Yesterday, I posted the first part of my recent article in ATG’s montly online newletter, ATG Insight. Below is the rest of the story…

So now what?
Of course there is a long list of tasks required to deliver the kind of experience the Millenials (and their parents, like me) are after. And only you know precisely what will work for your business and target customers. Yet at the highest level, I believe there are four overarching objectives for merchants looking to sustain – or better yet, expand – e-commerce growth:

  • Personalize the Web customer experience to deliver more relevant products and content. Consider “micro-targeting” approaches that use everything you know about a customer to deliver a highly personalized experience. Moreover, use rich media to improve the online experience and make it entertaining (while being careful not to sacrifice efficiency!).
  • Give direct Web store control to merchandisers and marketers that will enable a rapid rate of change. And equip those merchandisers with easy access to customer intelligence that will enable them to understand customer behavior, and empower them to create the most effective promotions. Armed with the right tools and access to your online storefront, merchandisers can greatly increase your company’s revenue and lower inventory expenses.
  • Arm customer service agents with better information and tools to increase conversions at escalation points. Make it your goal to change your customer service department from a cost center to a revenue generator.
  • Build upon a commerce platform that can support increased volume and customer dynamics, yet is flexible enough to support competitive differentiation.

A change in approach
As many of you know, we at ATG are not newcomers to the world of e-commerce. Our platform has been around for well over a decade. But that doesn’t mean we don’t recognize the need to continually change and evolve our offerings. And that is exactly what we’ve been up to. We recognize that delivering the kind of e-commerce experience that I described earlier takes more than a transaction engine with some point products bolted on in an attempt to support merchandising and customer support efforts. It takes a truly integrated yet flexible approach. We’ve been hard at work to deliver the industry’s only comprehensive, highly scalable e-commerce solution to drive the complete customer lifecycle of online sales, marketing and service – manageable from a single platform and delivered by a single vendor. Our flexible, component-based e-commerce software architecture enables you to personalize the online buying experience for your customers, making it easy for them to find desired products, comparison shop, register for gifts, pre-order items, redeem coupons, and much more. OK, I’ll stop there. But I would encourage you to take a look at how our offerings are evolving in an effort to support the changing customer – and your changing business. Better yet, let me know what you think and how we can continue to expand our solutions to best meet the demands you’re facing.

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