Tag Archive for: customer experience

Window Shoppers: Turn them into Customers [Part 2]

One of the previous articles published concluded that it is possible to turn window shoppers into customers. It didn’t go into the how’s or the why’s, but it did explain the who’s. Window shoppers have a variety of reasons why they are not ready – or willing – to purchase. Determining their openness to a sales pitch – or indeed, further conversation – is the primary step to establishing whether or not they can be turned into potential customers. Once that has been determined, the question is then: how?

How to convert a window shopper into a customer

In essence, any person who walks into a store is a potential customer. It is the purpose of the customer service representative to close the deal.

This begins and ends with one term: connect.

Connect

Connect is the first stage in any customer journey. It involves greeting customers, engaging them, and building a rapport with them from the moment that they walk into the store. It is sales staff’s job to connect with potential customers. This is true for every type of customer that walks into a store, be they a regular, an unpleasable customer, or a window shopper.

As we have discovered, most people are willing to wait up to 2 minutes before they are offered assistance. Essentially, that means staff has 2 minutes to establish a conversation with customers the moment they walk in.

How to Connect

One of the first things that staff needs to learn is how to not give a prospective customer the option of shutting down the conversation straight away. This mainly means not asking the ‘Can I help you?’ question. Why? Because this is a closed question, all the window shopper has to do is say ‘No’ and that’s it. Not the best way to start a conversation.

Instead, train staff to ask open questions that enable the shopper to answer in more detail:

  • “Hi there, have you been here before?” leads to “Let me show you around!” or “Welcome back, let me show you our new arrivals!”
  • “Welcome to [insert store name here], how are you?” opens the conversation to further small talk.
  • “Hi, I noticed you looking at [insert products here]…” this sort of conversation starter allows for staff to talk about product benefits and features, opening the conversation even further and hopefully sparking interest in the window shopper.

Developing these types of conversational tactics will also impact the sales pitch. Pitching becomes easier when staff has established a conversation with a customer. Things can go wrong at any stage in a conversation, however, and it’s important for staff to realize how to make their pitches. If the conversation has been about purple socks, for example, it makes little sense to suddenly start talking about the specials on tennis rackets. Common sense rules supreme: it’s vital to adjust the sales script to the customer.

Another thing that shouldn’t be forgotten is your unique selling point (USP). Giving customers, window shoppers or otherwise, a reason why they should make their purchase with your business and not the competition is the best way to convert them. It’s not always easy to put your USP into words, but it’s important to do so.

So, what makes window shoppers different from other conversions?

Nothing. The big secret to converting window shoppers into customers is to treat them like any other customer that walks in. All the tricks of the trade that staff learn when talking with customers, closing deals with regulars, can and should be applied to window shoppers – after all, you won’t know if they’ll become customers unless you try it out, and at the end of the day, isn’t that they point?

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[Intern Insight] Imagining the Future: My Future Shopping Experience

We have come to an end. This is the final article in this series and I’ve been struggling to find a fitting finale for it. We have covered topics ranging from customer service, customization, psychology to retail sustainability and global influence. All relevant sides to this major economic engine. I have conducted relevant research and read a lot of expert opinions. I think the only thing left to say is how I picture my future shopping experience.

What makes me so special?

Simply? The future shopper generation is my generation: The Millennials (Synchrony Financial, 2017). These shoppers will be technology-oriented. I am a futurist, hence the title. These shoppers will make purchases mostly online, but they will visit brick-and-stones store to benefit from merged service experiences! I’m partial to bookshop-cafés for example. Further, Millennial shoppers will opt for augmented reality to enhance their experience (ibid); I limit myself to trying out new hairstyles on mobile apps…

What I am trying to say is that I am a tiny drop in a massive storm that is about to come down on the retail industry. Together with my fellow “drops”, I have the power to shape the future and this is how I picture my future shopping experience:

First, I would like to bring to your attention the Law of Technological Adoption. As Taylor Romero said in his TED Talk “Everything invented before you were born: it’s just how it’s always been. Everything invented before you were 30: it’s innovation. Everything invented after you are 30: it’s impossible.” (Taylor Romero, 2016).

Let’s take a product that I like: books. You cannot go wrong with books. Nowadays, books come in many formats; hardcover, softcover, eBooks, audio books. When I was a kid, those formats were more limited. So, softcover and hardcover, it’s just how it’s always been. Ebooks? Innovation. I can take an entire library with me in just one tiny device, everywhere, every day. Currently, I’m still in my ‘innovation’ window of opportunity. What I really want, what I imagine many an avid reader wants, is total immersion in the world of stories.

I would love to walk into a bookshop and be welcomed by the smell of chocolate, hot pastry, and fresh paper. When I walk into a specific section, I want the authors to talk to me, let them be the advertisers.

