In 2020, more than 2 billion people engage in digital shopping on a day-to-day basis, and that number will only continue to rise as social distancing maintains at foothold. Before the recent surge in remote shopping, there was already a high demand for online shopping options— and as stores continue to limit their hours and guest counts, that demand has rapidly increased.
Digital shopping has the potential to give consumers the same value and quality as an in-store shopping experience–without exposing them to any risks or unnecessary stress. Even better, potential customers can shop online any time anywhere, so there’s a great deal of versatility built into the process. Still, digital shopping isn’t inherently perfect, but luckily DCatalog has measures you can take to ensure that your customers maintain a seamless interaction with your business.
How to Improve the Digital Shopping Experience
The first step to improve how customers interface with your brand is understanding the path that they take before reaching a purchase decision. This is known as the customer journey, and it’s different for every brand.
Most customer journeys are no longer linear, but they always begin with discovery (sometimes called awareness). This is because a vast majority of online interactions begin with a search engine. Search engine optimization (SEO) is an important aspect of the customer journey and DCatalog recommends you prioritize your brands SEO.
Next, the conversion funnel moves customers from discovery to evaluation to purchase to experience to loyalty. These are the broad emotions that your clients will experience and how your brand influences each of these phases is dependent upon your unique business practices.
In this age, where digital shopping technology is becoming a more vital component of every shopping experience, you are likely to find that you can enhance the speed with which your customers move through their journeys with more advanced technology.
The particularly tough area of the customer pathway for online retailers to master is, of course, the middle. You may be able to pay for ads that generate awareness or bulk up your SEO strategy so a wider audience views your site, but without an engaging shopping experience to pique their interest, drive consideration, and form intent, then you’ll never enjoy the conversion rate that you’re after.
Shoppable catalogs are one of the most useful and ubiquitous ways to bridge this gap in the customer journey— and skyrocket your ROI..
Why Shoppable Catalogs Can Enhance the Digital Shopping Experience
People have always loved catalogs. Perhaps this has something to do with feeling physically engaged with products, or maybe it simply relates to a sense of nostalgia. Either way, catalogs help engage both shopping and digital browsing.
Right now, there’s no safer and more effective way to market your products then with a shoppable virtual catalog. The great thing about shoppable catalogs is that they lend themselves naturally to the eCommerce functionality, but they also provide valuable data about customers’ shopping habits. This gives businesses the opportunity to showcase highly curated content.
Essentially, shoppable catalogs are both a browsing experience and an expert marketing tool that businesses can utilize to create an all-in-one value-driven experience for shoppers. So although a shoppable catalog will absolutely help you drive more sales, it will also help with every other step in the customer journey.
Shoppable catalogs that are published through quality platforms such as DCatalog can be optimized for mobile-friendliness, social sharing, and other SEO best practices that will allow you to reach a broader audience more easily. This will empower your target market to discover your products and begin browsing your offerings immediately.
When you have designed shoppable catalogs for the digital experience, you will have equipped your target market with plenty of quality content, such as product descriptions and pricing breakdowns. This will improve the ease at which customers navigate the evaluation portion of their journeys, allowing them to escalate to the purchase decision quicker.
Shoppable functionality plays a huge role in streamlining purchases. DCatalog allows you to build a shopping cart function into your catalog so browsers can buy an item that catches their eye directly and stay within the catalog. This eliminates any discontinuity and minimizes the leave rate.
Buyers will enjoy a smoother and more valuable experience with your brand, thanks to shoppable catalogs, which is bound to inspire future loyalty.
In-store experiences may not be prevalent at the moment, but that doesn’t mean that sales have to decline. DCatalog makes it simple to integrate your eCommerce platform with your shoppable catalog so customers can comfortably browse your product line and check out items seamlessly. This streamlined digital shopping experience will mitigate any pain points buyers may be feeling and inspire brand loyalty despite the present turmoil.
To see the profound impact that high-quality shoppable catalogs can have on your customers’ journeys and your conversion rate, get started with DCatalog today.