As consumers continue to swap the high street for online stores, retailers need to provide a seamless customer experience to remain competitive. Central to this user experience is customer service.

Shoppers have become more informed and more demanding of a high-level of service following this shift in commerce. Therefore, it’s now more important than ever for retailers to meet this demand. Here is a list of five customer communication technologies which will help ecommerce retailers boost their customer service offering in 2018:

1. iAdvize

iAdvize is a full-stack conversational marketing platform that connects customers or prospects in need of advice with experts who are available 24/7 via real-time messaging. With a product like iAdvize, businesses can provide expert customer service by using a combination of real people and chatbots, which combined creates a conversational experience for the consumer. iAdvize also has a unique peer-to-peer service which uses independent experts to provide authentic advice to online visitors.

2. PCA Predict

PCA Predict’s checkout optimisation tools remove friction on web forms, making it quicker and easier for customers to auto-complete addresses while capturing valid email, mobile numbers and delivery addresses in real-time. Its technology is widely used and is an effective tool in making sure the online customer journey to checkout is completed.

3. MailChimp

MailChimp’s automated email service can be used at all stages of a business as a key marketing tool. It can be programmed to target previous customers, new customers or even those who have nearly made a purchase but not completed checkout. MailChimp can run-on in the background with little monitoring while maintaining contact with clients and consumers, freeing up employees to focus on customer engagement.

4. SnapSurveys

By creating surveys, retailers are able to gain more insight into their customer’s likes and dislikes, and create their own data. SnapSurveys is a survey solution that prides itself on being suitable for companies of all sizes. Surveying targeted consumers can help drive sales, and businesses to see the level of product demand, their customer service levels and gain custom feedback from consumers.

5. Taboola

Having customers actually visit your company’s site can be half the battle, especially for smaller retailers. Taboola aims to drive quality web traffic and increase conversion and engagement rates by launching targeted advertising campaigns. They boast a network reaching more than one billion, and by using personalisation of the consumer as an advertising guide, it guarantees the right potential consumers see the ad.