A short story of how I wanted to pack my bags differently – got frustrated and ended up nowhere. An every-day brand experience of a customer in 5 mins.
I travel a lot. All due to my recent change of jobs, countries – well continents. If you travel a lot, you start to value your luggage. Especially if you try to pack and unpack more then trice a week. Hence my search for something to bring order to my packing chaos.
First destination of choice – research on the web. Something to put my shirts in. As I never bought this kind of shirt folding thing before, I thought I rather have a look before I buy it first. Lucky enough, a store only 10 mins away from my apartment seems to have the same stuff I found online. A quick car ride over – bad news – out of stock. Did the shop assistant try to write down my name, help with maybe finding an alternative or even send me to a competitor? No. But she guessed that what I search is out of stock – when I came in.
Frustrated – I went back online. And now it get’s tricky – I moved to Australia. So one of the first things I realised is that Google does not always send you to the right stuff – like me finding out that there is no Best Buy in Australia – took some time. I found what I wanted – Eagle Creek’s pack it line looked awesome.
Great website – here. Great videos to show what I am going to buy. References, customer feedback, good guarantee – I was hooked. So I put my set of choice into the cart and went for the checkout. When trying to change the location from the US to Australia – I got stuck. Eagle Creek only delivers to the US. It offers a widget on the initial landing page to find a retailer, but if you are in Australia – you are basically on the wrong continent to buy from them directly.
I kept searching for stuff online, but basically got lost. Sure enough, a couple of minutes later, Eagle Creek sends me a cart abandonment email: Need help with your EagleCreek.com order? and subtitle Was there a problem completing your order? – Yes there was.
The email looks great – directly links to the shopping cart – I could buy in 1 click – but I am on the wrong continent.
Ever had a similar experience? A lot of global and local brands I come across are not even that far (cart abandonment almost in real time after I left the online store). Customer engagement is key, but the devil is in the detail. Linking these experiences of customers together is something that could easily show Eagle Creek that people outside of the US cannot buy their goods. Something that they could easily act upon.
The moral of the story? Well – it not even is Eagle Creek – as I ended up finding their products somewhere else in Australia at a reseller – but the store I visited 10 mins from home. Bad website. Bad customer engagement and a lost opportunity to gain something from my visit. In 2015 there is really no reason to keep this kind of customer service – unless you want to be out of business – soon.
And regarding Eagle Creek? Well – it is not always easy to buy products online…
© Marty Bucella – www.martybucella.com
