As the retail industry continues to be disrupted by emerging technologies and shifting consumer behaviour, how do you keep up? One of the first steps is to keep up to date with the latest innovations and trends that will transform how you start, market, manage, and grow your business in 2020 and beyond.
What do customers want? They are looking for good-value goods and smart applications and designs. Retailers have made a virtue of delivering customer experience by making retail as frictionless as possible. Organisations are now mapping out their customer journeys to identify bottlenecks and clearing the way to purchase and beyond very smart way, the idea is that more the retailers can remove these bottlenecks and provide rewarding customer experiences they will have more happy customers.
Retailers are increasingly talking about how to earn customer attention, which is a common goal for all retailers. If customers cannot remember their shopping experience, there is less chance of they are going to become a loyal customer for the retailer. So, the starting point for the retailer is creating a memorable and valuable customer experience, but that is bereft of challenges.
Some of the key Challenges that a retailer deals with is in understanding
- Are customers happy with our brand?
- Feedback on retail store experience?
- Why do customers return to our brand and stores?
- How to improve the retail experiences for customers?
- What could be done which would help our customers to remember our brands and stores?
With the advent of new digital technologies and smart applications retailers can reach out more effectively to the customer using smart technology and the internet. But with this changing landscape comes a set of new expectations from the customers.
33% of retailers are going to see a decline in customer experience execution this year as shoppers' desires will outpace organizations' capacity to deliver a meaningful experience as 70% of the buyer’s journey is based on how the customer feels they are being treated by the retailers. Companies that are historically brick-and-mortar are fighting to bring innovation into the retail space, too. Retail eCommerce companies also changing how customers experience brands in their everyday lives.
So, what does all of this end to? It’s not enough to sale product anymore; retailers must sell them an experience using a mix of digital and physical store.
Digital Retail Experience
Mindful of how today's customers are using both the digital and physical worlds; Retailers sought to create a new 'Digital' retail customer experience. A unified experience which combines with all retail stores, eCommerce Platforms and mobile application customer journeys.
Today, customer journeys don’t always begin in brick-and-mortar stores - 90% of all purchase decisions starts with online search. In fact, according to data published by retail expert on Statistica, over 40 millions of US customers are ‘mobile-only’ internet users, about 35% of the entire internet population of the country.
How to Deliver a Digital Customer Experience in Online Retail
Online retail shows absolutely no sign of slowing down from the exponential growth we’ve seen in the past few years.
Approximately $ 3.46 trillion was spent online by consumers in 2019. With forecasts predicting an 18% growth rate over the next twelve months, it’s vital to the future success of businesses that their online customer experiences are the very best they can be.
Great customer experience is a major driver of revenue – customers who walk away happy are over two times more likely to part with more of their cash. Retailers should assess their end-to-end digital customer experience with an understanding of best practice in that area.
Physical retailing is no longer a stand-alone process and, without question, customer experience fuels today’s retail. That’s why it’s critical that retailers understand today’s linear consumer journey.
- Digital: Pre-store visit
- 76% Customers compare prices
- 62% Customers are look at reviews
- 47% Customers are checking local store inventory
- 46% of the consumers will search the product before buying in the store
- In-store Mobile Use
- 83% Customers Compare Prices
- 78% Customers are look at reviews
- 76% Customers are checking local store inventory
Over the next few years, retailers can anticipate consumers’ expectations to shift toward more innovation from their favorite brands. The innovating technology allows retailers access to more powerful forms of customer contact details, which will completely change how products market to, sell to, and engage with customers.
Differentiating on Customer Experience in Retail
To face competition, retailers are looking for ways to capture customer data and gain a holistic customer view across channels, personalized customer experience solutions using innovative technologies, allowing retailers to curate delightful experience that drive customer-centricity and increase brand value.
- Pervasive Digital Intelligence: Pervasive digital intelligence describes gathering and managing the detailed information about every action a customer takes, regardless of channel or mode of interaction.
- Humanizing Digital Systems: Humanizing or personalizing digital systems changes customer interactions. With AI processing the data, humanization allows a company to combine data and analytics to personalize any interaction that customers have with the company.
- Deploying “Multiexperience” in Customer-Facing Systems: Multiexperience is a relatively new concept but one that’s having a substantial impact on how organizations interact with customers. According to Gartner, “Multiexperience refers to the various permutations of modalities (e.g., touch, voice, and gesture), devices, and apps that users interact with on their digital journey across the various touchpoints.”
With all this new technology available at retailers’ fingertips comes ample opportunity to stand out from the competition. Utilizing innovative technologies and creating an innovative customer experience will not only highlight your product, but it will also demonstrate your ability to move ahead of the competition.