Improving customer experience with eCommerce testing

The Covid-19 pandemic has changed the way we do business. It has brought the digital eCommerce to centerstage, driving shoppers to buy products online like never before.

According to the latest Digital Commerce 360 analysis, “Consumers spent $861.12 billion online with U.S. retailers in 2020, up 44.0% from $598.02 billion in 2019. Online spending represented 21.3% of total retail sales last year, compared with 15.8% the year prior.”

The pandemic has not only fortified irrevocable changes in shopping behavior but also made a strong move towards eCommerce which is expected to proliferate further in the post pandemic world.

Amidst the altered consumer behavior, providing superior customer experience has been of utmost importance to many retailers.

Why is Customer Experience important? 

People and product are the two primary touch points that create the customer experience. It is a measure of how satisfied the customers are throughout the buying process.

As we know, a happy customer is one who is likely to become a loyal customer, superior customer experience is pivotal to the success of any organization.

Being loyal creates a positive word-of-mouth marketing that will foster the sales and boost revenue.

According to QuestionPro, a leading online survey company, “Businesses with a top-notch customer experience stand a 17% higher chance of growing consistently year after year as compared to those with a poor customer experience strategy.”

The message is loud and clear as to how critical customer experience is to the businesses.

What does it take for businesses to create a superlative customer experience that caters to people of all sections?

Customer experience is the pulse of every business

The first and foremost thing that every business needs to do to create a superior customer experience is to gauge the pulse of the consumer. To enhance their brand value, it is imperative to know their interests.

According to TrustPilot, “A totally satisfied customer contributes 2.6 times as much revenue as a somewhat satisfied customer, and 14 times as much revenue as a somewhat dissatisfied customer.”

In this age of digitalization where technologies such as AI/ML, IoT, and Big Data flourish, it has become easy for companies to collect data and act accordingly.

While data acts as a catalyst to collect information and improve customer experience, it is equally imperative to design a platform that eases this process. This is where eCommerce comes into play.

The role of eCommerce in customer experience 

The inception of e-commerce sites dates more than a couple of decades back and it has certainly evolved over the years. Today, literally everything comes to your doorstep at a click of a button.

As they continue to clutter, eCommerce sites look out for new ways to make their customers shop from them on an enduring basis.

By leveraging the latest technologies and creating a robust eCommerce site, conversion rates can be amplified to a greater extent.

All the leading eCommerce websites use AI and ML to engage their customers on a constant basis. They display a range of options captivating the customer to choose and shop any of them.

According to Gartner, “By 2024, 15% of B2B organizations will use digital commerce platforms to support both its customers and sales reps in all sales activities. With the increased demand for digital commerce and millennial shoppers preferring not to interact with sales reps as part of their buying journey, these organizations will have to rethink their commerce strategy and adjust accordingly.”

While the pandemic has pushed the eCommerce industry to its golden era, enterprises are reconnoitering various measures to delight their customers and stay ahead in the competition.

To stay ahead in this competitive world, it is pivotal to provide a seamless experience to customers and this is possible with eCommerce testing.

Seamless Customer Experience with eCommerce Testing 

By ensuring conformity to client requirements, eCommerce testing adds value to the brand and helps prevent errors.

To maintain the integrity of an eCommerce platform, it is prudent to have an effective eCommerce testing strategy in place.

An effective eCommerce testing is not only about rolling out new security features unlike the popular notion but is also about making every facet of the site functionality secure and robust.

eCommerce testing can precisely detect issues pertaining to browser compatibility, session management, page display, performance, language support, usability, and security.

As a result, the eCommerce site can be protected against cyber threats and offer a smooth, seamless experience to customers.

However, with the sophistication and frequency of cyber threats skyrocketing in recent years, it is imperative to protect your customers and business from such attacks.

Securing your eCommerce site against cyber attacks 

Failing to secure your eCommerce site will have rigorous effects on its business. Statistics say that small businesses who suffered with cyber-attacks did not last for more than 6 months.

The major threats to the eCommerce industry include phishing attacks, credit card fraud, cross site scripting, bad bots, Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, and SQL Injection.

To counter these threats, businesses have employed various measures related to security & penetration testing such as Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) Compliance, active protection, stronger passwords & multi-factor authentication, and wider education.

While these security concerns certainly prove costly to businesses, it is imperative that they adhere to some best security practices and imbibe an efficient security & penetration testing framework.

Some of the best eCommerce security practices that businesses perform on a regular basis include PCI compliance, Content Delivery Networks (CDN), security plugins, backup data, server security, payment gateway security, anti-virus & anti-malware software, firewall, Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificate, and regular updating of software.

While security is of paramount importance for businesses to stay in the race, it is vital to put a check on all facets of eCommerce testing to improve customer experience and increase return on investment (ROI).

Improve customer experience and increase ROI 

Investing in customer experience brings in a strong ROI and builds a powerful lifeline between the company and its customers.

Per research from Forrester, “The two main areas of focus for CEOs are revenue growth and profit growth. Any program that doesn’t contribute to these two areas, especially during the current economic uncertainty, is on the chopping block. To keep funding and gain future support for new programs, customer experience leaders must be able to clearly link customer-focused initiatives to financial growth.”

To better understand if the customer experience program is successful, calculating its ROI forms the key. The customer experience ROI metrics include factors such as customer lifetime value, churn rate, cost of support, average transaction size, and average contract value.

On a holistic view, improving customer experience with eCommerce testing is prudent for companies to excel in their business and drive immense growth.

Closing thoughts 

Today’s digital initiatives warrant companies to expand their wings and innovate. Any lag in nurturing these initiatives will prove costly in attaining business goals.

Cigniti’s experience in Retail and eCommerce testing has enabled multi-channel retailers transform their businesses through a quality-optimized, results-driven strategy, leveraging an unbiased quality engineering approach, customized retail testing frameworks & solutions, and a strong domain expertise.

Our compelling retail solutions enable businesses to align better with their end-user needs. From Food to Fashion to eCommerce, Cigniti has worked with top players in the industry on Digital Quality Engineering for the Retail Industry.

Cigniti’s eCommerce Testing Center of Excellence provides validation services for product & product category validation, checkoutand payments validation, interfaces validation, data validation, performance validation, and security validation.

If you are looking at improving your customer experience with eCommerce testing, talk to our Retail & eCommerce testing experts.