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Excitement is in the air as consumers fill physical stores and online shopping carts. From Singles Day to Black Friday to Christmas, consumers are out hunting for bargains to get the most bang for their buck.
To better understand the new trends in consumers' shopping preferences and behaviors, we surveyed over 10,000 businesses from 23 markets and 40,000 consumers from 26 markets.
The results? While online shopping has grown in popularity over the past few years, it has not killed the consumer's love for shopping in physical stores. This trend means thatunified commerce – the process of connecting payments across every channel where consumers shop – and the perfect customer experience, both online and in store, will play a major role in the future of retail.
This busy shopping period is a moment of truth for retailers globally. It exposes the strengths and weaknesses of businesses within a short, thrilling, chaotic, and intense period of time. So, how should you prepare?
Here are our top four takeaways from the APAC Peak Season guides.
1. Create the ultimate customer journey
The key to creating the ultimate customer journey is to put your shoppers first. Let your consumers freely shop from different sales channels while enjoying a consistent brand experience and service quality.
It's important to understand that consumers don’t see different sales channels, they see various ways in which to engage with your brand. As shoppers tend to receive recommendations and production information through multiple sales channels, it makes sense for them to easily purchase and return goods across channels as well.
"We use a channel-neutral approach. We are constantly trying to improve our customer journey using technology. Our stores and webshop support each other. The purchasing process is fluid and moves across all channels."
2. Turbocharge sales conversion rates
When your customers are ready to check out, they are already past the tipping point of yes or no. You are in the perfect position to give them what they want and drive sales conversions.
During the peak season, your checkout processes must run smoothly when your physical and online stores are full of potential customers looking to complete their purchase.
Boosting your online sales conversion rate:
- Optimize your checkout page and ensure that it works on all devices
- Provide a wide range of different payment methods
Boosting your in-store conversion rate:
- Enrich your shoppers' in-store experiences: Enable self-service checkout in your store, giving your shoppers more freedom to experience your brand on their own terms
- Shorten queues: Consider using mobile Point of Sale (POS) terminals for shoppers to check out on the spot seamlessly
"We can go to the customer rather than the customer having to queue and come to the till point. This has been especially good at Christmas, where we can queue bust, but also help our less-abled customers, who sometimes might feel intimidated coming to the till point."
3. Protect your business from fraud
With great traffic to your online store, comes great responsibilities (i.e. protecting your business frompayment fraud). While peak seasons tend to drive a massive spike in online purchases, it also causes a correlating increase in payment fraud.
Adyen’sRevenueProtect helps businesses better protect their operations against different types of fraud. It is a unique risk management product with different tools to detect, prevent, and respond to fraud. Utilizing a global, cross-industry network of data to accurately make the best risk decisions, leverage RevenueProtect to stay on top of evolving trends, and fight fraud effectively.
"With machine learning, automation means that the tool [RevenueProtect] can do the hard work for us. We don’t take our eyes off the system, but it helps to have exceptions highlighted by the tool, and it saves us having to trawl through transactions looking for trends."
4. Choose the right partners
As your company grows, it's important to work with the right partners while strengthening processes and supporting your core purpose. When choosing a potential partner, look to the long term and ask yourself these questions:
- Does your strategy and growth ambition match your potential partner?
- Is there a cultural fit and synergy between your business and the potential partner?
- Does the new partner support the current systems that you've built?
Choosing the correct payments provider plays a big role in your success. It's essential to look for a payments partner that understands your development strategy and can help you grow your business swiftly, without administrative and technical complexity.
"In addition to the strong service that Adyen offers, it's an incredibly good company to work with. One of the best things about our partnership is their knowledge – which they are happy to share. Whether it's evaluating new opportunities or dealing with challenges, fast and knowledgeable help is provided."
The perfect, conversion-enhancing customer journey starts here
Make the most of this busy shopping period with our APAC Peak Season guides. Dive into our insights and tips, and dig deeper into important consumer trends and behaviors.
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