In a bid to drive sales during the most hectic time in the retail calendar, traders are looking at ways that they can make their in-store experiences and services more appealing to consumers. It’s not just online strategies that need to be bolstered during the crazy season – retailers with bricks and mortar presences are also tweaking things.
Mobile checkout offering
One initiative that brands are investing in is the mobile checkout offering. A system that allows customers to pay for their goods on the spot via payment providers that floating staff on the shop floor will have on their person. This sounds pretty good, right? Offering customers the opportunity to skip the queue and make purchases faster can only be a good thing.
However, by providing mobile checkouts, you run the risk of limiting the amount of time your customers spend in your stores. There is less time for browsing for more products as consumers are more likely to leave the premises shortly after prompt transactions have been made. Retailers want to increase dwell time in their bricks and mortar stores, and this will inevitably reduce it. However, a lot of this potential sales loss can be recovered through the use of eCommerce sites and apps. With so many retailers offering online options for buying their products, consumers can purchase products online and pick them up in the shop, so the bricks and mortar store still benefits.
Are you obsessed with dwell time?
Retailers are beginning to rethink old assumptions they have had about driving sales. An excellent example of this is the obsession with dwell time. For decades retailers just wanted to get feet through the door and keep customers browsing their products of as long as possible, believing that the longer someone stays in the store, the more likely they are to buy.
However, nowadays the customer is focused on convenience and time-saving actions. They have no desire to spend any more time in the store than necessary and won’t buy from retaliation if it feels like a cumbersome, lengthy experience. These principles are applied to the entire omnichannel experience. Every touchpoint that the consumer has with the brand, the brand tries to make it as straightforward, quick and seamless as possible.
Some retailers are bucking the trend of seeing a short dwell time as necessary when it comes to ramping up sales. US retailers Target are addressing online shopping cart abandonment by sending consumers offers of in-store discounts. Part of this philosophy is that if you can get customers into a store to buy one item, they will leave with several more. Employing data to discover which customers are more likely to purchase in-store means that you can target via email only those who you know shop in-store when you send out cart abandonment emails.
Rethink your strategy to drive more sales
When it comes to bricks and mortar stores, eCommerce brands need to think about the best ways to satisfy their customers during the busy winter period. Top of the agenda is time. Customers want to be in and out as quickly as possible, and this requires some manoeuvring from retailers, but retailers also don’t want to lose any excess sales that come about due to aisle browsing. However, the bricks and mortar store can often be used to pick up any consumers who have dropped off while browsing online at any stage in the online transaction process. Getting these shoppers in-store can cause sales to boost and prove to be an opportunity for up-selling.
