For additional earlybird discount book before 23 December!

Download your ShopAbility Path to Purchase Summit Brochure here, and use the promotional code at the top when booking your seat to receive 10% discount.

PathtoPurchase2012_shopability

As part of the conference program, ShopAbility’s Norrelle Goldring will be speaking on:

Leveraging the growing amounts of shopper data for in-store activation:
• Differentiating information from insight and understanding the types
of insights to be gained from data
• Analysing the uses of insights across sales, category, trade marketing,
brand marketing and externally
• How to gain insight and leverage results for category strategy

As Gold Sponsors, ShopAbilitly will also have a stand at the conference so feel free to come and say hello!

With the launch of the Mix clothing range within selected Coles stores we thought it was worth visiting Coles Epping to see how they would incorporate the new category into their store layout.

The first thing you notice when entering is a lack of traditional security barriers and trolley bays clogging the front entrance. The trolley bay is neatly located outside the store and there are no obvious barriers directing traffic giving the store an open and expansive feel.

As usual you enter into the fresh food department with all of the offers you would expect to see. There is a baker onsite and the offer is extensive.  The meat, poultry and seafood offer is not as pronounced as it is in other new format stores but there is a reasonable specialty cheese selection available.

The fresh food offer is presented in the market style which both Coles and Woolworths have been rolling out across new format stores. With chalkboard style signage this section is nothing new. However, the main difference between the Coles offer and the recent Woolworths rollouts is the lighting. This store is well lit and feels much more open than the dark moody style Woolworths have been executing.

The next thing you notice in this store are the wide aisles. They give the store a feeling of space and make it very easy to shop and even browse. Multiple facings within a wide selection of categories helps shoppers navigate the shelf and find what they are looking for. There is also a store map attached to the fixture at both ends of each aisle helping shoppers find categories within the store.

The most obvious difference in this store is the Mix clothing offer which is located in the middle of the store offering predominately women’s clothing, some men’s and even some accessories. You feel like you are in a Big W store when you reach this section. The POS is even blue replicating the Big W offer. The clothes are basic as you would expect but there are people shopping the section so it is either appealing to them or they are just curious to see what is available.

There are two glaring omissions from this section. The first is children’s wear which is puzzling. I had definitely expected to find a children’s offer and would have thought it would be more popular than an adults range. The catalogue does not show any children’s wear but perhaps it is available in other stores. The second is a change room. While it is difficult to imagine someone pulling up their trolley full of groceries and heading into a change room within a supermarket to try something on it does seem strange not to have the option.

There are a number of new category executions in the store including extensive stationery, mobile phone and home entertainment offers as well as some exercise equipment not noticed previously in other stores.

The health and beauty aisle has interchangeable POS that feels like it belongs in a Priceline or Mass Merchant cosmetic section.

The freezer section at the far end of the store has signage to assist with navigation signposting the various frozen categories in shopper friendly segments (e.g. treats, entertaining and main meals).

Overall the store feels spacious with some great initiatives to help shoppers locate aisles, categories and products within the store. It is well lit and feels clean and pleasant to shop. There was however a lot of empty shelves for a Thursday morning indicating that there is either too much space allocated to some categories or poor shelf replenishment procedures in place. It’s a nice store and if you’re keen to see the Mix offer in store it is worth a visit.

It’s 6pm on a cold Canberra Monday evening, one week after Costco opened, and surprisingly the car park is relatively empty.

Plenty of people pushing trolleys within the store, but only 3 registers open, that says it all.

This format is the same as many of us have seen in Melbourne, Sydney and overseas with the normal mix of Food, General Merchandise  and outstanding stunt lines – same layout, same merchandising, same POD. You know what you expect to find in a Costco and they deliver.

The interesting element to this Canberra store is not the internal dynamics but what Costco’s arrival will cause in this conservative town of 330,000 people.

Apparently a full line Woolies, Big W and Dick Smith are all planned for an adjoining mini centre in January 2012, supposedly supporting a ‘Costco competitive’ range and pricing structure (apparently they outbid Coles for the privilege of opening there). Both of the majors have implemented competitive strategies in an attempt to counter the Costco effect (larger pack sizes, price reductions etc).

