Perfect CX Series Part 5— Store Experience
As we near the end of our series of blogs on Customer Experience, here’s a quick recap. We discussed how Customer Experience is not a stand-alone concept, rather it is a mixture of multiple experiences like brand experience, product experience, service experience, and contact center experience.
Talking about contact centers, we uncovered how these hubs meant for establishing communication between the brand and the customers, are an important source for the enhancement of CX. And similar to contact centers, another important CX Experience is the In-Store Experience.
Even when the world is drastically shifting towards online channels for purchases, brands cannot get rid of brick-and-mortar stores altogether. And for retailers, stores are a must-have.
This makes it crucial for organizations to know when and how they can enhance their store experience for greater customer satisfaction.
In this blog, we shall ponder upon what store experience means for your brand, why it is important to your customers, what are the major challenges that create hurdles for brand managers in enhancing store experience, and how American Express deals with them to set the best example.
So with no further delay, let’s begin!
What is Store Experience?
Store Experience is the impression you leave on your customers when they visit any of your brand stores. Customers may visit your store with an intention of buying or to just intake the collection you display.
But, at times they may begin with a casual stroll at the store which later gets converted into a buying decision. And that’s what a good store experience is all about.
A great example that most of you can relate to is the in-store experience of IKEA. IKEA builds a well-curated and thoughtful in-store journey for its customers which is woven like a story.
The customer is guided through a series of directions that lead them from one room decor to another highlighting how IKEA can best beautify their home decor.
Each stop is strategically placed with a midway cafeteria and a final purchasing center at the end. The entire journey is like being in a movie or exhibition and taking your time to absorb the environment.
Store Experience is not only important for product-based brands but also services. A good retail experience can mean the world to your customers. This can increase your chances of getting repeat purchases and at best, the creation of brand loyalty. So definitely in-store experience has a lot in store for brands.
But how is it relevant for your customers?
What Matters To Customers?
Customers today have less time at hand than earlier. This makes it difficult for them to go from shop to shop to get the perfect product that suits their needs. Also, with access to the Internet, they are well informed.
They have an upper hand over the sellers. So, what matters to the customers when it comes to store experience? What do they expect?
Customers want brands to be fast and seamless. They want to be able to do more by spending less time on each task. They want store owners to understand their needs and suggest to them the perfect fit.
They want convenience. They want the shopping experience to match their lifestyle. Thus, if a customer uses payment wallets, he/she would want an option to use one.
With the omnichannel presence of customers, it is required to create a sync between all channels. Around 90% of customers expect brands to provide a consistent experience across channels, according to SDL.
Also, customers want something engaging and entertaining to make shopping a less monotonous and tedious task and more fun activity.
And to fulfill all these expectations, brands must overcome the roadblocks of in-store experience enhancement.
Major Roadblocks in Managing Store Experience
Creating a memorable store experience for customers is not without its challenges. The major roadblocks include:
- Shift towards online shopping: According to Statista, the online shopping market will expand to cross 4 trillion globally by 2021. Such a rapid shift towards online shopping culture has made it difficult for marketers to focus efforts on improving the in-store experience. The uncertainty of customer response in-store leads to a great dilemma.
- Synchronizing in-store experience with online experience: According to Forrester, 69% of customers prefer to shop with brands that offer consistent in-store and online experiences. To meet such customer expectations brands must identify and maintain how the experience of customers remains consistent across all channels.
- Adding something unique to the store experience: Competition leads to building pressure to create something unique to offer the customers in terms of experience. The old-fashioned ways work no longer. For your brand to stand out you need to innovate and such innovation is always difficult to implement.
- Balancing innovation with budget: The budget of marketing is to be used on a variety of activities. Store Experience is just a part of it. But in-store innovations demand a lot of investment. This leads to conflicting interests with online channels that have a more promising future.
- Converting experience to purchase: Another trouble with creating a unique experience in-store is that customers might just come in through word of mouth to Experience the store and end up purchasing nothing. This creates false leads and wastes resources.
AmEx has found ways to work past these challenges to create a classic example of Store Experience.
American Express Store Experience Case
American Express has a unique reward system in place for its loyal customers. American Express cards have stringent regulations and norms for getting its customers onboard. But once they are in, they become part of the AmEx family.
AmEx cards can be used at a variety of stores including retail, education, airlines, healthcare, fuel, dining, etc. Famous brands that adorn users with AmEx cards include H&M, Reliance Digital, Titan, Tanishq, Croma, Jet Airways, Etihad Airways, IndiGo, Zomato, HP, Bharat Petroleum, etc.
AmEx users get enrolled for their unique rewards system. The Membership Reward Points from the use of AmEx cards at various stores can be redeemed to cover card charges, pay at checkouts, buy gift cards, book or upgrade travel, and if nothing, transfer points for money.
Lastly, to make it easy for the customers to find AmEx acceptable stores, the brand offers a dedicated search page with maps and location trackers. With all these, AmEx offers a great store experience to its customers.
Conclusion
To wind it up, store experience is a good opportunity to make your customers feel valued and thereby create and retain more customers. In-store shopping may be dying, but its value can never be undermined.
And this makes it very important for brands to keep experimenting with engaging customers offline because you cannot achieve everything from behind the screens. Last in line with the varied customer experiences is the Delivery Experience for eCommerce. We shall explore more about it in the next blog of the series. Till then, enjoy reading!
In the other parts of this series, we will learn more about each of the six varied types of experiences forming Customer Experience
