10 Warning Signs of Poor B2C Ecommerce Sales
Ecommerce has become a necessity and not a choice. Millions of websites are vying for customer acquisition and loyalty in this competitive industry. With the increasing pace of internet revolution, many B2C ecommerce newcomers are threatening the established online player., The need for unique offerings has become a crucial challenge for businesses. And of course, there are many other ecommerce challenges due to inadequate systems, labour-intensive processes, never-ending integration issues and much more.
The rise of digitization has transformed the ways of operating ecommerce business and it is imperative for you to stand out in the market. And to stand out, you need to meet customer expectations, provide excellent buying experiences, inevitable customer support, and much more.
Wondering how to do it all?
First things first, you need to understand the root cause for the poor performance of your B2C ecommerce sales.
Here is the list of 10 warning signs that indicate poor sales of your online store and how to fix them.
1. Poor sales conversion rate
Are you frustrated with low sales conversion rates? Well, you are not the only one as every business and industry is struggling with low website traffic and conversions. But if you are not doing something to improve your sales conversions, it is not going to shift magically. Imagine that 1,000 visitors are coming to your website every month but only 10 customers make a purchase. So, it is nearly 0.1% conversion rate.
It is the first warning sign you need to consider to improve the business performance of your B2C ecommerce because you are losing money every moment a customer is bouncing from your website.
There are many ways to fix this issue but before that, you should know why you have low conversion rate. Some of the most common reasons are:
- Call-to-actions are not clear or optimized
- Poor user interface of the website
- Long or complicated sign-up / checkout process
- Your website is not interactive
- No contact information or live chat on the website
The analysis of data and marketing automation tools can help your online business to identify the culprit of the ecommerce system and helps you understand the red signals on the ecommerce store. Knowing the mistakes will help you correct them and drastically improve conversion rates.
2. Poor Marketing ROI
This is one of the core reasons why most of the ecommerce companies find it difficult to sell online. The poor marketing returns on investment is indicated when marketing spending exceeds the returns. The primary cause of poor returns is lack of insights about buying patterns, customer behaviour, and data which can help to stand out in the competitive B2C ecommerce environment.
Well, marketing is not a cost but an investment to reap returns in future and therefore, companies spend a lot on marketing. The goal of calculating marketing ROI is to justify the business on financial terms. And to justify the financials, it is important to track and measure the marketing expenses properly, take corrective actions, and ultimately help customers move in their purchase decision journey. Some tools to measure marketing spending are Google ecommerce tracking, conversion tracking tools. These tools are comes integrated into advanced ecommerce platforms can be used effectively by online businesses.
3. Increased Abandoned Shopping Cart
Website traffic and sales conversions are not the only factors to achieve B2C ecommerce success. Nowadays, a lot of customers are visiting the website and adding products in the shopping cart but finally, not buying it.
So, even if there are a lot of visitors on your website, and they add products to the shopping cart but do not make the final purchase, you are in trouble. It is one of the biggest problems of ecommerce business and you cannot be completely immune to this problem.
But you can definitely reduce the shopping cart abandonment rates. The tedious checkout process is one of the primary factors leading to cart abandonments as the customers get frustrated from the lengthy processes.
Adding live chat solution and combining it with other rich marketing features helps in resolving the problem of cart abandonment. The proactive marketing approach helps in reaching out to the customers during their decision journey and provides an opportunity to engage with them who would otherwise bounce back from the website.
4. Dwindling Customer Loyalty
The foremost expectation of a customer buying online is a seamless and consistent experience across different channels. In the B2C ecommerce industry, more than 80% of the customers switch due to poor customer service. A lot of big players lose their customers because other online stores have better customer service or discounts.
Even the best-designed website without customer loyalty leads to huge business losses because most of the revenues come from existing customers. Creating customers is way too easier than maintaining them. The biggest challenge of the online industry is that the customer and the business do not know each other, nor they can do face to face transactions. So, the trust factor becomes very important. A company with good customer service, consistent marketing effort, and effective loyalty programs can eventually build the trust and loyalty of customers.
5. High Rate of Product returns and refunds
If the customers are not satisfied with the product or service, it scars the overall reputation of the business. At the same time, it leads to heavy logistics cost. This has been an issue for ecommerce players for a very long time.
The return rate plays a vital role in the success of an online business as it aggressively hampers the profit margins. The increased rate of returns and refunds is a major concern for online businesses. Considering the high costs and time-consuming shipping process, it is definitely a big warning for B2C ecommerce businesses.
Along with good products/services, a well-managed approach is also required to handle this problem. A hassle-free order management system can enhance your customer experience and also, increase the order volumes. The one-click returns management with integrated logistics services helps in streamlining the process, saves time and efforts, and also, improve the business outcomes.
6. Increased Customer Grievances
Being in the ecommerce industry where the customers can switch in a blink of an eye, customer service has no limits. The customer complaints hold good as well as bad news. The good news is that the customers care to give feedback or complaint about their experience. It helps you address the unnoticed issues on website and business processes. But the bad news is that if the complaints are not resolved, the customer will be highly dissatisfied and will go to some other online store.
Always treat customer complaints as a red flag and address them as soon as possible. It definitely helps your B2C ecommerce business to build a good brand image in the industry. With an appropriate complaint management system, no complaints can go unnoticed. It also improves the work efficiency of employees and ensures that the brand image is intact.
7. Rigid system integration
There are a lot of tasks to be done in an ecommerce system like adding and updating product database, receiving and updating orders, managing inventory, handling customer complaints, managing logistics and the list is endless. You will land up incurring high costs if your team is involved in all of these labour-intensive processes.
It is the right time to have sufficient integrations to manage the daily business operations and automate the processes. A full-fledged ecommerce platform can surely offer you peace of mind and streamline the experience of your customers. In addition, the integration of payment system offers multiple payment options and convenience to the customers.
8. Reduced average order value
A B2C ecommerce company works on three objectives i.e. increasing the number of customers, increasing repeat purchases, and increasing the average order size.
It clearly indicates the importance of average order value, which means the average amount spent by the customer while making a purchase from your website. The average amount or order value of one customer is always more important than the volume of products sold by the website or number of customers visited the website. The more a customer spends in a single order, the more profit the company will make.
9. Endless administrative tasks
Are your employees frustrated with repetitive tasks? Are there a lot of manual and duplicate tasks done in your company? If yes, there is a need to change your business processes. For example, ecommerce businesses need to come up with different marketing initiatives, promotions, discounts and offers every day. But at the same time, it is important to manage the cost and profits, inventory, sold items etc. If you are juggling between different ecommerce systems to handle these tasks? Then, stop doing it…!!
Why take pain when you can handle administrative tasks at one platform. An automated ecommerce platform can drastically transform the experience of your staff and boost your B2C ecommerce sales.
10. Few mobile orders
Mobile commerce is not a new buzz now. A mobile-friendly website is no less than a mandate for ecommerce businesses because most of the consumers today are inclined towards using smartphones. Over 65% of the buyers prefer to buy from a mobile-friendly website.
For the same reasons, it is important to have a mobile-friendly website and boost solid mobile marketing strategies like guided selling, interactive guides, social initiatives etc. It improves customer engagement and enhances their shopping experiences.
The last word
Every warning sign pointed out here costs you money as well as time. It is important for you to ACT NOW to address these issues while enhancing customer experience, reduce organizational silos, and boost B2C ecommerce sales. Switching to a right ecommerce platform can provide a much better experience to your customers and you will be able to increase online sales. Explore the solution and Schedule your FREE trial today.
