Recreating the in-store feeling online

Despite the seemingly unstoppable might of ecommerce, there is still a large portion of the in-store shopping experience which is hard to replicate online. But while customers can’t reach out and touch items, software firms are developing new ways to recreate the physical shopping experience on a website. Here are just a few:

1.    Create the sales assistant experience with live chat

Sometimes when you walk into a shop, sales assistants can be a tad overbearing, nay! Annoying. But the truth of the matter is, that sometimes you need to ask questions and getting answers to these will encourage you to go ahead with a purchase.

Online retailers can replicate this customer service by offering help via live chat. It gives that extra level of service that would be available in-store. It would be good to look at when shopping carts are being abandoned and making sure you reach customers before that point.

To do this successfully you need to have the resources to answer the queries. If you are offering this service it should be managed well and be as instant as possible.

It is also good practice to keep a history of chat with returning customers so your customer reps can have a full picture of their relationship with your brand.

“Online customer service can go further than an in-store experience; it’s virtually impossible to staff every physical store with enough experts with a deep knowledge of all products but online, you can,” says Tony Heyworth, International Marketing Director of LivePerson.

“By making a pool of virtual geniuses available to every part of your global on-line store, and extending their knowledge with instant ‘guru video’ help, customers can get answers to complex questions quickly.”

Live chat options can easily be added as a plug-in.

2.    Virtual fitting rooms

One of the biggest handicaps for online retailer is not being able to let customers try things on. In the real world there are fitting rooms because we all know there’s nothing worse than spending your time dealing with returns because things don’t fit or the colour doesn’t suit. In 2011, returns cost UK fashion retailers a whooping £90m.

But things are changing and technology is starting to solve this problem; there are a number of companies coming up with virtual solutions and they are getting better all the time. They can’t completely eradicate returns of course but they can certainly improve your changes of making a lasting sale.

A few options available on the market at the moment:

Fitiquette

This service allows customers to make a virtual mannequin using their measurements. From there they can put the clothes onto the figure and see how they fit and drape from 360°.

Fits.me

With its HQ in London, Fits.me is a very similar service which allows you to see what the clothes look like on a certain body shape. They use robots to reproduce any imaginable body shape and show what an item looks like on it.

Zugara

This Los Angeles-based company takes a different approach to the virtual changing room. It has recently patented its Webcam Social Shopper platform which allows people to hold clothes up against themselves using their webcam.

It doesn’t show you how the clothes will fit exactly to your size but shows you if the colour or style will work.

3.    Let your customers wander around your store

Customers love to browse. They love to have a stroll around a store, have a closer look at some of the objects on the shelves and then see what’s around the corner.

Virtual stores haven’t quite infiltrated the UK just yet but several have opened in Japan. These shops use high res panoramic photographs of the store and allow users to navigate their way around and take closer looks at items.

It isn’t a million miles away from the UK, Tesco has developed a virtual supermarket with British firm Keytree. It isn’t ready for use yet but the boffins at Tesco HQ are hoping advances in bandwidth will help to make it a reality soon.