Showing posts with label retail store. Show all posts
Showing posts with label retail store. Show all posts

04 April, 2017

C for Conversion (Footfalls to Customers)

One of the biggest challenges for Retailers is customer conversion. In large formats such as Malls, Department Stores & Hypermarkets, the opportunity is huge but in reality the conversion rates are quite poor. It’s a completely different story at supermarkets and fashion retail stores. The conversion in E-Commerce is a completely different effort altogether. In this article, we explore various opportunities for Retailers to engage with customers for better conversions.


Drive footfalls
One of the most important things for a Retailer is to drive footfalls in to their store, no matter if they are located on a high street or a shopping complex such as a Mall. This could be done through creating interesting visual displays on the shop front, attractive shopping offers, images of brand ambassadors, new launches of products (and services), “Happy hour” shopping boards, to name a few. The key here is to drive footfalls in to the store and leave the Conversion to the shop staff, which is of course, easier said than done. Retailers should look at various ways through driving more and more potential customers to the store as well as get back past customers to shop repeatedly with them. In E-Commerce, potential customers leave a digital footprint and most of them do not know that, however e-tailers follow the trail and repeatedly reach the said potential customers through various ways such as Re-Marketing through Google & Facebook. You may wonder how does the same product that you saw a few days back on a popular website still shows up on your Facebook screen – this is it. Indeed, its eerie that our digital footprint is captured, but hey, when you get a product for free, you are the product, remember!

Tie-Ups with other Retailers
Many times, Retailers collaborate with each other and co-promote their products and services. For Ex., when I launched my Hyperlocal venture Oyethere.com, we gave away free vouchers for beauty treatments from Naturals Salon, India’s largest Salon chain along with each purchase. At times, the Gift Voucher value was the same as the shopping value of customers and they were really glad that they actually got back their money back. During Diwali 2016, a clutch of Retailers in Chennai got together and created Chennai Shopping Festival where more than 300 retail stores participated and promoted the event driving footfalls to each other’s stores. It is quite common to see larger international properties such as Dubai Shopping Festival, Singapore/HKG Shopping Festival and so on where Retailers come together and distribute store traffic to each other. Ecommerce giants like Snapdeal create Shopping Days which bring together thousands of retailers together and offer best deals to customers.


In-store Experience
Once the potential customers enter the retail store, that is where the magic of converting passers by to customers lies. Through store props, product displays and discounts or promotions, Retailers encourage customers to buy the products or services then and there. It is important to remember that the conversion period is very limited since customers might be in a hurry or may lose interest if the offering is not attractive. Therefore it is important to ensure Customer Conversion efforts are looked into carefully and continually by Retailers.

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