There is already a Jim Murphy liquor super store there so the expectation I would think is that the central car park will draw from a huge catchment – think Goulburn, Wagga and the coastal strip right up to Wollongong, around 200kms/ 2 hours, as well as from the existing neighbourhood and destination centres around Canberra. Costco would be looking at $75-100m pa, Woolies at least $50m and that type of turnover just does not happen. It is about changing current shopping habits away from the local retailers and drawing big country style baskets from a very wide catchment.

The quote “everything in Canberra is only 20 minutes away” certainly puts the above into perspective.

So what will be the long term impact of a combined offer such as this on the current offers servicing Canberra population and the ripple effect into the wider catchment?  Think about the WalMart effect on regional US A – possibly, but  it certainly has the potential.

Watch this space for further developments. If successful it could come to a town near you!

First impressions as you pass the multitude of signs at the front entrance challenging Woolies and Coles to their price/ value proposition was one of the vast size of the place, it’s just huge. At 9am it was a lonely shopping experience but you could imagine the hustle and bustle of the weekend traffic.

Standard layout, Meat and Fresh Produce on the left, in house bakery in the middle and Grocery and GM on the right with a Liquor barn at the far end, and we are talking a distance of over 100mtrs from start to finish which is one hell of a trip for older people or families with whinging kids. I’m now beginning to be thankful for an early morning visit.

Concrete floors, adequate lighting, quirky black and white signage and tickets make for a fairly plain shopping experience with little to no theatre, at that time of the day anyway. The store may come alive with tastings and demos in peak trading periods but outside of those times it felt pretty cold and uninviting.

The range of Grocery is OK but not wide, all of the bases are covered and you could do a shop with ease. Their price position appears to be EDLP supplementing the normal range of Weekly Specials, but no house brands or PL at all. Based on that offer alone La Mana will not be cheaper than Woolies or Coles, but Value in a Shoppers mind is delivered through more complex criteria than a one dimensional price offer.

The Fresh areas were certainly well ranged, stocked and merchandised and this is clearly the area that they see as an opportunity to differentiate. The range of cheese in particular was great. Produce was good, but it reminded you of the old WW and Coles offer on pine tables.

The coffee shop looked tempting with fresh cakes etc, and was the busiest of any of the depts., but you’d expect that at 9am.

Whilst standing just inside the checkouts and surveying this vast store, I could not help but ask “what is the key point of difference here that will make this store a destination vs others?” How will they draw from the Sunbury/ Craigieburn/ Essendon area and ask people to drive past quite a few of the majors to visit this offer, week in, week out.

No theatre a la Big Fresh, a cavernous shed, impossible to heat in winter, no huge width or depth in Grocery, not a sustainable price leadership offer that will stand up to intense scrutiny, good well signed Fresh and quality was impressive, but the complete package was nothing well out of the ordinary.

The La Mana name is an icon in Melbourne, but is this the serious threat that many of us would hope that it would be?

Be interested in your feedback.

There’s been a lot of media huff and puff lately about the growth of online shopping in Australia. But the larger revolution – albeit quieter from a media point of view – is the change in shopper behaviour before they purchase, brought about by the ability to search online for product information before they even get to a store.

This has implications for the ‘path to purchase’ and for impulse purchases. As the degree of prestore search increases, so does the degree of planning.

I thought it worthwhile having a look at this and its implications for what stores will need to do in order to retain a role broader than being a mere transaction zone. The game SHOULD be much bigger than just range and layout, which are hygiene, navigation and deselection (narrowing down) factors, they’re not strategy. Once you’ve got your range and layout right, then what are you going to do to increase your category sales in an environment where shoppers are getting harder to influence?

THE PATH TO PURCHASE IS BLURRING

Traditionally the path to purchase was thought to be prestore and instore.

Prestore was when shoppers were making lists and were the passive subjects of advertising and promotional stimulus. Prestore was about consideration.

Instore was where the shopper was influenced on which of their considered products in a category they would buy. Instore was where the conversion happened.

Now the model is blurred. We have conversion happening prestore, and consideration happening instore.

The advent of mobile search and compare is creating consideration at shelf, not just conversion. An example is a shopper standing in a shoe store looking at training shoes. The shopper can whip out their mobile phone and price compare the shoe in the store they are in versus somewhere else. And if the somewhere else is nearby they may change their store choice. You’re then relying on your store staff service and sales capabilities to keep the shopper in your store. Or they might be looking at a shoe on shelf and if a staff member isn’t available, look up the product information online using their smartphone.

