RETAILERS GEAR UP FOR THE FESTIVE SEASON
With the holiday shopping season on the horizon, retailers are heading into the busiest buying season of the year, with consumers searching for the perfect gift for family and friends. This year, retailers are anticipating greater consumer spending amidst ongoing economic recovery and are mapping out strategies to ensure that they make the most from festive sales.
According to Deloitte, holiday retail sales are likely to increase between 7% and 9% in 2021 and hit $1.28 – $1.3 trillion from November to January. Asia-Pacific is expected to witness a rise in shopper traffic during the festive period, as vaccination rates rise and consumers regain confidence in returning to physical stores. In fact, 91% of consumers in India plan to shop and make a purchase during this festive season.
The retail industry is constantly evolving; technological advancements have changed the way consumers interact with brands and products, from the ease at which they are able to receive information to the way they digest an abundance of content.
Retailers need to modernise their stores and improve the customer experience to distinguish their brand. To this end, retailers are leveraging digital signage solutions as part of an omnichannel strategy to offer a personalised experience, optimise foot traffic conversions and boost revenue.
Steve Hawkes, COO – APJ at Sitecore said, “ We are seeing many consumer marketers increasingly relying on digital initiatives to capture the needed increase in sales this Christmas shopping season.”
DIGITAL STRATEGIES THAT RETAILERS CAN ADOPT
Here are several digital strategies that retailers can adopt to attract eyeballs and boost conversions during the upcoming festive season.
- Create a themed shopping experience: A themed shopping experience offers shoppers a unique and memorable shopping affair. Retailers can craft a magical experience and decorate their stores based on festive themes such as: Winter Wonderland, Santa’s Journey and Thanksgiving Traditions. Create an immersive experience and bring video walls to life with vivid festive videos and 3D animation.
- Captivate attention with outdoor digital signage: Utilise outdoor digital signage to showcase festive bestsellers and entice passers-by into the store. Reach a wide audience and increase engagement with a touchscreen interactive kiosk that features digital wayfinding and other useful information for shoppers.
- Increase personalisation: Smart digital signage embedded with visual sensors can detect audience age, gender, shopping path and dwell time. Offer a personalised experience and influence purchase behaviour by triggering targeted content based on audience personas.
- Introduce an interactive fitting room assistant: Create a highly personal and bespoke shopping affair with an interactive fitting room assistant. Improve the process of trying on clothes by allowing shoppers to try a look digitally via a virtual mannequin software. Automate product discovery and facilitate suggestive selling to enhance the customer experience.
- Encourage product discovery with Lift & Learn: Lift & Learn is an interactive solution that presents customers with an engaging, personalised shopping experience. Lifting a product triggers product information to be displayed on a screen, allowing customers to learn more about the product and facilitating product comparison. Analytics gathered help retailers optimise store displays and improve sales conversions.
TRANSFORM YOUR STORE WITH SCALA DIGITAL SIGNAGE SOLUTIONS
Digital signage helps retailers to transform their store and create immersive customer experiences to stay ahead of the competition.
Scala provides effective and reliable digital signage solutions for retail stores. Kickstart your retail transformation today with Scala digital signage solutions.
Esther Chew is the Sr. Manager – Corp Comm & Marketing at STRATACACHE Asia-Pacific and is responsible for developing and implementing the internal and external communications strategy and programmes across Asia-Pacific. She drives the company’s corporate image and brand messaging through integrated and strategic communications leveraging various platforms such as executive communication, client communication, digital marketing, media relations and B2B events.
