BY DAVID STEIN
At a recent Internet industry networking event, I listened to a very interesting panel discussion on order fulfillment issues in online commerce. No matter what question the moderator asked, the underlying theme of the panelists’ answers remained the same: people who buy products online are suffering from a major case of rising expectations. They want the much-touted convenience of the Internet to translate seamlessly into accurate and on-time delivery every time they order, and they want customer service that is as real time and interactive as, and more helpful and effective than, calling an 800 number. The first issue is one that all direct marketers face, online or not. How you deal with it on the Internet depends on how much money you have, what kind of infrastructure you need to build or outsource to get your deliveries done, and what it is precisely that you are selling. The second issue, however, is unique to online businesses. More to the point, it applies to you whether your site is as complex and sophisticated as Alloy.com, whose marketing director was one of the speakers, or as simple as the local hardware store allowing customers to place orders online.
As the panelists pointed out, a year ago Jupiter Communications was using a one-day response time as the benchmark against which email-based customer service was measured. Nowadays, that timeframe has shortened to about fifteen minutes, and the panelists were predicting that real-time online customer service is only about a year away, but don’t let that intimidate you. Most people realize that neither a fifteen-minute turnaround nor real-time interactivity is possible for everyone, especially smaller businesses with limited budgets. What is possible for everyone, however, is a carefully thought through system of emails that demonstrate your commitment to customer satisfaction.
I’m not talking here about simple personalization, which I’ve written about in this column before. If you don’t already have an email newsletter that you use to tell everyone on your list, customers and prospects alike, about your business, you should create one. And, if you don’t have a system that allows customers to tell you what their specific interests are so you can inform them of product arrivals, sales and other special events, you should get one. I’m talking about customer-service emails, emails designed to facilitate your interaction with a customer during and after a sale takes place. One of the panelists called them "the five emails that are the cost of doing business online." Here they are:
The first three let the customer know where they are in the purchasing process and demonstrates your willingness to be accountable for the quality of order fulfillment. The fourth email, delivery confirmation, is especially useful in situations where customers might not sign for packages themselves (if they’re not home when delivery takes place, for example, and a doorman signs for them; or if they work in a company that has a receiving department that signs for all packages.)
The fifth email, confirming that you have received a returned product, is both a courtesy letting customers know when they can expect their account to be credited for the cost of the returned item and a sign of your commitment to their satisfaction even when a purchase has not gone as well as you would like.
How you manage the sending of these emails will depend on how many orders you take online, how complex your online offering is and more. To begin with, you need to compose boilerplate text for each one. Then you need to decide how you will merge the customer name, address, order number, price, and whatever information you need to include with the main text. For some, it might be possible to use the mail merge functionality in a program like Outlook; others will no doubt have to talk to the company that hosts their web site. Either way, the investment of time and money that it will take to get a system like this up and running will pay for itself many times over in customer satisfaction and loyalty.
P.S. Your online business may require more than these five emails to keep in touch with customers during and after a purchase. If so, I’d like to know what they are. Email me at internetdoctor@autoonline.net and I’ll write about what I learn in a future column.
David Stein is president of Automatic On-Line System, a full service web design, marketing and maintenance company. He can be reached at (718) 361-3091 or by email at internetdoctor@autoonline.net.
