5 E-Commerce Challenges and How To Overcome Them

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As an industry born out of the Internet revolution, the edges of using technology to fuel your operations are well known to you. And yet, there is a considerable share of e-commerce players that haven’t completely used technology to top their game. The e-commerce industry has become so fierce, that surviving has become a matter of concern. With internet fostering the birth of many newcomers threatening reputed players, the need for differentiating on the basis of customer service experience has become as critical in modern times.

E-commerce Challenges: Problems and Challenges of eCommerce Industry

With the proliferation of smartphones and tablets e-commerce volumes have exponentially increased year-on-year, but so has shopping abandonments. This has resulted in a huge loss for e-commerce players. The reasons could be a non-responsive website, unexpected shipping costs, lack of personal assistance when required, or reaching customers at multiple touch-points. What the players really lack is effective CX technology that bridges the gap between e-commerce sales and customer service, a technology that can nurture customers at their preferred channel fostering advocacy at all levels.

But before investing in such call center technologies, you should understand what good it would do to you. This blog post will help you do just that. We will discuss the major e-commerce challenges that players face, and how a customer interaction technology could help in overcoming such challenges.

 

Challenge #1: Lack of Verification Measures

Once a customer signs up in an e-commerce portal, the portal is unaware about the customer except for the information he/she entered. the credibility of the customer is questionable. This heightens when the customer issues a Cash-on-Delivery (COD) purchase because the business is unsure whether the customer is genuine or not. These have resulted in huge revenue losses for many e-commerce players.

Solution: This challenge can be brought under control by sending out a textual or/and email message to the customer to validate his/her identity. And when a COD purchase is issued, an automated call or Interactive Voice Response (IVR) can be dialed out to the customer and ask him/her to validate the delivery address. This would not send out the wrong message to the customers that they are being doubted, and it would fulfil your purpose as well.

Challenge #2: Product Returns and Refunds

When products are returned because customers are unsatisfied with the product, it scars the business with the heavy loss of shipment and reputation. Cost of logistics has always been an issue for e-commerce players especially for those who deliver for free.

Solution: This cost of operation can be minimized with proper returns management with seamless interaction platform with logistic partners and vendors.

Challenge #3: Lack of Integration

Order management system, customer support system, dispatch system, order tracking system, etc are applications that can streamline the experience of the customer across the buying journey. But if these systems are disparate it could ruin customer experience.

Solution: Customer service solutions could integrate with multiple systems seamlessly, synchronizing available information across all systems and displaying it in a single interface.

Challenge #4: Customer Issues Going Unnoticed

Being in an industry where customers can take their business elsewhere in a blink of an eye, customer service goes a long way. E-commerce business receives a lot of inbound interaction with more than 75% being complaints or concerns. When these concerns go unnoticed, it compromises the standard of quality of your business and tarnishes your image.

Solution: With proper ticketing solutions and easy to use interfaces, employees are able to cater to every customer ticket generated at any channel. The efficiency raises with prioritization measures assigning the level of importance to each ticket, making sure high priority tickets are handled before anything else.

Challenge #5: Customer Loyalty

The e-commerce industry is an industry where the cost of switching is pretty insignificant. A lot of players have lost customers because their rivals have a better quality of customer service or better discounts. Knowing that 86% of clients stop doing business with a company because of poor customer service, you need to ensure customer service is always a priority for your online business and part of your retention strategy. Customers demand consistent and seamless experiences across all channels, and players that refuse to deliver fail to retain customers.

Solution: Customer service experience solutions make sure every customer interaction is under the radar. With effective customer nurturing technology tools and multimedia integration improves customer retention scores and are more likely to transform one-time purchasers to brand advocates.

E-commerce is advancing at a scorching pace, and a lot of e-commerce websites enter the business daily with a survival rate of less than 10% after the first year. This industry is brutal and demands businesses to arm themselves with the state-of-the-art solution to differentiate themselves from the crowd.

Our CX technology, Ameyo has powered over a billion customer interactions through Flipkart, Myntra, Jabong, etc. These are the biggest e-commerce players in India,
and why do you think they are where they are. They understood the need for superior customer experience in India and banked on it.

Understand how you can overcome e-commerce challenges with smart call center software technologies.