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Shinola Leverages Live Chat Capabilities To Boost Conversion Rates 1,600%

In looking to engage with consumers at every point in the decision-making journey, watch and bicycle retailer Shinola implemented the Moxie Digital Engagement Suite. The retailer created an online engagement system that helped improve its relationship with its customers (as well as its own results). Specifically, Shinola has achieved:

  • A 6.25% increase in overall online conversion rates;

  • A 1,600% increase in conversion rate among visitors who engaged with Moxie Chat; and

  • Streamlining of its online operations with its physical store experience, without increasing costs.

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The streamlining initiative turned out to be effective, with Shinola finding no difference in the content of chat conversations compared to customer service phone calls. For both, approximately one-third were sales based, another one-third occurred after the sale and the rest were miscellaneous.

As a retailer that manufactures and sells an eclectic array of luxury watches, bicycles and leather products — all made in the U.S. — Shinola has a unique brand experience that it feels the need to uphold. And with 47% of Shinola’s web site traffic now coming from mobile and tablet devices, the retailer also needed to leverage a solution built for every channel to truly give its customers an optimized online experience.

With the Moxie suite in place, Shinola can focus on assisting consumers via live chat before they get confused and potentially leave the site. With the growing rates of e-Commerce and mobile consumers, that possibility is one retailers can ill afford, especially as fewer people enter the brick-and-mortar store.

“We’ve seen through this past holiday season that people don’t go to physical stores as much as they want to,” said Tara Sporrer, VP of Marketing at Moxie. “There’s a huge opportunity for e-Commerce to grow, but it doesn’t mean that they don’t need help. People need expert help, and we provide them with that information and/or access to expertise that can help them through their buying cycle.”

Dennis Kopitz, Director of E-Commerce at Shinola, understood the retailer’s need to implement similar experience across all channels, explaining in a statement: “Moxie enables us to staff our online storefronts just like we staff our physical stores, serving our customers on their terms and delivering consistent experiences online and offline.”

Proactively Delivering Information To The Consumer

The Moxie suite has added numerous features to Shinola’s online offering, including live chat, an FAQ Knowledge Base and email. The suite is represented by a bell icon that consumers can click on at any time while on the site. The live chat option in particular is designed to reassure consumers that a customer service employee is there to solve any issues in the same way that an in-store employee could do.

“The idea is that a customer can tap the bell in order to engage with the brand to get information, talk to a representative or to send a message to get help,” Sporrer said in an interview with Retail TouchPoints. “It’s a very new approach to providing attention to customers while they’re in an online world. The reason we need to do that is because online conversion rates are generally very low, while in-store conversion rates are very high.”

Instead of enticing the customer to search out basic information, the Moxie bell can preemptively provide facts on products as well as buying and shipping processes, all while the customer remains on the product page. If a customer is browsing for bicycles, the bell will provide additional resources related to these products, such as assembly information, shipping options and registration. Upon hitting the “Learn More” button on the front page (which appears as a circle with an “i” inside it), users are immediately shown information regarding Shinola’s return policy and product warranty information.

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