There are lots of buzz words and phrases used in the business world. The customer experience (CX) is a prime example. The phrase has become ever more popular of late but is one that's often misunderstood. Before talking about the importance of customer experience, let's nail down what the phrase means. In a nutshell, customer experience refers to the impression a firm or brand leaves on a customer. That is the feeling about and view of a brand that results from customer interaction. Every touchpoint that a customer has with your firm along the customer journey generates an interaction. In combination, they contribute to their overall customer experience. Good, satisfying interactions improve customer experience, and vice versa. What's the difference between customer service and customer experience? Customer Service and Customer Experience are not that far apart. In fact, customer service is only one part of the overall experience. Customer Service is reactive - it only comes into play when a dissatisfied customer contacts the company. The business can only take action once something goes wrong, and not beforehand. Customer Experience, on the other hand, is proactive - a business can take action to optimize the customer journey before the customer becomes dissatisfied. Customer experience is a holistic approach that goes beyond customer service and takes into account the overall customer journey by building long term relationships with customers. According to McKinsey, companies focused on providing a superior experience across customer journeys realized a 10-15% increase in revenue and a 20% increase in customer satisfaction. By now, you must be wondering whether to focus on customer service or customer experience for the best business outcomes? The answer - you can't ignore either one. If you're caught in this dilemma, first concentrate on coming up with a customer service strategy to increase customer satisfaction. With that taken care of, start working on improving customer experience.

These are some of the ways Power-eCommerce can help you with the overall customer experience.

• Start with a full site SSL your store gives a more secure feeling for your users & customers. Make every page https gives the customer a safe feeling. Don't make your customer wait until the checkout page to see if the site is secure or they may not ever get there.
• Make sure your logo & banners look professional otherwise you brand has a poor image right from the start. We offer a Graphic Design Service for logo's and banners. You don't need to use us, there are a lot of graphic design websites you can check out also.
• Stay Connected to your customers by keeping them up to date at every step in their orders progression with automated order notifications and updates.
• Automation is key to informing your customer about their order before they ask.
• Automation of the order tracking number can be sent to the customer by email or SMS.
• Inventory Updates ensuring your customer does not order out of stock items.
• Automate the Sending of customer followup emails asking if they are satisfied with the order.
• Reaching out to negative reviews and thanking them for their feedback.

(Automations levels are based on the selected account type see Automation's page for more details. Every level has some level of automations to keep customers informed.)
Think about this - is your business fully capable of delivering awe-inspiring experiences? Although it sounds easy - it really is not. You need automations and a company wide commitment to give the best "Customer Experience".

Having a phone # the customer can call is BIG. If you can pick up the phone during normal business hours look in to using an answering service with live operators.