Retailers Are Testing Facebook-Style Shopper Profiles to Battle Amazon
New software tracks every purchase you’ve made, product you’ve returned, ad you’ve clicked on and item you’ve tossed from your cart.
Artist: Andrea Chronopoulos
Jessica Ferro recently ordered $200 worth of makeup from Sephora’s online app—and then waited a month for it to arrive. Despite conversations with multiple customer-service agents, the shipment had gone to her old address in Joliet, Illinois. She didn’t yell or document her experience on Yelp or Twitter. Ferro, 34, did what came naturally: She took her business elsewhere—to Wander Beauty, an online makeup seller that has put a premium on customer service by enlisting chatbots she can talk with whenever and wherever she wants.
“You have to make customers as happy as you can because there are so many options out there,” Ferro says. “What’s going to stop them from going somewhere else?”