With online and mobile offering such compelling alternatives to traditional shopping, retailers with physical stores need to offer consumers exactly what they want in order to compete. A recent report by the Interactions subsidiary of Daymon Worldwide reveals some very interesting insights into what shoppers are looking for when they’re in stores.
Demonstrations
Almost 60% of shoppers say they want demonstrations in the store. Depending on what the product is, it means that having someone prepare food in the store is helpful in a supermarket and seeing clothing on a mannequin or live model is a big plus for helping the consumer make a purchase decision.
Food And Drinks
Consumers enjoy having food and drinks available in stores. Stores with restaurants on the premises or right nearby are a definite plus.
Personalized Messages
The study found that 40% of consumer like getting personalized messages about their shopping trip while they’re in a store. But the flip side of that is that 60% of shoppers don’t like it. The data generally is a good cross-section of the population but it doesn’t dive into which groups like getting messages while shopping and which don’t. I would bet this breaks down into very specific groups and it’s an area worth studying. As technology becomes more ubiquitous every day, I’d bet that over time more people will become comfortable with personalized messages while in store.
Mobile Apps
The report says that 62% of shoppers use a retailer’s mobile app while they’re in store. Since retail apps have — so far — been very unsuccessful, I’m wondering whether this question was really understood by respondents. Did they really mean to say they want to use a retailer’s mobile app or was the answer really referring to the use of mobile apps during in-store shopping? So many people use Amazon’s app while they’re in other people’s stores it makes me wonder.
Try Before You Buy
Seventy perfect of consumers say they are more likely to buy a product if they get a chance to try it in store. Being out of stock and offering to ship it to a consumer’s home from another store is a nice consolation prize, but if you really want to sell things to people, better have it in the store.
Convenience
Well, of course. But what do they mean by convenience? The factors that are important to consumers for a store are location and hours. Checkout lines and being able to order the same products online or in store were ranked lower.
Holiday Shopping
Eighty-two percent of shoppers said they enjoyed holiday shopping. Interestingly, of the holiday shoppers that made lists, almost two-thirds would buy gifts that weren’t on their list if it appealed to them in store. There’s always opportunities for great merchandising.
The report has many important points. But the biggest point is that retailers need to keep asking what consumers want as their needs change over time.
