experience.
The two most important areas merchants should focus on for customization? The customer portal and the checkout flow. By tailoring each of these to suit the unique needs of your customer base, and making each as seamless and intuitive as possible, ecommerce stores improve the customer experience in monumental ways. Ultimately, the effect on your bottom line can mean higher AOV, increased conversions, and reduced customer churn.
But how do you go about the personalization process in an effective way? In Customizing the Shopping Experience, our ecommerce agency partners—industry experts in their field—share the insights they use to help their top clients offer optimal subscription management.
Looking for takeaways you can apply to your own business?
This guide will help you answer questions for your business like:
How can we create the most streamlined, intuitive checkout flow possible for our customers?
How can we customize our checkout flow to collect the information we need while also increasing AOV?
How can we personalize the customer portal in a way that targets AOV and churn?
Are there ways we can increase the amount of control our customers have over managing their subscriptions?
Frequently asked questions
What is a customer portal?
A customer portal is a secure hub where your customers can manage their relationship with your business. This includes not only viewing their account information, but also any self-service functions you offer, such as updating a delivery date, swapping a product, or changing a shipping address. Customizing your customer portal to ensure a seamless experience for your customer base is crucial to ensure you’re meeting their specific needs.
What is a checkout flow?
In ecommerce, the digital checkout flow is the progression of steps that prospective customers take to purchase a product or service. This includes adding items to their shopping cart, adding their billing and shipping information, adding payment information, selecting a shipping method, previewing the order, and receiving an order confirmation. Making your checkout process as seamless as possible reduces digital shopping cart abandonment. You can also optimize your checkout flow to increase AOV through cross-sells and upsells.
Why is it important for customers to seamlessly manage their own subscriptions?
Optimizing the customer portal experience for your store allows your customers to manage their own subscriptions without having to engage your support team. This benefits your customers, who can update their orders on their own timetable, as well as your business, which benefits from reduced support needs. Making subscription management as intuitive as possible for your subscribers can increase customer satisfaction and trust in your brand while reducing churn.