This isn’t just for the ‘few’ who have smartphones, by the way. Australia has one of the highest smartphone penetrations in the world, currently nearing 40%, and set to hit 60% by the end of 2012.

THE ‘FIRST MOMENT OF TRUTH’ – JUST ONE OF A SERIES OF TRUTH MOMENTS

P&G are largely credited with coining the expression the ‘First Moment of Truth’ to describe the shopper experience at shelf, where theoretically all the prestore and instore marketing and category management efforts come together to create a purchase decision at the shelf (or offlocation display).

Now we have not only a First Moment of Truth, but a Zero Moment of Truth (prestore) and a Second Moment of Truth (post store, when the purchased product is actually trialled).

Google’s recent report (April 2011) on the Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT), whilst not expressing a new idea, has probably been the first to articulate it clearly.

It identifies the shift in shopper behaviour by differentiating advertising and promotional stimulus (considered passive) from online and mobile search (proactive).

The ZMOT is when a shopper actively searches for product information online. This may be from a retailer’s website, manufacturer’s website, product reviews, social media such as Facebook, and blogs (which are a form of organized word of mouth), among other things a search engine may dig up. ZMOT is everywhere because it can be accessed whilst mobile, and it’s not just for high involvement purchase categories like cars and entertainment systems. Shoppers are actively searching prestore in product categories ranging from plasticware to pet food.

The Second Moment of Truth (SMOT) – product trial, usage and experience – has an impact on ZMOT. Users of a product when they get it home may post a comment about the product (and their purchase experience) on a social media website, or a product review on a blog or website. These reviews then contribute to the next shopper’s ZMOT findings.  In a recent report from IBM it was stated that a shopper is more likely to believe a review from a stranger than what a retailer or manufacturer says about a product. This demonstrates the need/role for informal product advocates and ambassadors (rather than paid celebrity sponsors).

Whilst marketers can’t control what shoppers post for SMOT, smart marketers in manufacturing can use ZMOT tools – including offers – to mitigate retailer clean store policies.

So now we have a model where advertising stimulus and promotions (Stimulus) may be prestore or instore. The ZMOT is everywhere (accessed prestore, instore, in transit) as is the SMOT. The First Moment of Truth may now be online, or in bricks and mortar stores, or multichannel (eg order online, pick up instore or order instore, have delivered to your home).

I haven’t figured out how to draw this yet in a pretty diagram. Stay tuned. It’ll probably look like one of those communication network diagrams like a cloud with lots of lines where everything connects to everything else.

THE DEGREE OF PLANNING IS INCREASING

The more ZMOT proactive product search that occurs, the greater the degree of pre-store product planning.

Depending on the channel, category and trip type, there may be a lot or a little impulse. On average in Australia across a number of shopper research projects in the past few years, we’ve found that most categories in grocery are planned down to product or brand level between 60% and 70%. That is within a specific category.

But this doesn’t mean you can’t get switch, upgrade or impulse instore, or that a shopper doesn’t buy other categories/products on impulse. We know that around 80% of shoppers deviate from (add to) their grocery shopping list once instore. That is, they come in for 4 things totaling $20 and wander out $50 and 8 items later.

What it does mean is that you need to work harder to interrupt them within a given category.

Interestingly, the recent Coles and Woolworths smartphone apps have a number of functions that will actually increase the degree of planning (My List, My Specials, where items are located in my store so I can find them faster etc) with fewer of the apps to increase browse time/impulse/engagement (recipe finders being the main one at this point).

In an environment where retailers have trained shoppers to expect low prices as the cost of entry and promotional strategies have simply shifted the majority of a category’s sales to on promotion (and deflated category value in the process), the crying need instore is for INTERRUPTION. Shoppers want to discover, be surprised, delighted, and informed … this requires engagement and theatre.

THE NEED TO PLAY TO EMOTIONAL, NOT JUST RATIONAL

In ‘The Buying Brain’, Dr AK Pradeep emphasizes that 95% of human decision making is unconscious and emotional not subconscious and rational. He outlines 7 shopper experience dimensions. In no particular order, these are Information, Interaction, Entertainment, Community, Education, Simplicity, and Self Worth. These serve as a useful ‘retail health’ scorecard for a brand or category.

It’s evident from this list that grocery retailing only really talks to simplicity (ease of shop) at the moment, with perhaps some bits of information and some Community (charity) activities. But supermarkets have work to do on the interaction, entertainment, education and self worth dimensions.

