Watch “The Evolving Customer” webinar moderated by Nicole Leinbach Reyhle, Retail Minded’s Publisher. Hear from Salesfloor’s CEO, Oscar Sachs who discusses Salesfloor’s latest study findings. The study uncovers how today’s customers want to communicate with sales associates, what information they communicate to customers effectively, and where retailers are missing opportunities to create connections with customers.
When Amazon announced it was going to build brick and mortar concept grocery stores – Amazon Go – it made huge waves in the media.
What was particularly interesting about it was how they incorporated a feature usually only seen online: Amazon’s ‘Buy with 1-Click’ button. This feature would create a seamless experience for the shopper: just select the items you want and then simply walk out of the store.
What Amazon knew about this move is what smart retailers are looking to do in brick and mortar properties: design stores replicate the best features of online stores. If that sounds like something out of a Black Mirror episode, it’s not. It’s going to be a hot trend in the future.
We’re far enough into the online retail revolution where we know there are some teens and adults who have grown up digital-first, even in retail. This fundamentally changes the purchase expectations and flow of a growing number of customers.
The ease of which regular shoppers online can navigate from consideration to purchase, to owning the item is a key part of the next generation of retail design.
In November of 2017, Target unveiled a redesign centred around the changing ways people shop. The store has a dedicated entrance for “express” shoppers: through this entrance, wine, beer, and package pick up are the first things you see. The store also has curbside pick up where a store employee will deliver an order you placed directly to your car.
If none of these options applies to you, you can use Target’s second entrance, for shoppers to “discover” new items or brands.
This twofold strategy emulates two distinct shopper patterns that exist both offline and on: The on-demand shopper, and the discovery shopper. By redesigning the space, Target hopes to capture both styles in a way that directly addresses their needs.
Apple got rid of the purchase queue years ago by making on-demand checkouts a reality in their stores. Customers can either walk up to any sales associate with a handheld device check themselves out with the Apple Store application. Just pick up the product you want, scan the barcode, enter your AppleID, and voila! You can walk out of the store with your new purchase without interacting with anyone.
The trend for retail seems to be moving toward operating the way we have become accustomed to shopping online all in an effort to bring people back into brick and mortar stores. The seamless process marries the best of both worlds: the ability to touch and feel the product in real-time and to ask crucial questions about the product while avoiding waiting in checkout lineups.
How can retail stores without hundreds of millions of dollars in renovation budgets and armies of sales associates effectively leverage this trend?
Set up an area somewhat close to your entrance for customers to pick up, return, reserve, or gift wrap items easily. If you’re unsure whether this will work, try setting it up during a busy time for shopping or returns for your store. It’s important to look at adoption rates, and solicit verbal feedback from those who choose to use this option.
Consider having grab and go stations in your store for the most commonly purchased items. Make these stations close enough to a cash or a mobile cashier to make the experience quick and easy for the customer
Using Salesfloor, you can set up predictive newsletters with items in them you know your customers will love, and let them know you can prep these items for them to pick up on demand in-store.
Look for purchase cadence for regular customers and be predictive about what you think they might need. This helps your associates become indispensable to these customers, who will likely return for the same simple, efficient service,
Merchandising isn’t just about showing off new lines or items that are on trend right now. Merchandising is also successful when it helps fulfil a need.
Online stores often bubble up “bought together” items in an effort to anticipate a customer’s needs. Grocery stores in vacation spots have long known the value of placing disposable barbecue kits in near the barbecue sauce, and solo cups and ping pong balls in with the mixer or near the beer.
Anticipating common uses or combinations of items in your store and either packaging them as kits or displaying how someone could package them/buy them together is a great way to increase total spend, and a great way to establish your store as a place that solves problems, thus increasing purchase frequency and word of mouth.
We live in an increasingly on-demand economy, but that does not mean that in-store retail is obsolete. Without resorting to wildly expensive redesigns, you, too, can leverage what the larger stores know about the change in how e-commerce trained customers shop and use that to gain strategic advantage by tweaking how your store and associates deliver the shopping experience from outside the store to the cash.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year. You’ve hung the festive garland up in your stores, you’ve got the Holiday music pumping, but you can’t help but wonder if there’s another way to attract last-minute holiday shoppers and drive sales.
Well, never fear, Santa has come early! Here are 6 ways you can attract last-minute holiday shoppers:
Yes, gift guides are the most ubiquitous tool in the industry. However, the ones that cater to shoppers’ needs and preferences, especially when they are short on time, are indispensable this time of the year. Very few people have time to spend leafing through or clicking through a 50+-page catalogue.
