Over the recent years, many people have started to complete the shopping online. It’s a fact that you can’t deny; as sales are expected to reach £2.842 billion this year. As more ecommerce websites continue to rise in numbers, spend is set to increase further to $4.878 billion by 2021.
To remove the fear of dropping off the high street, you need to focus on your retail performance to ensure you don’t end up in the same position as stores like Toys R Us and BHS. With more people venturing online to do their shopping, no business is safe.
The customers perspective
It’s important deliver a great service both online and offline; as customers will expect the same standard wherever they shop. You need to fully optimise your service to make sure the reality lives up. If not, you could find yourself closing down stores and letting staff members go.
According to some studies, it has been found that consumers are only willing to spend 13 minutes in a store before they are served. Although this may seem like a high waiting time, businesses around the world are still trying to improve this area of their operations and make great changes to ensure that no customer is ever disappointed with their service.
Organisations that failed to focus on the waiting time of their customers in fact lost 75% of them; which is ultimately bad for business. Customers that do not have an enjoyable experience with your business will not likely return.
With businesses holding back on implementing a more appropriate queueing system, it’s likely that waiting times will only increase. 50% of people believe waiting in a queue is irritating, so if you’re not already looking to introduce such systems in place — you could face bigger problems as a business.
The position of your retail business and what it can do to improve
There’s a lot retail businesses can do to drive better results. You should have an aim to deliver an efficient customer experience from the moment someone arrives at a store up until when they leave. Enhancing the customer experience is all about adopting new technologies that can streamline all processes across an organisation.
With a point of sales system already in place, you must question whether it’s good enough to operate with the high expectations of shoppers in 2018. You need to invest in a POS that has the ability to drive results and also give you greater visibility over your business inventory; it can often be hard to strike the perfect balance.
You must also review the position of your business and what makes you better than your competitors. It all comes down to the in-store experience, so you should make it your mission to ensure that someone is always on hand to help with any queries someone may have about a product or service. Although customers do tend to wait a generous 13 minutes before leaving; that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try your best to serve them as quickly as possible.
If you begin to invest in more efficient systems, you’ll ensure a streamlined process and better productivity from your employees. This in turn will generate continuous results when implementing new solutions or upgrading current technologies – something which often takes time to adopt.
By finding the correct queue management tools, you’ll be able to keep wait times down and boost sales. From this, you’ll be able to create upsell opportunities and offer a more tailored experience to your customers if integrated across different areas of the business.
As well as this, you will be able to gain greater control over your inventory and make more informed decisions quickly. As well as this, you’ll gain complete visibility over your stock which can allow you to make more informed decisions. In effect, it removes the need to go back and forth manually to check the availability of products. As well as this, you’ll be alerted when it’s time to restock your inventory, which can remove the need of constant monitoring; allowing you to always be prepared for popular store times.
Because of this, you’ll be able to better all processes throughout your business. This can be achieved through customer identification; knowing why they’re visiting your store and what they want from you. With this, a ripple effect is created and the flow of traffic across the store is improved.
Sources:
https://www.qminder.com/long-waiting-times-sales/
https://www.parcelhero.com/highstreet
https://www.thebalancesmb.com/pos-point-of-sale-retail-system-2890157
