Top 3 Key Trends Which Will Drive Customer Experience in 2020

By: Retail CIO Outlook | Monday, January 13, 2020

The year 2020 is going to bring fierce competition among the retails in terms of customer experience. How are retailers going to deal with it?

FREMONT, CA: Customer experience is a kind of simple litmus test for predicting which digital commerce brands and retailers are going to be losers and winners in 2020.

To succeed in 2020, companies need to have 20/20 vision into what kind of experience their customers anticipate—both online and offline.

According to studies, the biggest promise will be seen in three different areas that are not new but are recently witnessing the innovation and evolution that will allow them to drive real impact on digital commerce this 2020.

Individualization

Every customer wants to be treated unique and special. The increased complexity of the product increases the importance of configuring it by the consumer in the way they desire. This is going to be a major challenge for retailers and brands in 2020 as the brands and retail leaders have to shift their mindsets from personalization to individualization.

Beauty and fashion brands possess the natural opportunity to shift their mindsets. For example, Tarte Cosmetics allows its loyalty club members to considerably personalize their profile by adding details like eye color, hair color, skin type, and preferred foundation shades.

Subscription Purchasing

The subscription box industry is not new; however, innovative new subscription purchasing models will play a considerable role in digital commerce in 2020 as they place the customer experience at the center of every transaction.

The Hotel Chocolat, a U.K.-based retailer, is a good example. The company provides a broad array of award-winning chocolates and luxury chocolate gifts through its unique Monthly Tasting Club. This offer incited beyond 55,000 members to pay for the privilege and try the hotel’s latest recipes before it becomes accessible to the general public. All thanks go to a monthly selection delivered straight to the member’s door.

The loyalty program of the company becomes an important source to drive revenue that also satisfies its members and generates invaluable consumer feedback.

Augmented and Virtual Reality

In 2020, AR and VR in digital commerce settings will gain a lot of popularity. According to ABI Research, AR will affect as much as 3 percent of digital commerce revenue by 2020, and beyond 120000 stores will be making use of AR universally by 2022.

The capability of VR and AR is almost infinite, mainly due to their ability to dramatically enrich the customer experience and allow the customers to immerse themselves in a brand experience simultaneously, providing the customers full control over how they experience the brand.

Major Issues Impacting These Trends

1. Data Management

Data has always been the secret to deliver a personalized customer experience. In 2020, companies will utilize data in new and innovative ways for seamless customer interaction, regardless of channel.

To achieve this, companies need to obtain a 360-degree view of the consumer, which requires relevant data. However, the real trick is to allocate data and deliver it where it is required so that every call-center employee, in-store rep, marketer, and product manager can deliver superior, cohesive, and connected customer experience.

Organizational Structure

No organization wants to send its consumers an email with an exciting promotion that drives the customer to a brick-and-mortar store, only to find that the staff has no knowledge about the offer. The upside can be enormous as internal corporate silos dissolve into real cross-channel cooperation and collaboration.

It is evident that the year 2020 is going to be the year of customer experience in which the companies will use a plethora of innovations and technologies to appeal to their customers and add more value to their brand.

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