Send out themed gift guides at a regular cadence (but no more than 1 a day) in the run-up to the holiday crunch and make sure you note which items are discounted, specially gift packed, or otherwise unique.
Consider not just “gifts for him/her, but special interests as well: Technophiles, Homebodies, Travellers, Life of the Party, etc.
Set up gift displays that centre on a specific theme, for instance: Dads, Students, Home Chefs, Adventurers, or by gift type, like Secret Santa, Stocking Stuffers, Plane Friendly, etc and focus the entire display around a single theme.
Feature these displays in prominent, high traffic areas. These types of displays can really help confused shoppers who are short on time but want to buy great gifts. Themed displays can usually be seen at-a-glance and will help draw people in, even from outside your store, to satisfy their hard-to-buy-for friends and family.
Gift certificates are a massive business. Last year, shoppers spent $46 BILLION on Gift Certificates and Gift Cards. For those shoppers who have simply run out of time and inspiration, offer them a simple solution to gift giving.
Gift cards are an excellent bottom line booster, too. Up to one-third of all gift certificates never get used, but your company still gets the money upfront, which means it’s pure profit. Of the users who do redeem gift cards, 65% of gift card users spend 38% over the face value of their cards, which means a boost in revenue per transaction too.
Most people dread having to wrap packages, or don’t have the supplies at home, or have simply run out of time. Offering gift wrapping services (either free, for a nominal fee, or for a small donation to a charity) is a great way to attract shoppers to not only shop with you but to do all their last minute shopping with you.
Don’t forget to make greeting cards available too. If you can staff the gift wrapping area with someone with terrific penmanship, you can really delight customers. The more you cater to frazzled customers, the better your odds of increasing not only total purchase amounts but repeat business and word-of-mouth.
A great way to promote these services is through your social media (showing finished packages) and through email campaigns (run a banner that notifies potential customers of this added service.)
Tools like Salesfloor’s associate mobile app helps you be an elf this season. You can look up the types of items a customer usually buys and, when their friends or family come into the store, you can steer them in the right direction. This will also eliminate overlap of purchases, so the recipient won’t get five of the same item this year.
You can also use customer histories to guide you to suggesting items that go with items previously bought by a customer. If a customer previously purchased a set of earrings, you can suggest to their partner or friend they purchase the necklace or bracelet to match. You can make customers look like heroes this year.
Using Salesfloor’s Omnichannel Clienteling Module, create an email to send to your customers that they can send to their friends and family members to let them know your team can help them find the perfect gift. This helps their friends and family decide, and can help eliminate duplicate gifts.
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Gift giving is never easy, and gift giving under a time crunch can send people into panic mode. The more ways your business can make gift giving a seamless process will help you win this holiday season.
Anticipating the needs of stressed-out shoppers and delivering to those needs will make your team heroes this season.
The holiday season is upon us, and the frenzied shoppers are already busting down the doors. With December quickly approaching, it will only get crazier. Retailers know that this means it’s time to brace themselves and their stores for the rush of holiday shoppers. Bracing yourself means that you need to have enough associates on the floor to handle the volume increase. And though this sounds simple enough, you may find yourself asking the same question every year:
“How do I find good seasonal sales associates and get them trained quickly?”
In this article, we’ll look at the best tips and tricks for bringing the much needed extra manpower on board for the holidays and how to prepare them for their new roles in the bustling months ahead.
So you need to hire, but where do find the right talent? The good news is that there are a number of options available to you. They key is to make sure you get in front of the right people in order to streamline the process.
Student job boards: Students make for great seasonal associates for two reasons: they are always eager to earn extra money, and the temporary status of the work suits their schedules. You can target student job boards in programs that are relevant to your business as well. Fashion retailers can target fashion students. Book retailers can target literature students. They can bring their new knowledge to enhancing their position.
Online platforms: If you want a broader reach, consider posting on online platforms like Indeed.com and ZipRecruiter, where your post will be found by keen job seekers looking for seasonal work. Also consider doing an online search for your local temp agency where you can find those looking and available for short-term work.
Social media: Social platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram have fantastic targeting algorithms that allow you to get in front of people within interests in your area and people familiar with your brand. This means that you’ll be connecting with the people who are already knowledgeable about your company and industry. Finding new hires this way could reduce the time it takes to familiarize them with your products and how your store operates.
Referral bonus: Consider giving your current employees a little extra compensation for referring somebody they know who is looking for a job. Your employees will be more inclined if something is in it for them, and your hiring decision can be better informed, coming from somebody you already know and trust. This could add an extra bonus: friends of your employees would have a personal mentor as they are coming on board.
