Developing A Benchmark Approach: 7 Ways Smart Retailers Do It

In this developing digital era, retailers should adopt new approaches to empower their customers and promote their products.

FREMONT, CA: In this digital age, consumers embrace the advent of new technologies and are learning to leverage their power. Consumers do not elect to leave their comfort zone and wish to achieve their needs without moving an inch from their desk.

These consumers await an experience to be availed by stores during face-to-face interaction without really entering the stores and making a purchase. Learning modern-day consumers and providing the right platform to fulfill their needs is the primary concern of most retailers in this digital world.

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Therefore, the retailers should think beyond the demands of their prospective consumers that can meet their necessities at least to the borderline. In this regard, e-commerce can aid retailers in retaining their customers smartly.

The retailers should smoothly adopt new strategies to sustain themselves in this ever-changing consumer buying behavior era. Almost all retailers have enrolled their business online, thus promoting their products on different platforms.

Still, the retailers cannot stop with this and should discover new approaches to stay at the forefront ahead of their competitors. For instance, segmentation of customers based on their location, behavior, context, and interest can help them better understand the customers while accurately addressing their needs.

Smart retail data analytics capture critical metrics the organization's employees can access. In-store retail analytics supports identifying the interest of potential customers within the organization.

It merely accepts the processes of discovery, interpretation, and communication of meaningful patterns in data and applies them to retail store operations. In doing so, retailers can get more insight into the performance of their business on both micro and macro scales.

Here are a few new approaches CIOs can adopt to continuously engage retail consumers.

Experiential activation

Experiential activation is a new form of marketing, including event, participation, live, experiential, brand activation, and brand experience marketing focused on creating long-lasting and meaningful connections with customers.

As per a recent study, 58% Of industry experts have adopted experiential marketing to captivate their customers. Earlier this year, Sephora, a Paris-based French multinational chain of personal care and beauty stores, installed an intelligent digital mirror built with artificial intelligence (AI) technology in its flagship store in Madrid on Calle Serrano.

The mirror employing a smart engine acquires insights about the person in front of it regarding gender, age, look, and style. This helps deliver hyper-personalized experiences to shoppers. It then recommends products such as moisturizers, lipsticks, and fragrances to power their look.

The mirror show provided with QR codes enables customers to purchase the products on the company's website and also allows them to locate the product quickly in the retail store. This specific type of marketing is getting attraction to customers.

Virtual zones

Virtual zones, another form of smart retail, target the customers at the street level. It creates a V-Zone, or geofence, that derives the power of GPS covering an area ranging from a few meters to a few hundred meters.

It trails the customers whenever they pass the V-Zone. It then notifies the customers by giving them information about the nearby shops of interest. Additionally, the system can support as many beacons and sensors with the ability to deactivate or reactivate when required.

Smart analysis

Through smart analysis, retailers can earn insights into campaigns. For example, the heat maps generated help calculate the number of times customers visit a particular area, while the footfall figures help determine the count of customer visits. In addition, this analysis helps retailers further incorporate add-ons that can profoundly impact the frequency of customer visits.

Customized media campaigns

A customized media campaign is another method to connect with the audiences and encourage them to buy a product. Here, interactive media content is delivered straight to the user's devices. It works in a way where a first-time visitor will get an irrelevant message compared to the one who has visited the store a few times.

Once the new visitors' preferences are identified, relevant messages stimulating their curiosity to buy will be sent. Another example will be if a customer spends a predefined amount of time near a particular section. He/she will be notified about the existing discount on items in that section. This feature can help identify the target customers, thereby retaining the customers.

Indoor navigation

Using 3D maps for navigation and routing, indoor navigation helps shoppers find the accurate location of the desired product and places they would like to visit inside the store. At the same time, the customers can locate their position as well.

Facial recognition and machine learning

Facial recognition and machine learning capabilities built into a kiosk eliminate the need for additional sales staff, allowing the shoppers themselves to interact and know the prevailing discounts.

The kiosk has a camera and digital display. When a shopper operates the kiosk, it identifies the gender and age and displays the offers available on the screen. This smart retail technique allows the delivery of relevant offers to the right customers.

Also, with pre-configured tags programmed in the smart retail platform, customers can look for the most appropriate tags that suit them.

Conversational platform

Modern-day consumers have enormous opportunities to share their experiences and valuable information, providing reviews, asking for recommendations, and leaving comments.

The platform allows real-time conversation with the customers. These personalized conversations support responding to the customers directly on the smartphone. Also, the customers can give suggestions while clearing their doubts with the retailers.

Retailers face complex challenges with switching customers' buying habits. Hence, it becomes crucial for them to comprehend their customers thoroughly and cater to their needs. Research is the sole approach to gaining insights into the consumers' behavior, whereas digital platforms are unique solutions that can cater to their needs.