Experience is all about perception: great retail experiences depend on your customers’ perceptions of how the brand treats them. These perceptions affect their behaviors and influence where their loyalty lies. In other words, if they like you and continue to like you, they are going to do business with you and recommend you to the others. Creating great experiences means knowing customers well to deliver personalized experiences that will, in turn, encourage their loyalty.
Gaining in-depth knowledge about customers isn’t something that just happens. It requires thoughtful data collection and analysis to glean valuable insights from that data with speed and precision. This hard work is well worth the effort, because no matter what kind of business you’re in, improving the experience for your customers is the key to increasing sales and boosting customer loyalty.
Digital interactions already influence one third of spending at physical stores and cross-channel shoppers tend to spend more according to studies. Therefore, omni-channel solutions hold huge business potential. In fact, a recent study found that the lifetime value of those shoppers who buy from a business both in-store and online was 30% higher than those who shop using only one channel (IDC). Today’s shoppers want to have it all: they demand convenience, speed and ease, yet they don’t want – or need – to sacrifice either the quality of the products or the quality of the shopping experience.
Most companies predict that they will be competing mainly on the level of customer experience instead of price or products within the next few years. Retailers must stay ahead of these trends and find ways to create remarkable customer experiences that save customers their precious time. From new ways to engage with shoppers to modern technology that speeds up the checkout process, it’s all about the customer. It’s all about keeping customers at the center of the retail experience.
This renewed, customer-focused approach is part of an evolution from omni-channel retail to unified omni-channel commerce, in which shoppers no longer have to choose between the rich selection of online shopping and the service and attention of an in-store experience. New tools, systems and solutions, including the power of the cloud, create a truly seamless customer experience across digital retail and the brick-and-mortar store. New technologies are helping retailers create the next level of customer service, with more personalized interactions supported by machine learning, analytics and the cloud.