When you look at the traditional point of purchase drivers (range, space & layout, visibility & display, price, promotion and persuasion) there are 3 that are rational (range, space, price) and 3 that are more emotional (display/theatre, promotion, persuasion).

Clean store policies are effectively stripping the emotion out of a shopping trip that for many is already a grudge trip or considered a chore.

When we run shopper research typically the retailers want to understand what their range and layout should be, and most of what shoppers want is not just a layout that makes sense but typically category information, samples, tastings and demonstrations. They want things that will help them with solutions and keep them entertained.

Interruption and engagement – the levers to pull for impulse sales and category growth – will come from more theatre; better thought through relevant/tailored/interactive promotions that pull levers other than price, and from personalized service.

In the brave new world of shopper-controlled retailing, the retailers who retain relevance will be those who can interrupt, surprise and delight by playing to emotions.

Looking for a dynamic, flexible working environment? Enjoy agency side, in the fast moving consumer goods sector? Give us a call or send us an email. We’re recruiting for a Senior Insights Manager, to help support and develop our Insights offer, working with our Company Director and Group Account Director.

ShopAbility is a national leader in shopper insights and shopper marketing thinking. We work on major bespoke shopper research projects for blue chip FMCG brands, across a diverse range of categories and channels. So if you like variety, with the opportunity to make a real impact with clients, then this is the gig for you.

We are industry commentators for trade publications including Retail World Magazine, Convenience World Magazine, Retail Pharmacy Magazine and National Liquor News. We are guest speakers at the major trade conferences and regularly train in best practice shopper insights thinking and practice in the international area (most recently in Asia).

As a business, we run to a contemporary business model. We have clients in both Sydney and Melbourne, so you may be based in either. We are extremely flexible regarding where you work from, when you work and how you work. We don’t micro-manage people, what we do give is support and where required, direction. What’s important to us is the highest quality outcomes for our clients, and that’s how we’ve built our business in to one of the leading agencies in the Australian FMCG sector.

If this sounds like something you’d like to be a part of, we’d love to hear from you.  Ask for the full job spec via email: enquiries@shop-ability.com, and feel free to call Company Co-Director Norrelle Goldring direct on 0411 735 190 if you’d prefer to have an informal chat before applying.

The study, a joint initiative of POPAI in partnership with researchers ShopAbility, will track advances in shopper marketing and category management, including case studies, since the first Australian industry benchmarking survey in 2010.

Survey participants are rewarded with a free copy of the research report, valued at $495 (+ gst), and are invited to attend key industry leadership workshops where the research findings are discussed amongst retailers, suppliers/brands and POP agencies.

The link to the online version of the survey is now online and can be found here according to POPAI’s General Manager, Karen Spear.

“The inaugural industry survey in 2010 led to a raft of measures for industry improvement, and the best practice tools and templates developed by POPAI’s Shopper Marketing Industry Council over the past months since the study’s completion are evidence of this,” Karen said.

“This year the online survey will be shorter, and we’ve taken our focus areas directly from industry feedback provided last year.”

Norrelle Goldring, Chair of POPAI’s Shopper Marketing Industry Council, believes the survey will provide a valuable tracker as to the progress of the Shopper Marketing function in Australia.

Broad focus areas for the 2011 Shopper Marketing & Industry Survey include:

• Definitions
• Capability & Resources
• Insights
• Activities & Case Studies
• Digital / Online / Social
• Measurement & Effectiveness
• Impacts, Challenges & the Future

What you can do:

Go direct to the online open survey link here

Register to participate in the online or face to face or both: Email your name, company and ‘Register for Shopper Marketing Survey’ to popai@popai.com.au

Want to know more? Download the survey FAQs

POPAI’s Shopper Marketing Industry Council (SMIC), of which ShopAbility’s Norrelle Goldring is Chair, have developed a number of best practice tools and templates, including a handy ‘shopper marketing wheel’, case studies and roadmaps that are free to all delegates visiting the POPAI stand.

Delegates at the stand can also voice their opinions in the 2011 Shopper Marketing & Industry Survey. The study, a joint initiative of POPAI in partnership with  ShopAbility, will track advances in shopper marketing and category management, including case studies, since the first Australian industry benchmarking survey in 2010.

Survey participants are rewarded with a free copy of the resulting research report, valued at $495, and are invited to attend key industry leadership workshops where the research findings are discussed amongst retailers, suppliers / brands and POP agencies.

