The mystery surrounding cart abandonment has yet to solved, but one company is getting you a better look at how to keep your customers to keep the items in there. Cue Connect, the company tracking buyer behavior to increase conversions, is targeting those digital window shoppers so you can know what will pique their interest the next time around. Already partners with Shopify, Magento and BigCommerce, Cue Connect is helping you reach your most elusive customers.
Today we sit down with the Cue Connect team to learn about their growing businesses and how they are looking to provide smart data for ecommerce companies.
Tell us about the product or service.
Cue is a highly scalable online retail marketing platform that keeps shoppers and retailers connected across the entire path to purchase. With our “Wishlist” solution, retailers gain shopper intelligence and unlock new value from existing shopper behavior through the ability to share and save items. Our platform enables better experiences for the shopper and empowers retailers to build custom experiences and deliver relevant content at the point of sale, leading to higher satisfaction levels, increased site traffic, improved conversion rates, larger basket size and average order value.
How is it different?
Our product differentiates itself by aligning with existing behaviors, rather than attempting to modify them. We recognized that shopping cart abandonment had become a major challenge for retailers – consumers would go through the entire ecommerce process and add items to their shopping cart that might have piqued their interest, but they weren’t ready to purchase for one reason or another. Their selections were then wiped clean and no value or additional insights were gleaned for the retailer.
Our technology combats shopping cart abandonment and makes the Wishlist actionable by monitoring for sales, alerting the consumer when they’re within proximity to brick-and-mortar locations and providing recommendations of other items that may be of interest based on past purchase behavior or browsing history. By providing consumers with an opportunity to save their items of interest, retailers are able to go one step further in curating the shopping process, converting more sales and ultimately creating stronger customer connections.
What market are you attacking and how big is it?
The ecommerce market is massive, and is only continuing to grow – I recently saw an eMarketer study which found that the ecommerce industry will eclipse $3.5 trillion by 2020. We’re hoping to address a significant need in the industry today, which is the consumer demand for luxury experiences on a budget. With our technology, retailers will have the ability to connect with consumers who want to be connected with and, in turn, build meaningful relationships with those shoppers. We’re working with retailers that range in size and focus – from SMB to enterprise – and can scale our technology to accommodate each market and associated needs.
What is the business model?
We work closely with ecommerce platforms such as Shopify, Magento and BigCommerce and are available as an application in their associated marketplaces. Additionally, we sell direct to retailer for integration into their independent sites.
What inspired the business?
I was inspired to create a software platform that would enable customers and the retailers where they shop to connect and communicate in real-time when I was entering a CVS store one day. I was sending a message on my phone and thought it would be a great experience if I could get information about items I and my family need right while entering the store along with personalized offers or content that fit my interests and loyalty.
Why is the wishlist ripe for disruption?
The e-commerce industry has experienced a renaissance over the past decade as led by giants such as Amazon. However, according to a recent survey three quarters of shopping carts are abandoned. This is a major challenge that retailers are trying to overcome as they continuously report poor earnings.
While, the ecommerce industry has a whole has transformed in recent years, the “Wishlist” function of ecommerce sites has remained relatively stagnant. Platforms such as Pinterest recognized the need for consumers to have a way to organize merchandise that piques their interest online, however these platforms remain disjointed from the retailer’s actual website. Because of these siloes retailers cannot benefit from the trove of customer data readily available to them and, in turn, customers are left stranded with dead-end links.
With Cue Connect, both consumers and retailers benefit through a deeper relationship. Consumers are rewarded for shopping and retailers convert more sales.
What are the milestones that you plan to achieve within six months?
We plan to activate our software on thousands of retailers’ websites and mobile applications enabling first of a kind personalized real time shopping for shoppers across the entire path to purchase.
What is the one piece of startup advice that you never got?
Truly disruptive technology is by definition incredibly challenging to describe, build and deploy especially when it’s an enterprise solution so plan for long hard days full of a lot of iterations ahead. Stay focused on the vision and agile in how you get there.
If you could be put in touch with anyone in the New York community who would it be and why?
Michael Lazerow and Jeff Ragovin Salesforce Buddy Media. They founded and built a hugely successful social marketing platform that helps all kinds of business build connections and happy relationships with customers. The largest start-up exit in NY.
Why did you launch in New York?
New York is the retail and marketing capital of the world. It was only natural for us to put down our roots in city that’s setting the tone for the entire industry.
What’s your favorite restaurant in the city?
Fung Tu!