Virtual reps: Have you considered a virtual representative? At Salesfloor, we are piloting a virtual associate program that can help boost your online sales with a personalized storefront and virtual seasonal reps. With more and more people shopping online (or at least doing their research ahead of time), beefing up virtual reps could be a great way to scale your staff 24/7!
Finding and hiring your seasonal sales associates is only half the battle. The other half is getting them ready to hit the floor and service your customers quickly and efficiently. There are a few surefire ways speed up this process.
After-hours training: Consider bringing in your new hires after-hours for a couple intensive training sessions without the distractions of customers and other employees. Week-long training sessions can be time-consuming and slow.
Buddy system: Sometimes the best way to learn is by jumping in head first. Pair up new employees with your preferred veteran staff for a busy hands-on learning experience on the floor with someone who you trust to show your new hires the way.
Instructional content: Above all, make sure you’re providing new employees with the best tools to succeed and remember to supplement your training regimen with learning materials like videos and binders covering common questions, problems, and troubleshooting. Ensure that they have this at their disposal, and will continue to self-train beyond regular training sessions.
Salesfloor can also help make training easier with our mobile associate app. Using Salesfloor’s Omnichannel Clienteling module gives the seasonal sales associates access to a comprehensive view of their customer’s profile, purchase history and shopping preferences for both online and in-store transactions. This makes it easier and quicker for seasonal associates to develop a relationship and recommend products based on past purchases and omnichannel customer profile and all of this information is in one place.
We know that the holiday season is a balancing act of increasing both service and efficiency, but with the right know-how you can stay ahead of the crowd – and plan for it.
Happy holidays and we wish you an enormously successful season!
In our last article, we talked about a bunch of KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) you can measure to help keep track of your retail goals, including overhead costs, online and in-store sales. These are all really great ways to measure your success. However, reducing costs and increasing sales may not be your only or immediate goals. There may be other metrics that you want to watch like: attracting and retaining talent, customer retention, even brand awareness. So, then how do you track these?
In this article, we explore what KPIs you can use to evaluate your customer retention, talent attraction, and local marketing tactics.
Like we mentioned in KPI’s Part I, measuring your KPI performance this way is a handy skill that helps you create conclusions based on the differences in your trends over time. It’s a vital skill for any retailer, and it’s easy to do with just a bit of experimentation!
First, you’ll need a control group: the reports on your sales, costs, or whichever figure you’re monitoring from 12 months ago. Next, make your business the test group by implementing one of these nifty KPI metrics for a while. Compare those figures from your current period to those from 12 months ago to see the results of your metric!
Driving sales in e-commerce can be difficult when so many virtual shopping carts never make it to the checkout screen. While it may seem like counting a loss, measuring cart abandonment rate has a thick silver lining: it helps you keep track of potential customers that are already interested in your product:
Cart Abandonment Rate = 1 – (Total # of Completed Purchases / # of Carts Created)
Of course, you don’t need to do the math yourself. Marketing softwares such as those offered by BigCommerce can track your cart abandonment rate and respond by initiating email campaigns that convince customers to complete their shopping journey.
Customer lifetime value is the projected revenue that a customer will generate during their lifetime. It’s a great metric that both measures your business’ return on investment and helps you strategize upcoming goals. Determining the lifetime value of a customer is simply a matter of calculating all the sales your average customer has completed since their first purchase and then doing some number crunching:
Lifetime Value = Revenue x Gross Margin x Average # of Repeat Purchases
Don’t know how to measure the average number of repeat purchases? Just use order gap analysis to calculate the time between each of your customers’ consecutive purchases.
Job boards, store windows, employee referrals, flyers—it’s easy to spread out your recruitment ads to fish for applicants. But did you know that employees’ performance tend to correspond with their source of hire? Tracking your recruitment sources and comparing them to performance reviews will help you determine which forums send the best candidates to your hiring manager. You can easily measure the effectiveness of your sources by using an applicant tracking system like iCIMS.
It’s easy to reflect on how many of your job offers are accepted, but what about those that were rejected? Understanding why your offers aren’t accepted by candidates can drastically inform and improve your recruiting process, which alone makes it worth measuring:
Offer-to-Acceptance Ratio = Total # of Offers / # of Acceptances
Low offer acceptance rates are a telltale sign that your employment incentives need improvement. It could be that you’re not meeting your candidates’ expectations or cultural tastes, or that they’ve taken a better offer from one of your competitors. Minimize the risk of losing attracted talent before they’re even hired by analyzing candidate feedback and offering new incentives.
