Ever visited one of your own stores, and one of your competitor’s, completely undercover and experienced how things go for yourself?

Have you done the same with websites too?

You can’t get a full impression of your customer experience in just a single visit. But you can at least get an idea.

And even if you haven’t, all the customer experience mistakes possible have been made by one retailer or another.

So take a minute to learn from other examples and personal experiences so you know what to look for and fix:

1. Giving Customers Preferential Treatment

Do you make special offers to new customers, but then give your regulars no opportunity of their own?

What about the reverse?

The truth is you can do this. But you can’t make it obvious to one customer type that they’re not getting in on the deal.

For example, if you know an in-store customer by name and ask them what they want, they feel valued and appreciated. But your new customers feel hurt and forgotten.

If you offer to help your regular by name, get to know the new customer’s name too so they have a similar experience.

Otherwise, they leave and feel like you don’t care about them.

2. Taking a Political Stance

According to data from Euclid and quoted by Shopify, 78% of customers prefer you take no political stance whatsoever.

So, to keep it simple, best just to avoid politics.

However, if you’re determined to tackle a political issue, you can win when you do it at the right time and in the right way.

For example, consumers loved Dick’s Sporting Goods move to stop selling assault-style rifles in response to the Parkland, Florida shooting.

3. Inability to Talk to a Human

Automation runs supreme in retail. It’s your lifeblood…but not when it comes to customer service.

Accenture’s 11th annual Global Consumer Pulse Survey found 83% of consumers prefer human help – when trying to get service over digital channels.

Consumers need to be able to talk to customer service over the phone in just a few minutes. And they want to talk to reps who care and have decision-making power.

Sounds pretty simple. But you can probably name at least a company or two you interact with who clearly operates in direct contradiction to these principles.

4. Selling Customers Only What They Ask For

This one sounds a bit odd at first. Isn’t it exactly what you should do?

Well, you’re leaving money on the table by not exposing your customers to comparable options or additional products which enhance the utility of the one they’re purchasing.

You may have a premium model with more features too.

Don’t try to talk the customer into making a different decision. But do make them aware so they can make a choice that better suits them, if they’d like.

The same goes for your website. You should have product recommendations on every product page uniquely suited to what the customer’s considering.

Customers frequently appreciate this. And as long as they feel you’re operating to try to help them discover what else they might like, rather than trying to crank more money out of them, you’ll be okay.

So that’s just 4 of the many customer experiences you might make.

Best to let your competitors make them, while you make the fixes and snatch their market share, right?