Personalization as a highlight for your onsite marketing in e-commerce

1.) Online purchasing advice in e-commerce

Salespeople in brick-and-mortar stores have an advantage: they can show products, explain their benefits, and appeal directly to the user's emotions. Although classic one-to-one marketing cannot be implemented in e-commerce in exactly the same way as in a brick-and-mortar store, there are still a number of ways in which you can guide your customers digitally and provide them with the best possible advice. Various online consulting software programs are suitable for this purpose, for example:

• 1:1 video consultation: Direct consultation is also possible in e-commerce—via video. However, the decisive factor for using this onsite marketing tool is having the appropriate customer service capacity. Saturn has shown how it's done: during opening hours, sales staff in stores advise customers of the online shop – but only if they are available.¹ This complex form of online purchasing advice is particularly suitable for items that require explanation or are high-priced.
• Live chat: Live chat allows your customers to quickly and easily get in touch with your employees. This enables you to provide them with personal support, answer their questions, and give them product recommendations. Artificial intelligence can make the use of chat support more efficient, for example through automated responses in the FAQ section.
• AI Shopping Assistant: If your online shop offers a large selection of similar items within a category or products that require explanation, customers often find it difficult to make the right choice. This is where theAI Shopping Assistant can provide targeted support. Through natural and flexible chat dialogues, it determines individual needs, answers questions, and provides tailored recommendations based on product data and user behavior. This makes product selection easier and promotes informed purchasing decisions.

Example of an AI shopping assistant in a wine shop to assist with product selection. (Source: Own illustration)

2.) Optimizing the user experience

A positive user experience can encourage your customers to spend more money. It is therefore worthwhile for you to optimize the user experience (UX). It consists of the following four areas, among others:

• User-friendliness: Design your online shop so that users can easily find what they are looking for. This includes clear navigation, an easy-to-understand category structure, and intelligent onsite search in e-commerce.
• Accessibility: Another important component of onsite marketing is an easily accessible online shop. Ensure optimal website accessibility, reduce loading times, and use a consistent responsive design that also enables a positive UX on mobile devices.
• Usefulness: Focus on useful content that offers your customers added value. Personalized landing pages that address the needs and pain points of users can help with this.
• Joy of use: A modern, creative design enhances the enjoyment of using your online shop. For you, it's important to incorporate that special extra touch, for example in the form of gamification elements or entertaining Easter eggs.

An ecommerce search engine function that displays suitable product suggestions as soon as you start typing is one way to optimize the user experience.
(Source: gartenmoebel.de)

3.) Exclusive offers

Offers that give your customers a feeling of exclusivity can also increase the average shopping cart value, prevent abandoned purchases, and increase sales. For example, the Tchibo.de online shop regularly offers changing product ranges. Holders of the TchiboCard customer card can order these a week before all other customers.²

The key to such offers is ideal placement: if a promotion is hidden in a slider, customers will hardly notice it—and certainly not if they access it directly via a search engine.

So display the offers at the right time, for example, an exit intent pop-up when a purchase is about to be abandoned.

4.) Personalization in onsite marketing

E-commerce personalization is the highlight of your onsite marketing. It allows you to make the shopping experience more personal and gives customers the feeling that they are in good hands and making the right decision. We have compiled three examples of possible personalization measures that you can implement with personalization software below:

• With personalized search suggestions in Type Ahead or on the search results pages, you can respond to your customers' individual preferences and support them in their product research. In addition, you can also display personalized categories and category results. Personalized search and category results make it easier for shop customers to find suitable products and thus offer a quick start to the shopping process.
• Personalized product recommendations in e-commerce show customers other items that might match their interests. They can be used on various shop pages and, among other things, act as a counterpart to the checkout area in a brick-and-mortar store, encouraging impulse purchases. Different recommendation strategies such as cross-selling and upselling are also possible, which you can use to increase your sales. McKinsey concluded in a report that Amazon generates around 35 percent of its sales with recommendations.³ Thanks to artificial intelligence, you can stand out from purely rule-based recommendations. Self-learning recommendation systems continuously analyze your customers' behavior and use it to derive individual product recommendations.

Personalized product recommendations on the home page immediately engage online shoppers on a personal level and also enable them to quickly begin the purchasing process.
(Source: Screenshot from gepps.de)

• A personalized landing page allows customers to immerse themselves in their own personal product and brand world. You can enhance individual elements on existing landing pages through personalization, or generate a fully personalized landing page for each individual customer. With 1:1 personalized content, you offer maximum relevance and, in combination with interactive elements, create both a service and entertainment factor. This encourages shop customers to visit the shop regularly.

Real-time personalization is crucial for an optimal shopping experience: artificial intelligence adapts to customer requirements in real time based on current and expected future behavior.

Stay up to date on personalization: Sign up for the epoq newsletter. Register now!