Set Up Exchange Recommendations
Plans: Premium, Enterprise Platforms: Shopify
AfterShip Returns supports an exchange recommendation feature on your store and the AfterShip Returns page to offer customers personalized recommendations when they are exchanging their original purchase for a different item in your store.
You can opt for the preferred product recommendation engine to give customers the best return experience and increase the likelihood of them clicking the Shop Now button.
You can decide to exclude products with specified product tags such as Digital products (Gift cards) and Shipping insurance from showing as recommendations on your store or AfterShip Returns portal.
In this article, we will show you:
Important considerations
Set up exchange recommendations
Exclude by product tag
Demo
Store banner
Customer experience
The product recommendations engine has been moved to the AfterShip Returns page editor from the Refunds and Exchanges section.
You must enable Exchange for other items return resolution method under the Refunds and Exchanges section.
Go to Customizations > Returns page in your AfterShip Returns admin.
Click Edit to access the returns page editor.
As you are aware, returns submission on the AfterShip Returns page is carried out in multiple steps, each of which can be accessed, edited, and configured for your customers easily by selecting the desired page from the dropdown menu. To configure exchange recommendation rules, select the Select resolution step from the dropdown.
Select Exchange for other items resolution method.
Edit the customer-facing content as per your requirements including, title, price description, and primary, and secondary buttons.
Move to Product recommendations and toggle on to activate the feature.
Select the Recommendation strategy from the dropdown list. Find the list of supported types.
Under the Exclude by product tag section, you can enter the product tag of any item you'd like to exclude from recommendations in the input box.
Example:
If you want to exclude digital products like gift cards from showing up as recommendations during the exchange process, go to your Shopify admin, select the digital product, and verify the product tag you’ve assigned to it. Let’s say you’ve assigned a Digital product as a tag to a gift card in your store.
In the Exclude by product tag box, add the Digital product tag. This will exclude all the digital products that have been tagged with the Digital product tag in your Shopify admin from displaying as product recommendations during the exchange selection step.
The product tag must match the tag you have assigned to the product on Shopify.
Under the Store banner section, you can edit the text that will be displayed to your customers to remind them of the credits they have to buy a new product from your store catalog. This text editing is only applicable to the banner that will be displayed on your store if you have selected Exchange on your store as your exchange resolution method.
Irrespective of how you edit your store banner text, we recommend using the ${RemainingCredit} merge tag as it dynamically shows your customers' remaining store credit for their exchange.
Set up the background color of the banner and the text font as per your needs.
Once you are satisfied with the changes, click Save.
Let's say a customer has purchased a pair of sunglasses from your store and now wants to return them. You offer customers an exchange option, allowing them to exchange their purchase for any other item in your store, with additional credit for choosing an exchange instead of a return.
To ensure that gift cards don't appear as product recommendations during the exchange process, you've excluded them from the recommendations list by adding the associated tags— "Digital products" in the Exchange for other items settings within the returns page editor.
As a result, when customers reach the exchange selection step during the return process and click the Shop now with ${creditTotal} button, the product recommendations shown will exclude items tagged as "Digital products." This applies both in the Resolution selected popup and the Recommended for you section on your returns page.
Overview
AfterShip Returns supports an exchange recommendation feature on your store and the AfterShip Returns page to offer customers personalized recommendations when they are exchanging their original purchase for a different item in your store.
You can opt for the preferred product recommendation engine to give customers the best return experience and increase the likelihood of them clicking the Shop Now button.
You can decide to exclude products with specified product tags such as Digital products (Gift cards) and Shipping insurance from showing as recommendations on your store or AfterShip Returns portal.
What you’ll learn
In this article, we will show you:
Important considerations
Set up exchange recommendations
Exclude by product tag
Demo
Store banner
Customer experience
Important considerations
The product recommendations engine has been moved to the AfterShip Returns page editor from the Refunds and Exchanges section.
You must enable Exchange for other items return resolution method under the Refunds and Exchanges section.
Set up exchange recommendations
Go to Customizations > Returns page in your AfterShip Returns admin.
Click Edit to access the returns page editor.
As you are aware, returns submission on the AfterShip Returns page is carried out in multiple steps, each of which can be accessed, edited, and configured for your customers easily by selecting the desired page from the dropdown menu. To configure exchange recommendation rules, select the Select resolution step from the dropdown.
Select Exchange for other items resolution method.
Edit the customer-facing content as per your requirements including, title, price description, and primary, and secondary buttons.
Move to Product recommendations and toggle on to activate the feature.
Select the Recommendation strategy from the dropdown list. Find the list of supported types.
| Recommendation type | Definition |
|---|---|
| Similar products | Recommend products that are semantically or visually similar without using any customer data. |
| Bestsellers | If you want to show your top-selling products, this is the type you need to choose. The products sold in the last 30 days will be considered your best-selling products and ranked based on their sales volume. If some of your top-selling products are not in stock, they won’t be part of the product recommendation widget. If a store visitor has already purchased top-selling products, the most viewed products will be recommended. |
| New arrivals | This recommendation type is meant to suggest products you’ve added to your store recently. |
| Frequently bought together | If you want to show items that shoppers buy together, for example, ordering a screen protector with a smartphone, this is the type for you. Only in-stock items will be considered for recommendations. The most viewed products will be recommended if a store visitor has already purchased the frequently bought together products. |
Exclude by product tag
Under the Exclude by product tag section, you can enter the product tag of any item you'd like to exclude from recommendations in the input box.
Example:
If you want to exclude digital products like gift cards from showing up as recommendations during the exchange process, go to your Shopify admin, select the digital product, and verify the product tag you’ve assigned to it. Let’s say you’ve assigned a Digital product as a tag to a gift card in your store.
In the Exclude by product tag box, add the Digital product tag. This will exclude all the digital products that have been tagged with the Digital product tag in your Shopify admin from displaying as product recommendations during the exchange selection step.
The product tag must match the tag you have assigned to the product on Shopify.
Demo
Store banner
Under the Store banner section, you can edit the text that will be displayed to your customers to remind them of the credits they have to buy a new product from your store catalog. This text editing is only applicable to the banner that will be displayed on your store if you have selected Exchange on your store as your exchange resolution method.
Irrespective of how you edit your store banner text, we recommend using the ${RemainingCredit} merge tag as it dynamically shows your customers' remaining store credit for their exchange.
Set up the background color of the banner and the text font as per your needs.
Once you are satisfied with the changes, click Save.
Customer experience
Let's say a customer has purchased a pair of sunglasses from your store and now wants to return them. You offer customers an exchange option, allowing them to exchange their purchase for any other item in your store, with additional credit for choosing an exchange instead of a return.
To ensure that gift cards don't appear as product recommendations during the exchange process, you've excluded them from the recommendations list by adding the associated tags— "Digital products" in the Exchange for other items settings within the returns page editor.
As a result, when customers reach the exchange selection step during the return process and click the Shop now with ${creditTotal} button, the product recommendations shown will exclude items tagged as "Digital products." This applies both in the Resolution selected popup and the Recommended for you section on your returns page.
Updated on: 02/12/2024
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