A link to the online version of the survey will also be announced in mid-May for those unable to attend Shopper Marketing Live!, according to POPAI’s General Manager, Karen Spear.

“The inaugural industry survey in 2010 led to a raft of measures for industry improvement, and the best practice tools and templates developed by POPAI’s Shopper Marketing Industry Council over the past months since the study’s completion are evidence of this,” Karen said.

“This year the online survey will be shorter, and we’ve taken our focus areas directly from industry feedback provided last year.”

Broad focus areas for the 2011 Shopper Marketing & Industry Survey include:

• Definitions
• Capability & Resources
• Insights
• Activities & Case Studies
• Digital / Online / Social
• Measurement & Effectiveness
• Impacts, Challenges & the Future

In addition to the online survey, POPAI and ShopAbility are conducting face to face interviews with interested participants willing to share case studies of shopper marketing in action (optional anonymity).

What you can do:

o   Visit the POPAI & ShopAbility stands at Shopper Marketing Live! To pick up your free tools http://www.shoppermarketinglive.com/

o   Want to know more? Download the survey FAQs at www.popai.com.au

o   Register to participate in the online or face to face or both: Email your name, company and ‘register for Shopper Marketing Survey’ to popai@popai.com.au

Walking into the Kmart store at Broadway in Sydney the first thing you observe is a far tidier store than the average mass merchant, the shelves are stacked neatly and the pallet displays are well merchandised with clear signage to help you navigate the store. As part of the repositioning, Kmart Broadway trialled 24hr/7 day trading but has since reduced the opening hours to 8am till midnight each day. Less than 24/7 but more then I would have expected.

But are the exceeding expectation with regard to price? Well if a $9 toaster, $10 fan or $49 microwave are anything to go by there has been a definite shift in pricing for average household items. Kmart have introduced a generic brand called Homemaker offering a wide range of household items. The obvious next question has to be around the quality of such cheap items and therefore the true value for money but for the average student or family looking to set up a new home or replace household items they do offer a low-cost alternative.

Another thing which is evident is the Kmart pricing strategy which sees a large proportion of the products in store being offered at round dollar prices…$5, $8, $15, $49, etc…so there is now no need for loose change.

It is important to note that the shift in perception of Kmart as a retailer driven by value is being delivered through own-brand products. Branded products or goods such as CDs, DVDs and branded toys, for which there is not a generic substitute, are not as cheap as other products in-store, and they are certainly not the cheapest in the market for these products either, but overall my perception of Kmart has definitely changed. So, if you haven’t visited a Kmart store in a while…expect change.

THE SHOPPER JOURNEY TO THE SHOPPING CENTRE

Whilst the number of Shoppers visiting a Shopping Centre in small groups as a pure leisure outing is increasing, the majority of Shopper trips to the Shopping Centre are still destination based.  That is, the Shopper is going for a specific purpose or item, or set of purposes and items.

However, they’re also open to influence – nearly 90% of Shoppers deviate (add to) their shopping list, regardless of whether the list is on paper on in their heads.  So as a Centre based retailer you have a good opportunity to ‘interrupt’ them once they arrive at the centre, with ‘while I’m here’ type reminders. More about how to attract that impulse sale a little later.

First and foremost however, you need to ensure that you get on their destination shopping list – to be the reason they’re going to the Shopping Centre in the first place.

Below is a starter list of ‘habits’ of effective Shopping Centre retailers in making themselves retail destinations vs their competitors.

HABIT #1: LOCATION! LOCATION! LOCATION!

Be in the right place to optimise walk past traffic. What we are talking about is the real estate game, and having your store in the right (read logical) location for your categories as well as the best location for Shopper traffic.

It’s all about footfall. You need to be in the main traffic flow areas. These include areas near carparks, entrances and exits as well as main traffic flow paths to public transport. For example changing the location of the bus terminal due to centre refurbishments or extensions can cause major declines in what was once a thriving business as people just don’t walk past anymore, certainly not the sheer volume there once was.

The rule of proximity applies. Stores located near a major or mini major (department stores, supermarkets, major chains with large store footprints) get more traffic, period. The average supermarket would have around 35-40,000 customers each week and almost every household shops there….think about it.

