In the Era of Digital Technology, the Personal Touch Still Makes a Difference
The Power of Personalization: Consumers Increasingly Seek Customized Offers
It seems everyone today boasts a public profile on social networks from Facebook and Twitter to LinkedIn. And in the e-commerce space, consumers have become armchair critics, commenting on retailers, products and services via customer reviews. In turn, notions of privacy have been upended in the era of social sharing.
So it’s not surprising that most shoppers (74%), are willing to share some level of personal information with retailers, such as their age, likes, dislikes and purchasing history. As a bargain never goes out of style, those shoppers reluctant to share are swayed most by discount offers to provide their personal information. But they expect personalized product and sales offers in return.
One-size-fits-all retail promotions and blanket sale offers, like a diaper coupon emailed to a woman without children, seem woefully archaic today.
Shoppers prefer receiving personalized offers, for example, before leaving home via email rather than in the store so they can plan ahead. That’s because consumers often research products online, or “webroom,” before heading to the store to make a purchase. By contrast, once consumers are near a store or shopping its aisles, a relevant text offer is preferred, shoppers surveyed said.Retailers now make product recommendations based on shoppers’ purchasing patterns. That’s helped condition consumers to expect offers targeted directly at them.But while consumers increasingly expect retailers to be clued in to their needs with customized offers, they want to determine themselves how they get those offers. Once they’ve set the agenda, they’re open to a variety of marketing tactics.
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White Paper: Mobile Coupon Return on Investment
Mobile coupon popularity is growing rapidly in the retail sector. One analyst firm, solely focused on mobile, predicts that mobile coupons redeemed will almost double between 2014 and 2019 to more than 31 billion.
Initially, the move to incorporate mobile coupons into the mix of discounts available to consumers was driven by retailers wanting to provide a unique and improved consumer experience. In addition, a handful of retailers were looking for a solution that would limit their coupon liability exposure through the use of one-time-use mobile coupons. Today, a majority of retailers are interested in the ROI of implementing a mobile coupon solution as mobile coupon use is becoming increasingly popular with consumers. This is also driving the adoption of area-imaging (2D) scanners capable of reading QR codes and other coupons directly off the screen of customers’ mobile devices.
Top Ten Reasons Retailers Upgrade to Area-Imagers
Traditional laser scanners read linear bar codes at the point-of-sale—a technology that greatly simplified checkout. But today’s highly developed area-imaging scanners enable greater capability and flexibility, putting far more productivity into the hands of retail employees and allowing for revenue-generating mobile marketing initiatives.
With these advantages, it’s no wonder VDC’s 2013 Report forecasts area-imaging scanners sales to grow at a rate of 13.4% for the next three years, compared to the expected 7.3% decline for laser-based scanners over the time period. Imaging technology is firmly established as a cost-effective, durable, technologically capable alternative to laser-based systems. Plus, imagers are capable of supporting retailer’s mobile marketing programs, capturing mobile coupons right off customers’ smartphone screens or automatically collecting their information from ID cards for loyalty program auto-enrollment. Continue reading »
Unitech MS380 Wireless Scanner: Scanning A Barcode on a Smartphone Screen
Smartphones are everywhere and your business can benefit from them if they have the right technology in place. Not every barcode scanner out their can easily scan a code from a Smartphone LCD screen, but the Unitech MS380 can! Quickly and easily read coupons or promotional offers with barcodes off of a customer’s smartphone.
This video demonstrate how the MS380 wireless scanner can easily scan a barcode off of any smartphone LCD screen.
Honeywell Retail 2D
Today, retailers face a new connected customer that expects a seamless and customized shopping experience across different channels, from websites to mobile applications to in-store. This new technology-empowered shopper uses the Internet and a smartphone to search, compare, evaluate, and buy products and services, and most importantly, to engage and interact with retailers in order to get tailored offers.
To meet their customers’ expectations, leading retailers are investing in new technologies and tools to capture and analyse customer behavior and align their offering with customer demands, especially in stores, where customers still make most of their shopping decisions. In-store staff needs to be empowered with new mobile solutions which improve their productivity, while helping them connect with their customers and provide personalized service.
Thanks to these new tools, retailers can capture, connect and embed the two critical dimensions of today’s retail strategy in their processes: customer insight and product information. This is what we in Honeywell call Retail 2D.
