All About Service in Online Retail
Posted on Thu, Nov 03, 2011
In a departure from our traditional coverage of the digital media and retail space, this month we sat down with John Ernsberger, co-founder and vice president of sales at STELLAService to learn more about a critical aspect of the retail business - customer service. Fresh on the heels of securing an impressive round of funding, John took time to shed some light on the importance of service and offer some tips, especially as we near the holiday season.
1. STELLAService has a unique offering in the retail market, can you tell us a bit about what the company does.
STELLAService’s mission is to provide transparency around the customer service performance of Internet retailers to benefit shoppers and businesses alike. We do this by actually becoming the customers ourselves (unbeknownst to the retailer) and “road-testing” the true shopping experience first-hand. Our proprietary and rigorous evaluation system assesses a broad array of criteria, including usability and online tools, shipping and returns and human-to-human customer support. To maintain our independence and objectivity, we pay for all products purchased and rely on our staff of trained, full-time customer experience analysts to test the companies we evaluate.
Our professional methodology allows for an apples-to-apples comparison of service performance across the market. Consequently, we’re able to help online shoppers make better buying decisions by highlighting an exclusive group of sites that provide top-tier customer service. Shoppers can utilize our Web site to review the ratings of every company we evaluate. In addition, stand-out sites are eligible to display our seal of service excellence so shoppers can instantly identify a company that has a proven track record of fantastic service.
Richer transparency around service performance is also helping businesses as well. E-retailers that perform well in our rigorous assessment can leverage STELLAService to signal to shoppers that they are a part of a minority of sites providing fantastic customer service. Since people spend more money for great service (on average 10% more), we’re finding that our mark is boosting key performance indicators for our partners. We’re also preparing to launch a data product in 2012 that will allow unprecedented insight into a company’s service performance.
2. One of the more significant trends in the retail market is to take proven in-store practices and adapt them for an online world, do you see this happening in the service arena?
I think that the core tenants of customer service are absolutely transferable across channels. This said, multi-channel merchants continuously struggle for ways to ensure the consistency of customer service across their business units. For instance, many multi-channel retailers don’t allow in-store returns for products purchased online. As you can imagine, this is not ideal for a shopper who doesn’t know (or care) about a retailer’s inventory constraints and can leave a poor impression with the consumer. No matter what the case is, it is essential that multi-channel players develop a legitimate method to continuously monitor, measure and benchmark their service performance, in both the virtual and physical worlds.
3. Are there common pitfalls you run into as you evaluate retail sites, or is each case unique?
Evaluating the service performance of thousands of businesses has its challenges. Perhaps that’s why STELLA’s the first company to take it on! That said, I think each case is fairly unique. For instance, subscription based sites (e.g., Shoedazzle.com) are exploding. By definition, shoppers interact differently with these types of businesses than – say – a traditional e-retailer, such as Zappos. They may have different questions about purchases, returns, or how to register for an account. At STELLAService, we are vigilant about our data quality to ensure that it reflects real and true engagements with a specific retailer. We spend a lot of time developing content for our interactions in order to accurately stress-test the business and identify the companies that stand out from the crowd.
4. Do you have any advice for retailers as they move into the critical holiday season?
Here are five elements of the shopping experience that all Internet retailers - regardless of their size, budget or focus - should consider as they gear up for the holidays:
- Show a globally displayed link to your shipping and return policies.
- Provide a detailed order confirmation page that clearly highlights “bill to” and “shipped to” information as well as the shopper’s email address where the order details were sent.
- Avoid forcing shoppers to leave a voicemail when calling your company.
- Send an email to confirm product shipment with an estimated time of delivery.
- Leverage third party seals (e.g., service and security) to increase your site’s conversion rate. Test a seal’s effectiveness in different key areas on your site (e.g., shopping cart) to maximize success.
5. What do you read to keep pace with the industry?
It’s not surprising that I’m a big fan of Tony Hsieh’s biography and manifesto, Delivering Happiness. Zappos is truly revolutionary in that it successfully built its brand on the concept of exceptional service. I have also recently read Marsha Collier’s Ultimate Online Customer Service Guide, which has some great information. I am an avid reader of Wall Street Journal’s Technology section and AllThingsD.com, and indulge in a variety of industry publications, such as Internet Retailer and the E-commerce Times. I also regularly read Seth Godin’s blog because of his focus on marketing and its relevance to customer service. Ultimately, the best form of marketing is delivering great customer service.
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John Ernsberger is the Co-founder and Vice President of Sales at STELLAService, the first and only independent provider of customer service ratings for online retailers. John's passion for great service began when he was a kid working at an upscale restaurant where he observed the nuances of high quality customer care. John never fully appreciated the power and importance of customer service, however, until he moved to Seville, Spain, where the idea of outstanding service is not much more than remembering which product the customer actually ordered! Previously, John worked as a paralegal at Davis Polk & Wardwell, and prior to co-founding STELLAService he was a Sales Director at SEI Investments. John grew up in various places along the east coast and attended Bucknell University, graduating with a degree in Business Management.