How To Craft and Implement a Customer-First Strategy

Positive customer interaction is something that is difficult to translate from brick-and-mortar shops to online retail. For example, when picking out books from a local independent bookstore, the cashier might notice you’ve chosen a book by one of her favorite authors. She strikes up a conversation and recommends a similar book to read. You exchange thank yous, and then you head on your way, armed with not only new books but a positive interaction.

Copying that interaction with an ecommerce business can be difficult. Maintaining customer relationships from behind a computer is no small feat. You can make it a bit easier with a solid customer-first strategy.

What is a customer-first strategy?

A customer-first strategy is a business philosophy that defines long-term success around customer satisfaction. It hinges on a straightforward idea: Happy customers equal loyal customers. And loyal customers leave positive reviews, make repeat purchases, and even lead to more happy employees. While some companies focus on cutting costs or launching numerous products in a year, a business with a customer-centric mindset defines long-term success by its ability to maintain a positive customer experience.

Why implement a customer-first approach for your ecommerce business?

“The customer is always right” is an old saying, but putting customers first is still a wise business decision to gain a competitive edge. A successful customer-first strategy can result in the following:

Profit

Delivering exceptional customer service drives revenue. According to a report from the international consulting firm McKinsey, improving customer service interactions can increase revenue by as much as 7% and increase overall shareholder returns by as much as 10%. For example, customers who have a positive experience with your store may spend more money by adding more products to their shopping cart (increasing your average order value) or signing up for a product subscription.

Brand loyalty

Brand loyalty is a useful metric to track since brand reputation can otherwise be hard to quantify. The idea is simple: If you prioritize customers, they will return to your company for repeat business. Harvard Business Review found that improving customer satisfaction increases customer loyalty, meaning happier customers are more likely to purchase from you in the future and are more likely to recommend your company through positive online reviews, social media posts, and word-of-mouth referrals.

Employee retention

Fostering a customer-centric culture doesn’t mean sacrificing employee satisfaction. In fact, the two can be symbiotic. Employees who work for companies with a strong customer-first strategy are more likely to find their jobs meaningful than employees who don’t. Customer-first organizations see fewer altercations between customers and staff, so their work environments tend to be more positive. It can create a virtuous cycle where employees who are happy at their jobs are more capable of delivering superior customer service.

Ways to put your customers first

• Communicate
• Innovate
• Define the problem
• Exceed expectations
• Have an open-door policy
• Help customers help themselves
• Track your progress

Here’s how to make business decisions that create a customer-first culture at your company:

Communicate

Though it may sound obvious, a customer-first strategy only works if you’re listening. Regularly survey customers, either immediately after they’ve made a purchase or when they haven’t revisited your site in a while. Invite customers to enter a raffle for rewards such as free products in exchange for filling out a survey. Collecting customer insights in this way can help you stay in touch with the wants and needs of your customers so you can better serve them in the future.

Innovate

A customer-first mindset means adapting to your customers’ needs. A truly customer-focused business hears customer feedback and implements innovative ideas that solve their problems with incremental, thoughtful, and continuous improvement. For example, you might start bundling complementary products after discovering that customers frequently buy the same items together, such as a lunch bag and travel utensils.

Define the problem

Analyze customer behavior to ground your business in customer-first thinking and understand what unique value your company offers. For instance, the photography accessory company MagMod found that many customers wanted to buy multiple items at once but found themselves overwhelmed by all the possible combinations. So, MagMod began selling curated bundles of items that worked well together, solving some of that friction for customers. On an episode of the Shopify Masters podcast, MagMod CEO Spencer Boerup explains that offering expert curation led to more satisfied customers.

Exceed expectations

Meeting customer needs is one thing, but exceeding customer needs is a surefire way to gain a competitive advantage. For example, let’s say you run a fashion brand that makes custom jumpsuits. You can display an FAQ page with illustrated graphics detailing how customers can provide accurate measurements for your garment makers. For those customers who still have questions, you can direct them to your live chat option where an experienced team member can walk them through the process step by step.

This level of customer service anticipates a problem (inaccurate measurements leading to ill-fitting jumpsuits) and solves it from the customer's POV. Understanding your customers and their needs can help you anticipate problems before they arise and craft a solution that goes above and beyond what they might have expected.

Have an open-door policy

Being attentive to your customers and making your team available to them are key tenets of a customer-first strategy. If your customers have a problem or a question, encourage direct customer communications to show your customer base that you care. For example, Erez Zukerman is the co-founder and CEO of the computer keyboard company ErgoDox EZ. Despite his position, Erez spends hours every day doing one-on-one customer support. He does this for a reason: Customers appreciate the access and Erez gets unparalleled customer data that he can use to improve his products.

Help customers help themselves

We all know the maddening feeling of being on hold for hours. Aim to keep response times to a minimum by reducing the strain on your customer service team and giving customers ample ways to solve simple problems themselves. Offer self-serve options like FAQ pages, AI chatbots like Shopify Inbox, return management systems, and guided product demos so customers can answer simpler questions. Meanwhile, your human representatives are freed up to tackle trickier issues.

Track your progress

There are a few specific customer and sales metrics you can improve if you want to practice a customer-first strategy. Focus on increasing your customer retention rates and decreasing your churn rate—the number of customers who don’t return for repeat purchases. In time, this can translate into lower customer acquisition costs. Additionally, track the response times of your customer service team, which have a direct impact on customer service quality.

Average out these numbers and track them monthly or quarter to quarter to gauge the effectiveness of new tactics and protocols. If you just launched your business, use competitor data to set benchmarks against which you can measure your progress.