How “conversational commerce” will revolutionize the customer experience

Conversational commerce, or the use of direct chat, messenger apps or voice interfaces between the customer and the company, is becoming more and more common in online commerce and is simplifying the customer experience.

Thanks to “conversational commerce”, it is now possible, for example, to make a purchase by simply sending a text message. A process that is increasingly being used by online stores and other start-ups.

But what kind of user experience is it possible to offer in a simplified environment? What are the initiatives in this sector and what are the best practices to take into account to take the plunge? Yann-Claude Philippot, E-commerce Expert at SQLI analyzes this phenomenon which leads to new purchasing experiences

“Concierge services like clacdesdoigts.com (inspired by the concept of getmagicnow.com) work on a very simple system: you send an SMS to a mobile number, a link is sent to you immediately to create the account and add a payment method, then everything happens on your messaging service. No need for a site, app, or email.”

This channel therefore becomes a transactional vector, with initiatives such as Callfrank, MeetPeter, Digit or HelloJam. We can talk here about an Invisible App, “since there is no specific User Interface”.

Is No UI the new UI?

“It is by relying on tools whose primary function is diverted (or augmented) that we can now create engagement in a completely new way,” continues Yann-Claude Philippot.

Bottom line: “The success of these initiatives is based on these three factors: simplicity, immediacy, personalization.”

And the expert concludes: “with a very high penetration and usage rate of messaging apps (more users than “social” apps like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram), it is a potential and a gigantic opportunity, because none of the 3 historical social networks have been able to monetize other than through advertising. What was just a simple service for exchanging text, images or videos has quickly transformed into a complete ecosystem with APIs and developers to allow the creation of “micro-stores” on these channels.

And it must be admitted that in the field of technology, the most advanced initiative in this sector is, by far, that of WeChat, which has quickly become much more than a Chinese version of Whatsapp.

“A pioneer in the field, WeChat has opened its platform to developers to help brands offer innovative user experiences, in particular by allowing them to sell products or services via the application.”

Indeed, the platform offers brands the opportunity to quickly create and manage a micro-store in order to offer a selection of products for sale. The advantage for the end consumer is that they do not have to leave the app to finalize their purchase. The engagement can therefore be very significant.

In short, “conversational commerce does not have the virtue of replacing traditional e-commerce, but this paradigm will allow companies to experiment in a lighter and faster way, by focusing on the substance (the offer, the product, the service) more than the form (the app, the UI)”, predicts Yann-Claude Philippot.