Borderfree : To Segment Successfully, Know Where International Visitors Are Coming From

As anyone returning from a trip abroad will tell you, international travel is an entirely different experience from traveling within your own country. From standing in long immigration and customs lines to overcoming language barriers, it can be a challenge adapting to the protocol and culture of another country.

That's why it's so surprising that one of the most common ecommerce flaws retailers fall prey to today is giving their international visitors the identical site experiences as their domestic traffic. To truly welcome international visitors and keep them on the site long enough to shop-and better yet, to buy-you need to treat them differently based on where they're coming from. The better you can segment your customers based on their origin, the better you can convert them to loyal customers.

How do you begin? It turns out the question of 'where' your customers are coming from is more complex than simple geography. To truly understand how to address international customers' needs, ask these three important questions about each unique visitor to your website:

Often, mobile customers are just browsing, so if they suddenly abandon that shopping cart, it doesn't necessarily reflect the quality of your products or how international-friendly your site is. However, if you see a trend in cart abandonment among desktop customers, who are usually more serious about shopping, it may be worth a closer look.

Second, take a look at how each of your website visitors found you. Did they simply type your address into Google? That indicates familiarity with your brand, even though the customer may appear 'new' in your analytics. Or did they arrive to you through a paid campaign-a brand ad or a product ad-or through social media? What keyword or image attracted the customer? The answers to these questions may help you better engage with your customers and make them more active within your brand.

Finally, customer geography is important-but it involves more than simply knowing what countries your visitors are coming from. It's surprising to consider that many retailers may know customers' country or region, but they don't know what's working where. To match your site experience to your real customers, it's critical that you understand the dynamics at play within those countries: Some may not trust ecommerce (parts of Africa); others use mobile at a much higher rate than desktop (parts of Asia); and still others may be wary of home delivery (parts of Russia).

By answering these questions, you can stop guessing and start analyzing how well your site is working based on the needs of your customers. Do you have a low conversion rate in a certain country? It may have more to do with the preferences of customers there than with your site, but you can tailor your site to better answer those preferences. Running a serious segmentation engine can help.

Once you find out where your visitors are coming from, what they need and how your site can meet those needs, stick with what works. That way, you can ensure that the international visitors who arrive at your site receive a warm welcome-and keep coming back.