Be in a precinct.  For example, if you’re a fashion store you need to be in a fashion precinct or fashion store cluster.  Competition actually DRAWS traffic.  You’re better off being right next door to immediate competitors than away from them, as a clutch of stores all with a similar offer – eg shoes – become a shopping destination for that type of item.  It’s no good being a shoe store and being located near all the services like banks and road traffic authorities.

You might not be able to influence your existing store position, but if your lease is about to expire or the centre is about to undergo renovations you should use this as an opportunity to review your store location in the centre. Get a hold of their new centre floorplans and identify your ideal location based on main traffic flows, proximity, and precincts.

HABIT #2: MAKE YOUR STORE A DESTINATION

Reduce reliance on impulse and browsing foot traffic.  Ensure your store is a destination for the Shopper for their shopping occasion – that they have already decided to visit your store for a specific purpose BEFORE they even set foot in the Shopping Centre.

The rest of this article is devoted to ways to do this.

HABIT #3 (and 4, 5, 6, and 7…): CREATE A GOOD RELATIONSHIP WITH SHOPPING CENTRE MANAGEMENT

Your absolute first port of call should be meet and get to know the Shopping Centre’s Retail and Marketing teams, and make sure THEY know YOU. Get involved in any offer and voucher runs they may be doing. Support events they might run such as  fashion parades.  Get involved in campaigns they are planning.  The more you proactively offer, the more preferential and supportive treatment you will receive and the more you will be their first port of call when they are planning an activity.  It might sound obvious, but it’s amazing how many retailers don’t make the effort. And it doesn’t cost much. (And might even get you a better deal on your Shopping Centre media and advertising).

Little things mean a lot. Giveaways work wonders. If your centre has hubs – eg fashion hubs, kids hub, food hub – make sure you’re there with a goodie bag of offers and small trinkets.

Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Get involved with the Shopping Centre’s giftcard program.  Shopping Centre management LOVE retailers who help with their centre giftcard programs and it’s cost effective to be involved.  Come up with a prize, gift with purchase, coupon or other offer – it doesn’t have to be big or expensive.

HABIT #4: INVOLVEMENT IN CENTRE MANAGEMENT MARKETING CAMPAIGNS

Ensure you have a presence and better yet, an offer, in major gift guides the centre puts out.  You may need to provide a couple of hundred dollars’ worth of stock for photo shoots, or it might cost you a few hundred bucks in redemptions of promo offers, but the traffic it drives to your store and the incremental sales resulting pay for it ten times over. This is increasingly important with new season fashion (clothing AND housewares) launches for example, most Centres publish glossy colour magazines as free Shopper give aways, find out the publishing dates and get involved.

Become a consistent presence in any ongoing or long-running campaigns the centre may have, both with Shopping Centre media and online (see below).

HABIT #5: SHOPPING CENTRE MERCHANDISING AND ADVERTISING

Options may include one or more of billboards and posters, banners, kiosks, toilet media, floor media, car park media, Shopping Centre entrance media. These options can be expensive, but is worth doing when launching your store or when your store has a major seasonal promotional theme running. You can amortize the cost by offering the centre a bundled deal to take up more than one media type for the duration of the promotion.

Shopping Centre media and advertising for retailers is best approached on a centre by centre basis – doing a total media package per centre – rather than on a most-centres-for-least-cost reach and frequency type basis. But understanding how this option could fit as part of your total promotional/ marketing spend is critical.

HABIT #6: ONLINE SHOPPING CENTRE PRESENCE

Most Shopping Centres have a loyal Shopper on line data base that can be accessed by their retail tenants with special offers or seasonal promotions. This will give you and your business, via your Shopping Centre data base, the all important 1:1 contact with potential customers. These can be Brand driven, category driven or even Service driven – how about promoting that new staff member with extensive experience in kids clothing or shoe fitting?

Get involved in online campaigns offered by your centre or centre group. Because Shopping Centre trips are fairly frequent, Shoppers use centre websites to check out what’s coming up at their ‘local’. By having a presence on your Shopping Centre’s website you are more likely to turn your store into a destination – rather than relying on walk past traffic – next time Shoppers who have browsed the centre’s website visit the centre. Take out banner and click-through ads. Ensure you have online specific offers running that they can redeem when next in the centre (this will also help give you – and Shopping Centre management – an idea of how effective their website is).

HABIT #7: EXTEND YOUR RETAIL SPACE

An additional store space – kiosk style – within eyeline of your current store can double your sales, particularly in key retail periods like Christmas where your core store may be too crowded to fit all potential Shoppers.

