Although e-commerce has become a constant feature of retailers' lives in recent years, the truth is that we are still in a transitional phase, which inevitably leads to businesses being confronted with unfamiliar terms and strategies. Bracketing (buy to try) is one of them.
What is Bracketing?
In simple terms, bracketing is a new trend in which consumers buy several items with the intention of returning some of them, especially when it comes to clothing and household goods.
To a large extent, this phenomenon happens and flourishes because with bracketing consumers are able to overcome one of the biggest disadvantages of e-commerce: the lack of contact with the product.
Bracketing - Percentage of consumers between 2017 and 2021 in the United States (18-65 years old)
Source: Statista.com (Nov 2021)
By ordering, for example, three shirts of different sizes or designs, consumers can, in a way, replicate the shopping experience in a physical shop by trying on the different pieces and combining them with the rest of their wardrobe, but this time in the comfort of their own home.
Although it cuts across all age groups, the phenomenon of bracketing is most visible among women of the Millennial and Z generations and high-income consumers.
According to a study by Fibre2Fashion, an American solutions company for the textile industry, 44% of women (compared to 30% of men) who are between 18 and 29 years old. Among high-income consumers (those who make purchases worth 100,000 dollars or more a year), 481,000,000 reported having practised bracketing.
Although bracketing favours the consumer's online shopping experience and doesn't present any added costs, since there is the possibility of returning products and getting your money back, it ends up causing substantial losses for retailers.
For example, the clothing multinational sold 499 million dollars worth of products in 2019, but ended up spending 531 million dollars on returns in the same year.
How to prepare your online business for Bracketing?
In order to reduce the prevalence of bracketing and offer an online shopping experience that suits their customers' preferences and needs, online businesses must..:
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Adjusting your online payment methods to consumer habits and needs
Exchanges, returns and refunds are inevitable, but that doesn't mean you've "lost" the customer - quite the opposite. A good returns and exchanges policy and quick refunds made using the same payment method as the purchase are important for the customer to see your online shop as a reliable partner.
Diversity marks the list of online payment This makes it necessary for businesses to adopt comprehensive and functional solutions to meet the consumption habits of Lusitanian e-shoppers and thus generate more sales for their online shop.
So that checkout and refunds aren't a problem and your online business offers the best possible service for your customers. innovative online payment methods to its customers, REDUNIQ offers you two online payment solutions: o REDUNIQ E-Commerce and REDUNIQ@Payments.
Whilst REDUNIQ E-Commerce allows your online shop to receive e-commerce payments with Visa and Mastercard debit and credit cards, from customers all over the world, by Multibanco or MB WAY reference with no membership costs or monthly fees, the online payment gateway REDUNIQ@Payments which is specifically aimed at businesses that sell online without a website (via social networks or marketplaces), is the turnkey solution that will allow you to receive online payments by email, SMS, WhatsApp, Multibanco reference or MB WAY with Visa and Mastercard cards without having to worry about membership costs, fixed costs, monthly fees or integration.
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Offer a more complete and assertive product description
When bracketing becomes a constant in your online business, it can mean that the information about the products you sell is perceived by customers as scarce or inconsistent, giving them a feeling of lack of trust.
For example, in an age when consumers are increasingly demanding, mere information about a garment's size is of little real value to customers, since the size 36 in your online shop will probably be different from the size 36 they find in another shop.
For this reason, always try to include the unique measurements of each garment, use product images and offer information on the height and size of the clothes worn by the models so that consumers can more accurately assess the size they choose.
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Provide a virtual fitting room
Virtual reality and augmented reality technologies are excellent partners for your online business when it comes to offering your customers a more immersive and "bracketing-free" shopping experience.
As well as offering 360º product visualisations, include virtual fitting rooms in your offer so that your customers can simulate the experience they would find in a physical shop, a decisive factor for more and more e-shoppers.
The virtual fitting room has technology that, using the physical characteristics provided by the consumer, is able to recommend the ideal size for a particular item of clothing or footwear.
In this way, the introduction of virtual fitting rooms ends up offering customers greater security when choosing a product, since it solves many of their doubts during the purchasing journey, and consequently reduces the number of exchanges and returns.
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Improve your exchange and returns process
Exchanges and returns will always exist in e-commerce, but it is possible to mitigate them and make the process less damaging and labour-intensive for your online shop.
The absence of a system that allows consumers to easily exchange their purchases leads them to try to get round the problem by buying a product, trying it on at home, choosing the item that suits them best and returning the rest. Complicated exchange and return scenarios like this end up encouraging bracketing.
To improve this situation, try implementing an exchange and returns automation system such as aftersale, which not only facilitates the process but also encourages customers to exchange rather than return products.
In this type of aftersale system, with a couple of clicks, the customer can exchange one size for another or choose to receive a shopping voucher so that the money they have already spent does not have to be returned by your online shop.
In addition to simplifying the process for the customer, this system ends up serving as a database that allows the business not only to fine-tune its offer by offering a shopping experience tailored to the specific needs of each consumer, but also to become a major generator of revenue, repeat purchases and loyalty.
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