The rise of online marketplaces has revolutionized how people shop. Today, consumers have access to a vast array of products from numerous brands, all through their smartphones.
This presents a golden opportunity for brands to reach a wider customer base and scale their businesses to new heights.
However, in this crowded online marketplace environment, there's a significant challenge that often gets overlooked: brands don't own their customer data.
Without customer data, brands struggle to build long-term relationships, execute targeted marketing strategies, and most importantly, create loyal customers who consistently repurchase.
Why Customer Loyalty Matters
Think of loyal customers as your biggest fans. They frequently repurchase, recommend your brand to others, and aren't easily swayed by competitors' pricing. You gain a more stable revenue stream, strong brand loyalty, and powerful word-of-mouth advertising.
But how can you create this level of loyalty when you don't have direct control over the shopping experience within the marketplace environment?
In marketplaces, your brand competes with countless others. Everyone is vying for buyers' attention with limited ways to "standout" through store layout customization, which is typically standardized for each marketplace platform. There's very little room for custom store displays that brands can modify.
Additionally, with numerous similar product options available, customers become more price-sensitive rather than brand-loyal because it's easy to compare prices and tempting to chase the "lowest price" label.
This situation raises the question: how can brands navigate this landscape and build a loyal customer base in the crowded online market?
Challenges of Building Customer Loyalty in Marketplaces
Building customer loyalty in traditional retail stores involves direct interaction and personalized shopping experiences. However, marketplaces present unique challenges:
1. Limited Brand Control
Within marketplaces, your brand doesn't truly "own" its own storefront. Your brand identity must share space with hundreds or even thousands of other brands in a nearly uniform, platform-determined store layout.
Options for expressing your brand; from visual presentation and storytelling to the shopping experience, are extremely limited. Brands can only work within the provided space: product photos, titles, descriptions, and minimal decorative elements. Beyond that, the customer experience is entirely controlled by the marketplace's rules and design.
As a result, it's difficult for brands to truly stand out or build emotional connections with customers. To buyers, brands often appear "all the same," so purchase decisions are driven more by practical factors like lowest price, fastest promotions, or highest ratings; not by loyalty to the brand itself.
2. Customer Data Not Optimally Captured
Since around 2022, major Indonesian marketplaces began restricting sellers' access to buyer data. Important information such as names and phone numbers are no longer displayed, and brands typically can only view shipping addresses for logistics purposes.
This policy was implemented as part of compliance with personal data protection regulations. From the platform's and consumers' perspective, this step makes sense. However, for brands, the impact is significant.
Without customer contact data, brands don't truly know who their buyers are and have no channel for building ongoing communication. Strategies like post-purchase follow-ups, loyalty programs, and repeat order campaigns become severely limited.
Some brands resort to manual methods: checking tracking numbers one by one, copying and pasting into spreadsheets, or contacting customers through marketplace chat. Besides being time-consuming, this approach isn't scalable and is prone to errors.
3. Extremely High Competition Levels
Marketplaces bring your brand face-to-face with numerous other sellers offering similar, even identical, products. On a single search page, customers can see dozens of options simultaneously, creating a highly competitive business environment.
As a result, customers can easily switch between brands. Purchase decisions are often determined by practical factors such as price, chat response speed, store ratings, or active promotions. In this environment, keeping customers focused and loyal to your brand becomes a major challenge.
4. Increasingly Price-Sensitive Customers
Marketplaces actively make it easy for customers to compare prices. Features like "lowest price" sorting, discount labels, and promotion wars make buyers tend to prioritize the lowest price over long-term relationships with brands.
Without strong differentiators beyond price, brands risk getting trapped in thin-margin competition and struggle to build sustainable loyalty.
How to Build Customer Loyalty in Marketplaces
Although marketplaces have limitations in terms of brand control and customer data access, there are several strategies that can be implemented to build customer loyalty:
1. Optimize Product Listings with Quality Content
Showcase your products with detailed descriptions, high-quality photos, and informative demonstration videos. Use appropriate SEO keywords to make it easy for potential buyers to find you. Attractive and professional content will create a positive first impression and differentiate your brand from competitors.
2. Provide Responsive Customer Service
Quick responses to potential buyer questions, professional complaint handling, and good after-sales service will create a positive shopping experience. Customers satisfied with the service are more likely to return and purchase your products again.
3. Add Memorable Packaging
Attractive and branded packaging can leave a lasting impression on customers. Add personal elements like thank-you cards, brand stickers, or free product samples to make customers feel special and more likely to remember your brand.
4. Run a Marketplace Loyalty Program with WhatsApp
The most effective way to build loyalty is by running a marketplace loyalty program that uses WhatsApp as the communication channel. Through this program, brands can collect customer data legally (with customer consent), reward points for every purchase, and build direct relationships with customers.
WhatsApp is chosen because of its extremely high penetration rate in Indonesia and better engagement levels compared to other channels. With a WhatsApp-based loyalty program, brands can send new product information, exclusive promotions, and personalized reminders, thereby increase the likelihood of repeat purchases and create a loyal customer base.
5. Encourage Customers to Leave Reviews and Ratings
Good reviews and ratings not only increase store credibility on the marketplace but also show customers that your brand cares about their feedback. Offer small incentives like vouchers or reward points for customers who leave reviews, making them feel valued and more loyal.
Wrap up!
Building customer loyalty in marketplaces is indeed challenging, but it's far from impossible. With the right strategy, brands can create a loyal customer base even when selling on third-party platforms.
The key is building sustainable relationships with customers. Loyalty isn't built overnight, but through consistency in delivering value, appreciation, and personal communication.
If you're looking for a platform that can help run a marketplace loyalty program with WhatsApp or website, Tada offers a solution integrated with popular Indonesian marketplaces such as Shopee, Tokopedia, and TikTok Shop. Request our demo now to learn more.
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