Click and Collect is one of the biggest changes in shopping habits over the last few years. As I’ve touched on in previous articles, customers love the convenience of doing the browsing from home, or on-the-go with their mobile, combined with the immediacy of being able to have the item here and now by collecting it from the store, rather than waiting for (and in some cases paying for) delivery.
There are variations on click and collect, such as what some analysts call ‘webrooming’ – when the customer researches online but does not complete the purchase at the same time, preferring to come into the store to try on, or make a final check of the item. The risk of this approach for retailers of course is that the sale is lost between the screen and the store, or that the customer gets to the bricks and mortar shop and finds their item is not in stock at that location.
So what do these behaviours teach us about the approaches that retailers need to take to maximise their sales from Click and Collect. Expanding on that theme, what do they also need in place to ensure that they turn webroomers into buying customers?
Touchpoint #1 Win the sale online – Click and Collect
The most efficient approach of course is to secure the sale online for collection instore – true click and collect. We know that the customer facing solution – the online store – is significantly enhanced (a better customer experience and a higher browser to purchaser conversion rate) if it includes key features such as:
- Check rewards points balance
- Show how rewards can reduce or replace the cash price of the goods
- Use ‘other purchasers also liked’ feature to cross sell and upsell
- List of local stores with stock of the product (based on a single view of inventory)
- Rapid checkout with minimum clicks
- Delivery costs and times clearly shown – no hidden surprises at the end of the transaction
Touchpoint #2 Bring the researcher into the store – Webrooming
If the potential customer is researching using your online store, but doesn’t complete the purchase there and then, the essential task is to get them to come into the store. In addition to the online features mentioned above, I am seeing retailers are using added incentives such as
- Reservation – the ability to reserve the goods in store, so that they can come in to try on, check the colour or confirm that the item is exactly what they want, without the risk that the stock has been sold between them browsing and getting to the store
- Offers on the browsed goods – this might be a special price, a digital coupon that the user can activate in the store, or multiples of reward points if the customer buys the item in store within a certain time.
Touchpoint #3 Convert the webroomer to customer
The retailer has go the webroomer to the point of entering the store, with a product in mind and an intent to purchase. But there are still plenty of techniques that the retailer can use to ensure that the sale completes.
- Welcoming the shopper when they approach or enter the store – using technologies such as blue tooth beaconing and in-store Wi-Fi to send digital offers, based on the customer’s browsing history.
- Digital signage –retailers I talk to are very excited by the possibilities offered by digital signage to dynamically tailor messages and offers, especially when used in combination with beaconing and Wi-Fi.
- Mobile sales – retailers are arming their staff with mobile devices so that they can provide all the relevant product and stock level details to shoppers, and even empowering them to offer rewards and incentives where appropriate.
- The sale can still be lost after the customer has put the goods in their basket, and research tells us that digital consumers are more demanding than any others when it comes to fast and efficient service, and mobile queue-busting and self-checkout kiosks are an important part of the customer experience, along with rapid payment methods such as digital wallets and digital receipts.
iVend Retail has helped retailers around the world drive Click and Collect sales.
To find out how we can help your business convert online browsers to shoppers, click here
Click and Collect – the 3 touchpoints where retailers can convert online browsers to shoppers Paula Da Silva, CitiXsys @iVend_AsiaPac
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