3 Step Process For The Perfect Christmas Customer Journey

Christmas is just around the corner, for businesses and consumers alike. A survey showed that 36% of people began their festive shopping around the end of October to November, which means they will be well under way by now. Has your business begun preparing for this Yuletide shopping spree?

Did you know, a typical household in the UK spends just over £2,900 in a month, but in the run up to Christmas our spending habits change drastically. According to the Bank of England, households spend on average almost £740 more in December than other months, which is 29% more than in a typical month.

In order for your business to be ‘quids in’ this Christmas, follow this 3 step process for the perfect customer journey:

1. Clean Up Your Christmas List

Never mind simply deciding who’s been naughty and nice this year, it is essential that your business cleans up its data ahead of any marketing campaigns. 92% of customers believe suggestions from friends and family over other forms of advertising, making word of mouth marketing very important.

Therefore, if you are planning on sending out Christmas marketing this year, make sure you check your database for any inaccurate data before hand. If your business compiles large volumes of data then a bespoke solution will enable you to cleanse, dedupe, and standardise your database. In turn, this will help you to remain compliant with GDPR and adopt a clearer view of your customer base.

If you are planning an email marketing campaign, it is also well worth considering Email validation, as the email addresses in your list may be malformed (data-entry error or spam) or even non-existent. A large number of inaccurate or invalid emails will increase your email sending costs (based on list size) and may damage your sender reputation. Email validation analyses each email address in your list and returns a report detailing which emails are deliverable, unconfirmed, unverifiable, disposable, undeliverable and harmful. Once your list has been validated, you can be confident that your emails are being sent to active and verified email addresses.

2. Validate Their Address

Once you have cleaned your customer and prospect data, the next step towards the perfect customer journey is keeping that data clean. Validating their addresses during the online checkout process is a prime way of doing just that. It is estimated that 81% of shoppers will abandon a cart if a checkout process is too complicated or flawed in any way. In an era where customer experience is king, capturing data correctly is the linchpin of the purchasing process.

So how can you do this? By integrating a sophisticated address validation solution into your web form that receives regular Royal Mail Postcode Address File (PAF) updates. This is will help to combat and reduce customer frustration and address-related cart abandonment.

3. Verify Their Payment Details

Last but not least on the road to perfecting your customer journey this Christmas is ticking the last box in the purchasing process; verifying their payment details. Internet scams greatly increase during November and December as consumers up their online spending. According to UK Finance, Authorised Payment fraud in the UK totalled £583.2m in 2021, with Card Fraud 14% less at approximately £500m.

To help safeguard your customers and your business this Christmas make sure you utilise bank validation software to reduce the risk of fraud. The quick and accurate capture of data at the point of entry within the online shopping cart will save you a lot of time and money in the long run.

4. The Result

Once you’ve completed this 3 step process you can sit back and watch your business thrive.

If your company struggles with data, then outsource to the experts today! Find out how Hopewiser’s innovative address and data solutions can help you create the perfect customer journey this Christmas.