The demand for product customization has sky-rocketed in recent times, it has proven to be the key in satisfying customers. An article on ResearchGate says that;
“A key assumption Is that customized products create higher benefits for customers than standard products because they deliver a closer preference fit”.
Customers love when products are tailored to their preference fit, The Deloitte Consumer Review shows that; about 36% of customers today say that they are interested in customized products, and businesses that can offer this can tap into this opportunity. E-commerce today is highly competitive and over-saturated, but product customization has been seen as an efficient way to stand out among the competition. There are other benefits such as;
- Customer loyalty: Happy and satisfied customers will definitely be loyal to your brand. Loyal customers will keep coming back, to buy again.
- Stronger online visibility: Loyal customers are likely to recommend your store to family and friends. A survey showed that “customers who designed their own shoes gave companies a 50% higher Net Promoter ScoreSM (NPS®)—a standard way of measuring customer loyalty—than customers who bought regular products from the same manufacturer”
- Increase in Profit margins: According to Bain customers are willing to pay a 20% premium for customized products. Because you are giving customers the ability to customize your products they won’t hesitate to pay more for the customized products.
- The rate of product return tends to be low or near impossible when it comes to customized products since the customers design the products themselves.
Product customization has all these benefits, yet has some challenges. In the following section, challenges linked to product customization and how to overcome them will be discussed.
EXPENSIVE TO IMPLEMENT
There is no denying the fact that product customization is not an easy or cheap project to execute. For example, Nike built a whole customization platform and spent nearly $20 million to implement – NIKEiD a service provided by Nike that allows customers to personalize and design their own Nike merchandise, which took months to develop. Along with other expenses like support and maintenance costs.
How to overcome this challenge
However, Due to the development of software, there’s an easier and cheaper way to give customers exactly what they want. By simply installing a Visual Product Configurator in a woocommerce store. After successfully setting it up, a customer can design his product to his preference. All that is needed is the;
- plugin uploaded on the site, and
- the configuration settings which require transparent PNG files to set up
After the configurator has been set up, that is all that is needed to offer customization options to customers.
NEED FOR ADDITIONAL FEATURES
Implementing a product customization software might not offer all that you need, that’s why most big businesses build their own customization platform but this is overly expensive and costs more to maintain or upgrade when needed.
How to overcome this challenge
By using the Visual Product Configurator you can request; additional features already, that can easily be uploaded to a woocommerce store. The VPC is also customizable on request, when there is a missing feature you need, it can continuously be developed for you.
COMPLEXITY
It’s fairly normal for a store owner to get overwhelmed when product customization setup comes to mind. The reality is that you don’t have to be a technical wizard to set things up, you don’t have to hire a developer. Which will require you to pay, first for the installation, and for every time you need to update or add a feature.
How to overcome this challenge
The Visual Product Configurator is a woocommerce product customizer that is so easy and flexible to use, you don’t need to be a technical person to understand how it works. It has been designed to be intuitive. It’s also well-documented with video tutorials and a live chat in case you need immediate support or have any questions.
SPECIFIC CUSTOMIZABLE PRODUCTS
Most product customizers don’t work with all products, some do not work with simple products like face masks, while some do. And some might not work with complex products like the PlayStation controller, bicycles, etc. Which again leads to the option of building personal customization or giving up on customization.
How to overcome this challenge
The VPC works with every configurable product without exception. Once you set up the components of the custom product, link each option of the component to a transparent PNG file. The combination of all selected options will display as layers and will show the final preview of the personalized product to the customer.
This simple yet powerful way to work allows the VPC to handle not only colors but shapes, shadows and effects, of any type of product from the simplest (custom face masks, custom phone cases, etc) to the most complex products(custom ps and xbox controller, etc).
CONCLUSION
To avoid these challenges, the VPC is the best tool for product customization, and it’s more than just a WooCommerce plugin, it’s a full service that includes:
- A team of handpicked graphic designers who can create the options layers for you or provide advice whenever needed.
- +15 WordPress experts are able to set up your store (staging and production sites), and take care of the security and every technical aspect of running an online WooCommerce store while you focus on bringing the customers in.
Like any innovation attempt, product customization has its challenges but with the perfect tools, the challenges can be easily defeated, which in return will take your store to the next level.