Using Live Chat To Provide Personalisation In Ecommerce

94% of companies agree that personalisation ‘is critical to current and future success’. However, less than half of companies are using personalisation in eCommerce.

Personalisation in eCommerce opens up your company to a potentially huge increase in online conversion and average order value. Personalisation means customers can find products which they like, much more easily. In fact, 59% of online shoppers believe that it is easier to find interesting products on personalised eCommerce websites. Of course it’s easier, and of course it’s going to make us consumers buy more. If I’m browsing an online clothes store and I’m presented with predominantly male clothes (because I’m male) then I’m much more likely to find something suitable for me to buy…and this is of course a very simple example.

The higher the standard of personalisation offered, the higher the suitability of recommendations. The more suitable the recommendations are to the customer’s interests and needs, the more products can be sold to them. Better recommendations also mean that shoppers are more likely to return as they feel that they are receiving a better service. 56% of online shoppers are more likely to return to a site that shows product recommendations. 53% of online shoppers believe that personalize eCommerce websites provide a better service.

So us consumers want personalised recommendations; but at the same time we don’t want our privacy to be infringed. It’s easy to access a lot of information about a customer through things such as Google Analytics, but there’s a limit to how much eCommerce sites should try to see and how much they should use in order to not creep customers out. According to recent TRUSTe research 60% of people say they are more concerned about security now than they were a year ago. This doesn’t just mean security of their bank details but also their personal information and preferences.

Personalisation in eCommerce therefore needs to be offered to customers in an unobtrusive manner. The most effective way of learning about customers is not necessarily to look through their data but instead to talk to them. Find out what they like, whereabouts they are from and what they are looking for on a one-to-one basis.

According to a report by LivePerson, 41% of consumers say they are more likely to trust a brand if live chat is available on their site. Live chat builds trust in your brand as a whole, but customers are much more likely to have confidence in revealing information about themselves to a person than to a machine. At least through conversation we know and have control over what we reveal.

Live chat agents need to be friendly and empathetic with customers. Robotic responses don’t make for good conversation. The best way to learn about your customers is to be friendly. Don’t be salesy but show a genuine interest in them. This will lead to a conversation which reveals a wealth of information about them which should be used to offer personalised recommendations.

This personal service will provide increased conversion. To offer the best personalisation in eCommerce, your employees need to be well aware of your full product range, which products work well together and what works really well is if they have a genuine interest in what they are selling.

At The Chat Shop, we use our Explore Identify Match methodology to discover a shopper’s wants and needs, and then match a suitable product to this information. This is just one way in which we increase conversion for our clients,

Find out how we can help you increase conversion

If you enjoyed this blog post, here’s some of our other top eCommerce related posts that we think you’ll love:

• 5 Killer Tips to Increase Ecommerce Conversion Rates
• You Should Pay Closer Attention To Basket Abandonment
• 2 Ways You Should Be Offering eCommerce Personalisation
• Writing Product Descriptions That Convert