When locals search for a product you sell, is it your business or your competitor’s at the top of Google’s results? What about on Yelp, Facebook, or Apple Maps? Your ranking in keyword searches for your area is a strong indicator of how accessible your store is and how far your brand awareness has spread. Low rankings can be improved through SEO optimization tactics, such as pining for positive reviews online. The more (high) ratings you have, the more likely it is for your business to be featured with a star rating within search results. Take a look at Google’s review guidelines to learn more about how it’s done.
Social media interactions can be pivotal in establishing your popularity among both current and potential customers, in addition to their own local network. While using this KPI effectively requires you to actively monitor and encourage growth in followers, likes, and so on, it yields great rewards in terms of brand awareness and foot traffic. Both Facebook and Twitter also have built-in analytics that can track customer engagement and web traffic to your site by tracing your shared links. Why not encourage check-ins and use of hashtags so you can follow along with your customer’s engagement?
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Want more KPI tips and tricks? Check out our other article on easy-to-use metrics for overhead costs and both online and in-store sales!
With so many options available to retailers these days when it comes to investing in growth, it’s difficult to truly understand what will work. The key to knowing if your investment is sound is through tracking the right KPI’s (key performance indicators). But, what are the right KPI’s? That’s the next big question.
Sure, we all want to track the bottom line: incremental sales. That’s the golden ticket. But there are often more nuanced KPI’s to track that lead to those sales. There are a whole lot of those metrics to follow, so we’re breaking them down into two separate articles. Here we explore what KPIs you can use to evaluate different aspects of your business, including overhead costs, online and in-store sales, and how you can measure them.
It’s easy to see the difference these KPIs will make over time with just a little bit of experimentation. First, you’ll need a control group: the reports on your sales, costs, or whichever figure you’re monitoring from 12 months ago. Next, make your business the test group by implementing one of these nifty KPI metrics for a while. Compare those figures from your current period to those from 12 months ago to see the results!
Measuring your KPI performance this way is a handy skill that’ll work for almost every metric. It’ll help you create conclusions based on the differences in your trends over time, which makes it a must-know for every retailer!
Sales per Square Foot
This KPI measures the amount of revenue generated on average for each foot of retail space in your store:
Sales per Square Foot = Total Revenue ÷ Total Floor Area
This is a popular metric for store owners who want a clear perspective when evaluating their rent costs or redesigning their layout. It’s the ultimate indicator of how effective your store layout and sales associates are selling products, and it helps in deciding whether or not to downsize, relocate, or upgrade your retail space.
Sales Per Hour
Sales Per Hour (SPH) is a helpful KPI to measure when reviewing staff-related overhead costs. SPE calculates how much revenue your employees contribute to your business on average by dividing your total revenue by the number of employees:
SPH = Total Revenue ÷ Number of Employee Hours
This metric is especially helpful in understanding how hiring or firing employees may improve or endanger sales. Measuring SPH can also suggest employee efficiency and profitability, as well as how the revenue of different retail locations may be affected by staff size.
It also helps to understand how the tools and technology you’ve implemented to aid your sales staff have helped drive increases or decreases in SPH. Tracking the before and after deployment of tools is an important metric to look at when evaluating strategic initiatives and investments in technology for associates.
Web traffic
Your online sales rely on website visits, which are easily measurable using Google Analytics. By monitoring your web traffic, you can regularly track the total number of visits (or “sessions”) on your site and compare them across time. Google Analytics also measures how many unique users visit your site—a feature that is extremely helpful for analyzing trends in how many new and returning visitors your website receives each day.
Average Order Value (AOV)
In an omnichannel retail world, average order value (AOV) is one of the best ways to measure how useful your online channels are compared to others. To measure AOV, divide the total amount of revenue by the number of orders taken within the same time frame:
Average Order Value = Total Revenue ÷ Total Number of Orders
Compare the AOV of your online store to that of your virtual sales associates to get a better perspective on their performance (you can do the same for your in-store AOV and sales associates as well!) This will help you coach your sales team and inform you on which channels and tech tools are worth investing in for your business.
Sales Conversion Rate
Despite the rise in customers shopping online at the expense of foot traffic, brick-and-mortar stores still typically make sales to 25-35% of their visitors while most retail websites convert only 1%. That’s many opportunities left on the table! You can measure how many of your customers end up making purchases by analyzing your sales conversion rate:
Sales Conversion Rate = Total Number of Orders ÷ Total Visits (in-store or online)
Measuring your sales conversion rate is incredibly important now that retailers have sales channels competing with each other, but it can be used for more than just comparing website and onsite AOV. Monitoring your sales associates’ conversion rates can help you see how your brand representatives are helping sales through customer interaction, too!
