The customer experience continues to resonate more and more at Wayfair, one of the world’s largest online selections of furniture, home furnishings, décor, and goods, including more than eight million products from more than 10,000 suppliers.
Liz Graham, Vice President of Sales and Service, Wayfair, talked to Loyalty360 about the company’s resounding customer experience.
“We have a massive market opportunity as consumers increasingly embrace the ease and convenience of shopping online,” Graham explained. “By offering more than eight million products, we’re providing the selection our customers desire and we use technology and strong visual merchandising to help them quickly and easily zero in on the exact item that meets their needs and matches their style and budget. We are also investing in a proprietary logistics network that’s purpose-built for home−ensuring a flawless experience from start to finish for even the largest and heaviest products. We are excited to see this experience resonate with our customers.”
That unwavering focus on customer experience is keenly understood by Wayfair officials.
“We’re always focused on our long-term commitment to create the best possible shopping experience for home, which means making home decorating and renovating fun, approachable, fast, and easy,” Graham said. “That promise to ourselves and our customers definitely guides our decision-making any time we approach new challenges.”
What’s more, Graham noted that Wayfair delivers differentiated service to customers at every stage of the experience, from the first step down to the last mile.
“Once a customer finds and buys a product, we’re continuing to exceed customer expectations in the final step of a frictionless shopping experience with faster delivery speeds enabled by our proprietary logistics network that is purpose-built for home,” Graham explained. “Wayfair can now reach 99 percent of the U.S. population within two days and provides 100 percent in-house service teams dedicated to providing an exceptional customer experience.”
Repeat customers placed 2.9 million orders in the third quarter of 2017, which represents a staggering increase of 48.2 percent year-over-year.
“Our emphasis on continuous innovation when it comes to the customer experience is helping us to delight shoppers with the best ways to find exactly what they need for their home,” Graham said. “Repeat customers placed 61 percent of total orders in the third quarter of 2017, compared to 56.9 percent in the second quarter of 2016. These numbers are a testament to the engagement strategy powered by the company’s unique tech offerings, which helps build deeper customer relationships each year.”
Over the past couple years, mobile has become the preferred way to shop for Wayfair customers.
“We have more than 1,200 engineers, including a dedicated mobile team, for both iOS and Android,” Graham said. “As shopper preferences shift, we’re trying to, not only create the ultimate home goods shopping experience, but also to push the technological limits of how customers can engage with the company and shop for their homes across all available channels. Whether shoppers would rather browse online or via mobile, call a sales representative, or flip through a print catalog, we want the experience to be seamless and totally customer-centric. The customer experience we’ve built has increased the number of repeat customers and is driving our growth year-over-year.”