Showrooming is on the tip of the industry tongue lately, but real, actionable ways to combat this mobile boogeyman are few and far between.
That’s why we liked the advice doled out by Tim Callan in Chain Store Age. Callan argues that retailers have plenty of metrics available to them to determine whether or not their customers are actually engaged in showrooming—and what can be done to address it.
Getting the customer experience right
How long do your customers spend inside your stores? Where do they linger? How long was the average engagement with particular products?
These questions can easily be answered by:
- Measuring traffic and dwell time to determine if and where inside the store customers may be engaged in showrooming
- Provide customer wifi in store and review usage logs to see which mobile sites customers access
Once you’ve determined that showrooming is actually happening, take action. Discount those products, or enabled your sales staff to do so. Put a heavy emphasis on service and professional sales staff; focus on the customer’s in-store experience to woo them away from their mobile devices.
Take note of brands like Nordstrom, which overcomes a tight economic climate by achieving excellence in relationships—consumers know when they walk into a Nordstrom location, they will have an experience that includes outstanding (and personal) customer service.
Showrooming may very well be a fact of life in the omnichannel world. Using common-sense metrics to develop actionable solutions will help keep the boogeyman at bay.