Foot Traffic
Monitoring foot traffic into your brick-and-mortar store is a huge insight into how changes in seasons, aisle layout, and window advertising may affect customer attraction. Of course, counting each customer that walks in can be a hassle. That’s why every retailer needs one of the many in-store analytics tools that measure this KPI for them.
Average shopper dwell time
Your online analytics can measure how long a customer has browsed your website, but what about in-store? Discovering that your customers have a long dwell time and low conversion rate in your store could be an early warning sign of customer dissatisfaction. It could mean some of your items are out of stock, or that your retail associates are unable to close their sales. Retailers can catch these trends early on by using location analytics programs such as Coursa and Meraki to measure how long shoppers browse their store on average.
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There are many tech tools and formulas retailers can use to evaluate their overhead, online and in-store KPIs, but we know there are still many more aspects of your business worth analyzing. Sign up to our newsletter (publishes every two weeks) to stay in touch for the next article on KPIs, where we will cover customer retention, talent attraction, and marketing.
Every day, there seem to be more announcements that retailers are in trouble or closing. Certainly, there are multiple reasons why retailers fail, but there are a few common themes to the current closures that we can all learn from. Understanding the needs and habits of today’s consumer, we cover some ways to avoid joining the growing list of retailers affected by the retail apocalypse.
Most interactions in retail stores are about servicing customers, and it’s important to recreate that experience online. That’s why all apocalypse-thriving retailers have web features that bridge the online and offline service gap that plagues other lagging brands.
Rent the Runway, an NYC-based luxury label rental store, has increased business by 100 percent since opening their first store by amping up their online service to the quality of that in-store. Online, customers can purchase rentals or even request items to be delivered within three hours for a nominal delivery fee. Rent the Runway also makes their reputable fashion and fitting consultants accessible to customers online via their “Dedicated Unlimited Concierge Team” service subscription.
Similar digital service features are also being successfully used by high-end brands such as Harry Rosen to connect customers to in-store sales associates. In fact, after integrating customer engagement banners into webstores, service requests went up 50 percent on average.
Personal data is the key to understanding the preferences and purchasing patterns of shoppers, and it’s been beauty giant Sephora’s secret weapon in becoming retail apocalypse-proof.
Sephora uses customer data to construct highly personalized marketing campaigns, offers, and adverts to convince casual browsers to check-out online and in-store. The insights gained from their online shoppers and VIB loyalty program have helped them become the number one selling cosmetics retailer in Canada and the US, and their brick-and-mortar locations are only expanding.
Using data from online channels also helps in offline marketing. Monitoring customer product reviews online, for example, now helps retailers better manage and display their inventory in-store. Best Buy has just recently integrated such data into their own stores by displaying online reviews alongside their products on shelves, which makes their customers’ omnichannel shopping journey even easier.
Top-tier retailers are using only the latest gadgets to improve their shopping experience. In fact, you could say there’s now a retail arms race to integrate new “endless aisle” technology into stores.
Endless aisle-ing is yet another omnichannel approach that allows customers to easily order out-of-stock items on their mobile device or other convenient interfaces installed in their local store.
Walmart Canada has already begun pioneering endless aisle tech by outfitting touch screen kiosks in its stores and providing local pick-up options to combat the rivalling convenience of other online mega-retailers such as Amazon.
Sephora has also geared up its stores by collaborating with Pantone to produce ColorIQ, a program that pairs shoppers’ skin tones with a matching shade of makeup. The beauty giant continues to produce other creative solutions through their innovation lab in a race to be one of the most tech-enabled brands in the market.
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Brands taking steps to improve their service, data collection, and tech demonstrate the difference between surviving and thriving. Bringing the online shopping experience into brick-and-mortar stores and vice versa expands consumers’ purchasing options, and that convenience brings foot and web traffic running to brands.
If you, too, want to avoid joining the ranks of the retailers succumbing to the retail apocalypse, you’ll need to keep up with your customers’ expectations. And yes, we can help with that.
From Baby Boomers to Generation Z, each generation has its own defining political and cultural traits that have characterized their coming-of-age and shopping habits.
As of now, there are four major generational demographics that economists have recognized as distinct markets: Baby Boomers, Gen X, Gen Y (more popularly known as Millennials,) and Gen Z—each of which is unique in their perspectives on marketing tactics and purchasing preferences.
If retailers want to make their products available to each generation in the best way possible, they need to adapt their brand experience in a way that accommodates all the options that these groups rely on. That’s why we gathered all the data you need to know just what each generation is looking for.
When it comes to the joy of shopping, Baby Boomers want convenience above all else.