Imagine a holographic Shakespeare popping up in the Classics section to tell you more about Hamlet, or King Lear, or Romeo and Juliet. This technology is not as science fiction as you might think. With the help of digital holographic projectors and optical screens that reflect the light of projected holographic 3-D images to a target observation area, digital 3-D signage and holographic in-car dashboard display is just around the door (Phys, 2016). Why shouldn’t it be adopted in the retail industry?

How wonderful would it be, if I would walk into the Fantasy aisle and an entire panorama of the Lord of the Rings’ Middle Earth would appear with Aragorn’s holographic self to escort me to the cashier. Talk about personalization!

If I had doubts about my choice of literature and immersion, then the augmented reality technology from my phone would help me understand what each book is about. In any of these situations, I would get my information instantly and accurately, no “buffering” for me, no sir! Because I have no patience. My gratification needs to be instant.

For a long time, I thought that this imagined experience was just wishful thinking, a daydream, but technology has this miraculous quality of transforming the abstract into almost tangible interactions.

Technology is the avatar of what we dream and cannot express.

It makes self-interaction possible without selfishness. The retail industry of the future can help me understand myself better: letting me explore the reasons why I like certain products or services, the reason why I chose them, or why I am not trying out new ones. Most importantly, the accessibility of the retail industry would be so easy; I would not be held back by the inertia of buying simply because it’s comfortable. Everything will be comfortable. What is left to say other than the fact that I am looking forward to the future. And William Shakespeare speaking to me from the aisles. And being guided to a cashier by a favourite character. Thank you for imagining the future with me.

This post is brought to you by one of AQ’s Undergraduates, Laura Susnea. As part of our internship programs, undergraduates and classic interns are encouraged to take part in company culture. Laura’s primary project focusses on training programs and eLearning and how best to adapt this to industries under pressure.

This is the final entry for the Imagining the Future series. The entire collection can be read here.

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Window Shoppers: Turn them into Customers [Part 1]

Sales Staff: Hi! Welcome to Sample Store! Were you looking for anything in particular?
Window Shoppers: I’m just browsing. Thanks.

Many customer service representatives are familiar with this exchange. Many people come into stores just to have a quick look around. These window shoppers have a variety of reasons why they might only be browsing. Most of the time, sales staff will leave these people alone, preferring to service people who are actually interested in making a purchase; window shoppers are just a waste of time. Or are they?

What are window shoppers & why do they do it?

Window shoppers are people who browse a shop’s products and services without the intent to make a purchase. Their reasons vary, of course, but when narrowed down it can usually be assumed that it’s one of the following:

1. Wishlisting

Wishlisting involves people browsing products that they don’t actually need/want right at this moment, but they are looking at something they might buy in the future. Call it a daydream. It can also mean that the shopper can’t afford the products in-store at the moment, but is hoping to be able to afford them at some point in their life. These people are looking for inspiration, and are easy to talk to. They’re not ready to purchase now, but that doesn’t mean they should be ignored – there’s a potential future sale here, and the pitching should start now.

2. Comparing

A shopper might be checking on the quality or price of products and services to get themselves the best offer available. They’re looking for answers: why should they purchase your product/service over the competitions’? These are the window shoppers really worth talking to: connecting with these people will allow businesses to beat the competition.

3. Waiting

Perhaps the shopper is filling the time before another engagement – picking up their kids from karate practice, or before a dentist appointment. They could be waiting to meet someone, using your store a landmark; they could simply be waiting for a taxi or Uber. The fact is, they’re waiting, and it’s not for you or your sales pitches.

How to tell what type of window shopper you’ve got on your hands…

Window shoppers are easy to dismiss – after all, they’ve inferred that they would rather be left alone, and certainly some of them should be. The trick is to learn to differentiate between a definitive ‘I’m just browsing’ and an open-to-conversation ‘I’m just browsing’.

A lot of this will come from experience – customer service representatives who have been in the game a long time will be able to spot the different window shoppers from a mile away – but for the most part it’s all about paying attention.

We can learn a lot about a person’s openness to sales talk just by actively listening to what they’re saying, and how they’re saying it. Pay attention to the way a window shopper responds to the initial ice-breaker. Do they meet your eyes, do they smile? Is their body language open or closed? Closed would imply that they turn away from you, giving you the distinct impression that they want to be left alone and the conversation is over. Someone who is open to continuing the conversation is more likely to turn towards the sales representative, this should act as an invitation to continue the conversation.

Aside from body language, it’s important to watch window shoppers as they browse your wares. Are they checking for certain elements in particular? Colours, pricing, quality? Depending on the situation, you could attempt to approach them again once you’ve determined that they’re looking at particular things. (Note how I said ‘at particular things’ not ‘for particular things’, remember, they may not be ready to make a purchase just yet.)

Is it possible to convert a window shopper into a customer?

In short? Yes. Every person who walks into a store can be turned into a customer. That’s the purpose of having sales staff in play to start with. Even a window shopper who doesn’t express immediate interest in making a purchase can become a customer.

In Part 2 of this article, we’ll explore the how.

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