J.P. Morgan Expert Describes 3 Common Ways Retailers Needlessly Frustrate Customers

In an increasingly crowded retail space being squeezed on both ends — from the top by expanding industry titans like Walmart and Amazon, and from the bottom by a bevy of hopeful and hungry startups — it becomes imperative that middle-market retailers do everything in their power to prevent themselves from being pushed out of business entirely. That seemed to be the primary theme discussed by PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster as she sat down with J.P. Morgan’s head of commercial bank merchant services (client management), Teresa Walker.

Throughout the 20-minute interview, the two execs covered a great deal of ground, exploring topics from tech tools to fraud-fighting capabilities. First and foremost for Walker, however, was an emerging reality suggesting that if middle-market retailers don’t focus on the following aspects of their businesses, they could end up losing their customers to competitors.

Promo Problems at the Checkout

There’s almost nothing as frustrating as loading up your cart — either online or physical — and having a promo code for a discount, but it’s absent from your purse (or email inbox). Or, perhaps, it simply doesn’t work. Webster called this the “promo rope-a-dope” because it entices you into the shopping process, with the end result being annoyance.

“Integrated experiences on things like this matter,” Walker explained. “When I get something like an email, and I go: ‘Oh, cool! I’d like to get 20% off!’ And so I click on the link, and then I go to check out … where’s my 20%? Ok, I’m in an app. Now I’ve got to go back, find that email, copy that code, paste it, get my 20%. And while that takes only a couple of minutes … do I really want to do that? And I find myself kind of mad at them and irritated. Why is that still happening?”

Pointing out that a great amount of resources go into capturing a first-time customer, Walker added that their initial experience has to be positive. When a frustrating promo is offered, cart abandonment, and a negative first impression, are likely to result.

Clunky Payment Processes Can Test the Patience of Even Loyal Customers

When discussing whether customer loyalty could be eroded, Webster quickly affirmed that it could.

She suggested that it was folly for merchants to assume that their loyal customers would fight their way through a friction-filled experience.

“Most of the time, even at that moment of truth, even if it’s a brand I love or a merchant I favor, a bad checkout experience loses my sale, my appetite … maybe even forever,” Webster said.

Indicating that merchants may have blinders on when it comes to smoothing out the payment experience, particularly for long-time or repeat buyers, Walker talked about her own recent issues when engaging with payment portals. She said that the clunkiness of merchant portals may be forgiven in rare instances where a certain product was absolutely necessary, but when purchasing everyday items, it was an unforgivable error.

“Where I’m not patient is for what I call everyday shopping … I want to get in, get out of there, and get on with my day. And if I sense any kind of friction, I’m not going to shop there. And I don’t think I’m unique,” Walker said.

Failure To Link Online Purchase Profiles to In-Store

Webster and Walker went on to discuss the fact that a lack of a comprehensive customer profile, one shared reciprocally between an online storefront and its brick-and-mortar locations, can lead to deep frustration for potential customers. A failure to communicate with a customer at all potential retail touchpoints (the now-popular omnichannel customer service approach) represents a failure to keep pace with an informed, modern consumer who straddles the realms of in-person and online shopping, as MarketSource pointed out.

Walker named this as her biggest pet peeve and therefore biggest priority, because handling it effectively creates an ease-of-use case both for the retailer and the customer, eliminating time wasted by trying to dig through purchase histories or identify a certain product that a customer could be looking for.

Ultimately, Walker emphasized that “time is precious,” and customers naturally gravitate toward the path of least resistance. This puts retailers at risk of losing business to competitors offering smoother experiences unless mid-market companies address the friction points in their checkout systems, redemption processes, and omnichannel operations. Many of these retailers, she explained, have grown so rapidly that they’ve overlooked the shopper’s perspective, resulting in experiences that fuel these three major consumer frustrations.