The Boomer generation is just too stressed for shopping trips, as Colloquy reports that at a 27 percent response rate, Boomers were the least likely to agree with the statement “I think shopping is a great way to relax” when compared to all other generational groups. They also scored well below Millennials in terms of browsing with only 37 percent of
Boomers reporting that they would be likely or willing to explore a store for new products.
The Baby Boomer’s aversion to browsing is understandable; with a greater amount of disposable income than all other generations, Baby Boomers also have the spending power to make purchases without necessarily hunting down for bargains in-store, which is a greater characteristic of Millennials and Gen Z. However, Boomers are very comfortable browsing and shopping online with 85 percent of surveyed Boomers reporting that they research products on their web browsers. In a surprising finding by Immersion Active, Boomers aren’t opposed to taking a leap of faith to purchase products online either as 66 percent of Boomers reportedly make regular purchases via web devices.
Although they regularly make purchases online, Baby Boomers by far prefer the personal engagement of traditional stores when making actual purchases. At 84 percent, Boomers were highest amongst all survey groups in expressing their preference to shop in-store, and 67 percent report that if an item they want is available online or in a nearby store, they prefer to purchase it at their local retailer rather than order online.
The root of Boomers’ brick-and-mortar preference is tied to their high expectations of customer service. According to a LoyaltyOne survey on generational consumer habits, Boomers were the most likely demographic to take their business away from retail chains following a subpar exchange with one of their sales associates.
Boomers place immense value in brands based on their interactions with sales associates, and retailers can capitalize on this by offering the experience through digital channels. Social web store features and clienteling apps have become vital tools in engaging the Boomer generation and catering to their reliance on associates’ recommendations.
When it comes to social influence, Boomers are more selective on what sources they trust for brand recommendations. Although 82
percent of Baby Boomers are on social media, they are still
unlikely to use the platform as an influence on their shopping habits, and only 12 percent of Boomers say they look to friends and family for advice on their purchases. Instead, Boomers are twice as likely as Millennials to have their interest sparked by the reported popularity of a brand when purchasing a new or unfamiliar product. This suggests that brands with bold and consistent omnichannel engagement are likely to perform better among the Boomer demographic due to their suggested popularity.
Sandwiched between the Boomers and Millennials, Gen X is often referred to the “middle child” generation due to its reputation of often being forgotten by marketing specialists. Because of this, there is little market research into their spending habits compared to those of Boomers and Millennials. This comes as a shock when the spending power of this generation can’t be ignored: Gen Xers produce 31 percent of total US income despite representing a mere 25 percent of the population.
One of the greatest obstacles in the marketing approach to Gen Xers is that they tend to shop more conservatively than other generations. They’re more skeptical about marketing tactics, which means they won’t be won with flashy advertising but with practicality and proof of performance.
To avoid regretting their expenditures, Xers won’t purchase a product until they’ve researched it thoroughly, which is why they make extensive use of search engines, online reviews, and social media networks before making a purchase. That being said, having any doubts about product performance will easily dissuade them from their buying journey.
Gen X prefers honest explanations of product usage and trusts clienteling techniques that cater to their own habits. When marketing to Gen Xers, it’s critical to make products and services especially visible and accessible online by using SEO strategies to optimize their research and an active social media presence to demonstrate a personable and authentic brand image. Digitally, email is one of best channels for reaching out to this generation. Gen Xers check emails on a regular basis and are more likely to respond well to personalized offers based on their previous purchases. Like Baby Boomers, Xers also rely on quality customer service for brand loyalty as they see store associates as people who can relate to them on a consumer level and relay the best options for their purchases without an upsell.
Born 1981 to 1997
Whether for social media, research, or purchases, Millennials use web devices in nearly every aspect of their life, even while shopping in stores. 68 percent of Millennials demand the convenience of omnichannel accessibility during their shopping journey, which means having an integrated experience that can effortlessly transition their consumer data from their smartphone, to laptop, to local store, and back again.
Millennials are so omnivorous in their point-of-sales that as a generational demographic, they’re the most likely to make use of every avenue of purchasing available to them. In fact, younger Millennials (aged 20-23) on the cusp of Gen Z are more likely to shop in a brick and mortar store when compared to older Millennials (aged 32-35,) who are the most likely within the group to buy via mobile. And overall, when Millennials shop for something both online and in a store, they are much more likely to make a purchase in a store than they are online. But while the myriad of online stores and buying options today have offered Millennials the ability to be more selective with their purchases, the options can get overwhelming as Millennials actually tend to prefer browsing for products across brands rather than settling on an option and purchasing it.
