Your aim when creating the perfect eCommerce Unboxing Experience is to craft a shareable and memorable experience for your customer – Memorable so your customer remembers, and shareable to encourage them to share their experience with their friends on social media or by word of mouth.

 

WHAT DO WE MEAN BY AN UNBOXING EXPERIENCE?

 

 

It’s quite simple, it’s the experience you give your customer when they open your parcels. It’s often the first tangible experience that your customer will have with your brand if they have purchased online and their perception of your company can be made or broken by the quality of this first touch point.

Think about the experience you give customers when they walk into your brick and mortar store (or if you haven’t got a brick and mortar store imagine you have for a few minutes), you would want it to be professional and create an atmosphere that will entice your customers to return time and time again. It’s not just about the products, it’s about the experience you give your customers that will create a loyal following. So extend this to your eCommerce Packaging remembering that this is your customers first tangible impression and it’s your chance to create that special link that will win you loyal customers for years to come.

 

 

The Components of a Great Unboxing Experience

 

 

To complete the perfect box opening experience we need to consider a factor from each of the components below. They will all combine to entice your customer to share their purchase and even place another order.

• • How it affects Emotions.
  • How it Looks.
  • How it Feels & Tastes.
  • How it Smells & Sounds.

 

Affecting your Customers Emotions

 

By engaging your customers emotions with their new purchase you will increase the likelihood of them sharing their experience on social media. Give one of these great ideas a try…

• • Say ‘Thank you’ with a hand written or printed note, or even a special card.
  • Include a cute or fascinating image.
  • Write an amazing fact.
  • Most importantly – Ask your customer to share their purchase with a short message.
  • Add your branded hashtag & social media links for them to post their experience to.

 

 

How Unboxing Looks to Your Customer

 

 

Your parcel needs to reflect the quality of your online brand so there is consistency. Great looking parcels like Incognito® eCommerce Packaging help to engage your customers emotions and will be one of the main deciding factors in a social media share.

• • Use coloured or printed tissue to give a ‘gift’ like look to your parcels.
  • Use materials that reflect your brand, e.g. a brown cardboard matches a vintage look, but a clean understated brand will look best with a white finish.
  • Finish your parcel with a ribbon or string to show the parcel was packed with care.
  • High quality graphics are now cost effective for dispatch packaging through the introduction of advanced digital printing.

 

 

Designing the Outer eCommerce Packaging Box

 

The outer box has to be transit proof and effectively protect the items you have packed inside, this means it needs to be practical as well as pretty, so give a bit of thought towards cost effectively combining these two factors.

• • Your first consideration is, how do they open your box? Add in a neat, easy tear opening strip.
  • Create a unique box shape or cut-outs.
  • Go incognito! These boxes are plain on the outside with printing on the internal faces, keeping your customers in suspense and expensive products secret and secure.
  • Use short run digital full colour printing for maximum impact at low cost from just 100 boxes at a time.

 

 

How it Feels & Tastes to Your Customer

 

 

Texture is not often considered in packaging but this can have a significant effect in completing the unboxing experience. And by taste we don’t mean your customers will take a bite out of your boxes!

• • Consider a premium single faced corrugated board to make your boxes a little unusual.
  • Use a textured board layer pad just inside the lid to cover your products.
  • Add in some sweets or chocolate as a treat for your customer.

 

 

How it Smells & Sounds to Your Customer

 

This will give your parcels an ultimate WOW, although the smell won’t be captured by an unboxing video be assured that it will be talked about!

• • Buy a bottle of nice perfume and give each box a quick spray before you pack your parcel.
  • Use materials that have a sound dimension to them, your customer will love the scrunching noise of a crinkly tissue or the bang when popping those bubbles.
  • Why not use the Christmas cracker idea and incorporate a banger that goes off when your customer opens the box.

 

 

Extending the Unboxing Experience

 

 

Think of something to put into your parcels that will extend the experience and get them to interact more with your brand and even entice them to place another order. – Add small samples of other products that they may be interested in but make sure they are relevant to the customer.

• • Use QR codes to connect your customer to loyalty schemes, competitions, reviews, and other incentives to connect online.
  • Make sure you put in a catalogue with your full range so they can browse other products.
  • Why not make your packaging reusable?