Yes you’ll need to pay additional rent, but you can mitigate this cost by offering the centre’s management a package deal on the combined rent.

Pop up stores have been wildly successful overseas and some Centres offer these temporary options to tenants for short periods of time (– these are not the sock retailers that seem to appear in major traffic flow pathways!). Usually implemented as a ‘stunt’ that fits with an overall marketing program, these can sometimes be attractive to your supplier base to launch a new range of products or a new service. Banks are using this as a way of extending their reach.

HABIT #8: EVOLVE YOUR OFFER

Oddly enough, the major retailers that created the furor late last year around the growth of internet sales effecting their business, have now “opened” their own on-line retail offer, one from a virtual shop front in Asia. Surely all of that fuss last year wasn’t to cover up the fact that they had strategically and financially underinvested in the growth options available for their business. No way!

So what is the salutary lesson to us all with this example? Understand that your Shopper’s wants and needs for products and services evolve as much as the options that are available to communicate with them – iphone apps, social media options and direct marketing to name a few.And you need to understand which applications are best to attract and stick Shoppers to your business.

HABIT #9: VISUAL MERCHANDISING

The front of your store is what potential Shoppers see first so why not treat it as the critically important element that it is? Initial impressions count, either good or bad – windows, the entrance path and internal visibility construct that all important initial impression of the front of your store.

Regular Shoppers visit Shopping Centres every 2-3 days and if your front of store treatment does not get a positive response, why leave it unchanged? Two week turnarounds are common for front of store window treatment, but theming the content is also important. Planning your front of store treatment to align with the key events on your promotional calendar is fundamental for any retailer. If you need help to understand or implement, ask an expert to advise you on your best options. Most Centres have experts available who can provide advice free of charge.

Basic housekeeping underpins great Visual Merchandising. If your store looks messy and disorganized why would a Shopper even be attracted to enter and look at what you are offering?

Look at Osh Kosh or Country Road for lessons in managing your VM messages from the front window right through to the fixture, especially with new seasons merchandise all combined to create a fantastic story.

And they illustrate great solutions to their Shoppers which is the intention.

HABIT#10: IN STORE MARKETING

How is your business ‘categorized’ in store? Does it align to a logical sequence and flow? Then, do the key messages and call to action prompts subtly sell your offer?

What ticket types do you use? Tickets for ‘New Line’, “Sale or “Special” and “clearance” should be in every retailer’s toolkit, and probably not many more. Be disciplined about their use. For example ‘Sale’ should be exactly for that and used strategically 2-3 times per year. Shoppers see through permanent Sale events and it amazes me to see how many retailers cycle the same ‘Sale’ offer each week and wonder why there is little Shopper interest.

‘Clearance’ should be used to clear old stock with depth of mark down that ensures quick movement.

The old adage “the first mark down is the best mark down” still rings true. If a line is a dog and has not sold at the regular price, cut it hard and sell it out. Small 10-20% off will not clear a dud buy.

‘New Line’ or just ‘New’ on a product is a powerful message for fashionistas and can create a sale, and not just to introduce new seasons clothing but can be extended to any product in any category.

And now for HABIT #11……DO SOMETHING….ANYTHING!

It amazes me to see Centre based Retailers wondering where their business went. If your business is not growing, or declining, you have a responsibility to do something – anything is better than nothing (which has got you to where you are in the first place)

• Who have you talked to you about your business? Your accountant reports on numbers and is not a retailer by trade. Talk to your Centre Retail management, see what they can offer by way of supporting activity or providing an experienced retail expert to advise you on a few options to consider.
• Have you asked your Shoppers? Ask them, you may be surprised.
• How are the other tenants around you performing?
• Is your decline in customer numbers or in spend, or both?
• Has the competitive set changed in the Centre?
• Have you changed or not changed your range or offer?
• How old is your fit out?
• How shop blind have you actually become as the landscape slowly and subtly changes…..but you haven’t??

Most Shopping Centres have independent retail expert consultants who can provide independent advice on alternatives to grow your business. Ultimately the decision is yours, but talking to and getting advice for someone who has been there/ done that may help you either save your business or get you back on the path to growth.

To sum up, your approach needs to be both internal and external – to cover the bases with both traditional retail media, new media options, your overall initial Shopper front of Store impression and with the Shopping Centre management for incremental opportunities to increase your destination Shopper footfall and thus your sales.

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