Seeing shopping as a social event is another trait that strongly characterizes the Millennial market and sets it apart from older generations. In stark contrast to Baby Boomers, research shows that Millennials enjoy shopping and see it as fun and relaxing activity to be shared with friends and family. According to Gen Buy, the grand majority of Millennials report that they shop with other people at least half the time, and 60 percent consider advice from their friends when deciding what to buy.
Of course, the social consumer experience is not only limited to shopping mall excursions but social media as well: 68 percent of Millennials admit to being strongly influenced by social media posts while 84 percent say user-generated content has at least some influence on what they buy.
Retailers should recognize that social media is extremely important to Millennials in their purchasing journey because even though they value the opinions of family and friends, they seek out the experiences of other consumers above all. Not only do 90 percent of Millennials research product reviews online, most tend to rely on other consumers’ reviews on retailers’ sites over those of people they know. By taking advantage of all these forms of recommendations, it’s no surprise that 82 percent of Millennials say word-of-mouth is a key influencer of their purchase decisions.
Like Gen X, Gen Y is also skeptical of overbearing marketing tactics. Millennials tend to reject retailers who constantly push products through messaging and instead prefer authentic interactions with sales associates who happen to also be consumers of their retailer’s products. Millennials are also likely to interact with brands and retailers through social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook in order for their voices to be heard.
Born 1998 to 2010
Gen Z is the generation of digital natives that can’t remember a time before Internet, and as such, the platform has become the foundation of their buying process. Gen Z uses their plethora of Google resources to compare prices, styles, availability, and ratings of products to make the most educated purchase possible. Being savvy with price-checking tools also makes Gen Z more selective when making big expenditures with many often buying products only when they’re on sale or even delaying gratification by waiting for newer products to become available.
While much of their research is digital, Gen Z still enjoys visiting stores as a social excursion in the same way Millennials do. In fact, 84 percent of Gen Zers intentionally structure their shopping trips a social activity and wait to accumulate a solid list of wants and needs before visiting stores with friends.
Like Gen Y, Gen Z is also likely to contribute to consumer-generated content for brands by voicing their comments and concerns online and by seeking out interactions with brand representatives. As Sara Spivey, CMO of Bazaarvoice, says, “Companies should encourage Gen Zers to share photos and videos with their purchases, create polls and contests on social media and, most importantly, listen and respond to their feedback.”
Catering to Gen Z’s online expectations by providing consumer-generated content is crucial for retailers, because not only do these teens respond extremely well to word-of-mouth, but they actively participate in it as well. Spivey claims that 40 percent of Gen Zers give online reviews “very often,” which in turn encourage others within their generation to purchase products. In this sense, Gen Z consumers sharing brand content on social media can easily be considered unofficial brand ambassadors.
Despite being inundated with digital content, Gen Z still prefers to shop in-store versus online, but they crave a store that can keep up with their tech more than anything. Companies need to understand that technology drives Gen Z’s shopping experience—an established social media presence should complement touchscreens in brick and mortar stores if retailers want to keep tech-savvy Gen Zers eager to interact with their brand.
Ironically, the instant gratification that Gen Z has become accustomed to through their digital habits isn’t entirely sustainable from their web devices when it comes to shopping.
“Two-thirds say they’re comfortable shopping online but still prefer to shop in-store for the instant gratification of not having to wait for their orders to arrive,” says Spivey. “The shopping trend of buying online and picking up in-store is quickly gaining traction with this group.”
Additional research shows that other wallet-friendly incentives, such as coupon offers (all generations love coupons,) are also a great way to bring Gen Zers in store.
Considering how Gen Z and Gen Y both still shop both online and offline, and reportedly more so than older generations, retailers need to prioritize enhancing both groups shopping experiences by appealing to their affinity for technology and perspective on shopping as a social enterprise. Offline, stores should promote a chic, tech-savvy, communal atmosphere. Online, retail sites should interact with and promote user-generated content to provide a seamless shopping experience across the average Gen Zer’s many juggled web devices.
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With generations old and new increasingly using web devices to help them make purchases, digital tools are shaping the way customers across all generations interact with brands. Using the right clienteling apps and social media engagement techniques will help retailers build lasting relationships with consumers who continue to seek social and authentic customer service experiences during their buying journey.
Watch “The New Role of Omnichannel Associates” webinar moderated by Joe Keenan, Total Retail’s Executive Editor. Hear from Kiehl’s Retail Director, Jason Steiner and Salesfloor’s CEO, Oscar Sachs. Kiehl’s Retail Director, Jason Steiner, shares how they redefined clienteling with new store associate tools to help increase online conversions and drive traffic back to the stores. Salesfloor CEO, Oscar Sachs, provides best practices and insights from leading retailers who are empowering store associates with new clienteling tools.
