Online Clothing Sales: Return Policy Matters!

When I was considering advertising my little girls' clothing line on Momfinds.com, I ran across a very interesting snippet on their advertising page:

"Online Shopping Concerns (ranked in order of most common response to least common response)
Fit of items
Hassle of returns
Shipping costs
Quality of items
Security of entering credit card number online
Finding right item or shop
Wrong item(s)/lost item(s)
None

MomFinds Consumer Insight:

Online shoppers' primary concern is that an item will not fit and that it will have to be returned at the consumer's expense. To address these concerns, we promote well-known brands (so that sizing is familiar), feature items that do not need to be tried on (i.e. handbags, sunglasses, gifts, etc.), and aim to select vendors with free shipping and return policies."

This confirmed what I had already felt: that, for items that are size-sensitive, going overboard to make returns easy and fast is really important.

Thankfully, I don't get many returns. My returns policy requires me to pay shipping both ways for any and all returns & exchanges. (Ouch!!)

But happy customers matter. I once heard a stat that said a customer who is happy with her purchase the first time will tell 3 friends about it; a customer who is treated well when returning an item will tell 10 friends!

So, as much as it hurts, don't cut corners on returns!