The mobile-first approach to marketing was a fantastic idea…at first.
At the turning point of the smartphone era, a new UX strategy needed to be developed to suit what appeared to be the only preferred platform of the customer on-the-go. Working outward from a mobile to desktop interface ensured an identical experience that carried over without sacrificing all the bells and whistles that a desktop platform would boast, and while we celebrate the platform shift, it certainly hasn’t been the best or last development in improving the shopper’s journey.
As uniquely form-fitting as mobile development is for improving users’ access to products that they would otherwise have via desktop, it recreates some of the same problems of desktop-only sites. Mobile first fails to ask why online shoppers are using one device or another, and what they’re looking for in choosing that option. Do they need efficiency, experience and incentives? And how can a platform assist in each of those? Omnichannel retail platforms with mobile, desktop, and brick-and-mortar façades have the potential to adapt their interfaces. The myriad of reasons for why a customer might opt for a mobile over desktop interface or interchange between the devices over the course of their shopping journey are addressed and accounted for in its features.
The case against mobile-first is a matter of meeting the potential that the platform truly offers. It’s no longer enough for retailers to adapt their sites and retail apps to the parameters of a smartphone or tablet screen—they need to contextualize their usage as well. The use of a mobile device is within the context of a user’s immediate needs and trend-proven preferences, and catering to these whims goes beyond simply distinguishing between them to actively striving for an interface that suits each experience. That’s why the next logical step for ease-of-access marketing is a leap from a mobile-first to a context-first approach, which considers the circumstances in which the platform is used, then adapts it to suit that need.
If a millennial is researching product reviews on their smartphone before making a purchase in-store, as over 80% of them reportedly do, their user experience could be improved significantly based on the context of their location.
Should the retailer’s context-first-built mobile app recognize that the buyer is presently at the store, a feature could allow it to forgo all the animations and filler content that usually characterize the app and instead prioritize product reviews in its preview icons and native search engine. Other possible extensions of using context to optimize the online experience have even included suggestions to program retail applications to analyze a device’s battery power and data usage to estimate what context the user is presently in and adapt itself to suit that contextual need best.
While these examples may seem idealistic, they’re not far-fetched technology-wise. They also serve to illustrate just how much a web interface can be optimized by using the context of the customer’s location to streamline their interactions and make their journey from the aisle to check-out counter as breezy as possible.
One of the other many strengths of the context-first approach is that it operates aside from live, time-and-space data monitoring. Context-first also offers all the benefits of the classic marketing technique of demographic targeting, only instead of using dated census-based guidelines such as age or gender, it operates off a concrete set of consumer personas uniquely identified through user interaction and shopping habits.
Let’s say you’re a returning customer at Saks Fifth Avenue. Are you a professional looking to class up your look for a potential promotion, a parent dressing their child in the latest trends, or a fashion enthusiast aiming to shine out in a crowd? How can Saks know which persona you are, and how can they situate their product placement to suit your needs best?
Saks’ secret is that it uses the context-first-built retail tool Salesfloor Storefront™ to customize product recommendations to their clients via the application’s Most Recommended feature. Salesfloor’s Associate Data Cloud uses the data gathered from purchasing, browsing, and other activities from every store in the network to update and selectively suggest relevant products to different shoppers.
Now potential and returning customers of blazers, headbands, and sequin skirts can be readily recommended deals on products that are more relevant to them, such as blouses, strollers, and six-inch heels. The professional, the parent, and the trendsetter now each have a personalized interface where they can browse for curated products at their leisure without having to step over the items that would only interest the other personas.
Another Salesfloor client, Harry Rosen, uses Salesfloor Connect™ to personalize their online customer experience even further by taking advantage of the application’s embedded tool that allows customers to interact and connect with associates based on their location. Not only does this feature increase engagement with the brand, but it also optimizes the customer’s use of their preferred platform by adapting product recommendations to suit their needs best. As for the brand itself, they benefited from up to an average of 50% more service requests by customers after they integrated Connect™ directly within their site pages.
The new customer journey starts with checking out reviews and ends in the checkout line, but all the steps and motives between the two points are unaccounted for in a mobile-first approach.
Mobile first is limited by its simple mirroring of desktop content when it has the potential to be just as complex and nuanced as any one person’s shopping habit. The context-first approach is designed to synch with the in’s and out’s of daily life, the customer’s shopping persona, and the high-quality customer service that they expect when they go to their browsers to interact with a brand.
As more high-end brands secure their clienteling by adopting context-first built applications, retailers that lag behind the trend are apt to miss out on the benefits and sales offered by the industry’s latest innovation.
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