In times of “social distancing” consumers choose to (or they’re forced to) stay home. With restaurants, bars, clubs, malls, and event venues closed, overall foot traffic will automatically decline. The challenge for you as a brick & mortar retailer is figuring out how to navigate this pandemic and keep your brick & mortar business alive. Good news: It can be done!
As the pandemic forced employees to work from home, many realized they needed to update their furniture. Specifically, their home office. The question is: How can this be done with low foot traffic or with the doors to your store closed, even?
How to Keep Your Brick & Mortar Business Alive During the Coronavirus Pandemic
It’s time to think outside the box and make use of the resources you have. Remote selling is the solution that allows shoppers to still make major purchases while allowing your sales staff to work in isolated circumstances – either at the store or at home. Here’s how you can get started with remote selling right away:
1. Use your customer contact lists for cold calls and to email your customers.
Have your RSAs (Retail Sales Associates) reach out to past customers and leads you have generated over time. Use your in-store offers or previous items they’ve viewed to pique interest and spark a conversation. In times like these, it’s really not hard to find an icebreaker topic…
Need Help Putting Together a Lead List of Customers?
Use the Share & Shop Reports in the Catalog App Manager (CAM) to gather contact information from guests who have used kiosks in your store. Any shopper who has ever sent products to themselves via email or text will appear here.
Pro Tip: if you have multiple stores under one account, sort by “Device”. You can view collected customer contact information at that specific location’s kiosks.
For more detailed information on how to access the customer contact information collected on your kiosk, check out How to Use Share & Shop to See Detailed Customer Data and How to Access Email & Text Message Reports.
2. Use your Catalog Kiosk ‘Endless Aisle’ Application to facilitate over-the-phone or email consultations for consumers interested in buying.
You can use your Catalog Kiosk app as a selling tool when working with shoppers over the phone or via email. The kiosk app has built-in features that allow you to:
- Send product information via text and email (and collect the shopper’s information in the process)
- Share entire shopping carts via text and email for approval (can be used to quote items)
- Save shopping carts to revisit them after the customer thinks it over
- Send a financing application link directly from the kiosk for an easy & remote financing solution
There is more information on the above-mentioned features after Step 3. So, keep reading! 🙂
3. For a more in-depth and interactive shopping experience, co-browse with consumers using the Catalog Kiosk Desktop App and screen share.
Create a guided virtual shopping experience with consumers. Furniture is a big-ticket item and requires a consultative approach to make sure concerns and questions can be addressed. Take your shopper on a virtual tour of all products in your store – allowing the RSA to direct the browsing experience in the catalog app.
For more information on how to use the Wondersign Desktop App (Windows/Mac) and screen sharing options, visit: How to Offer Remote Co-Browsing With Your Catalog Kiosk
As promised above, here’s some more information on some of the built-in features of the Catalog Kiosk that make it easier for you to facilitate remote selling.
Sharing Product Information via Text and Email
In a lot of cases, you’re already doing this today. Let’s say you have a shopper on the phone and they are interested in purchasing a new sofa for their home. They aren’t comfortable leaving their home at the time because they prefer to be socially distant, however, they would still like the experience of shopping with an RSA to get expert suggestions.
Simply use the Send as Text/Send as Email feature to immediately text or email product information, imagery, and dimensions to the shopper while you are speaking with them. Get their feedback in real-time and tailor the conversation and the path to purchase to their answers and reactions.
If you want the Send button to stand out more, read this quick helpdesk article. Learn how to change the color of the button to increase usage.
What Will My Shopper See?
If the shopper decides to use text as the method of receiving the information, they will receive a text message with a link. The link will take them to a landing page that has the same images and product information that is displayed in your Catalog Kiosk app.
Pro Tip: to avoid cross-shopping while sharing your product information with guests, hide your pricing and SKUs from the information sent. By default, they are both hidden. You can change these preferences in your Catalog App Manager (CAM).
For more information about your settings for sharing products via text or email please visit: How to Manage the Kiosk’s Store-to-Shopper Email & Text Messaging Features
Save & Share Shopping Carts via Text and Email
Back to our socially distant shopper who’s forced to work from home. They realize that they could really use a new desk for their newly needed home office.
First, use the filter options to narrow the results down to the preferences of the shopper. Let’s say this shopper is looking for a desk made of wood. Use the Material filter and select Wood.
Once you’ve narrowed down the results to wooden desks, send your shopper the items you think are the best fit for their home. Add all the items in question to the shopping cart and save the cart. Make sure cart saving is enabled for your devices in the Catalog App Manager (CAM). This setting allows you to save entire shopping carts on your devices, so they can be retrieved later. When working with your customers remotely, saving their carts for later is a crucial piece of the shopping experience.
Save the cart with the shopper’s name. When they are ready to discuss their intended purchase, you can easily pull up the products that you were looking at previously.
Once the shopper has their final decision on the items they would like to purchase, you can share the entire shopping cart with them to get final approval. Letting them look over everything before collecting payment will help avoid any miscommunication on what the consumer is purchasing.
What Will My Shopper See?
If the shopper decides they want the shopping cart sent to their email, they will receive a list of the item names and a small preview image. The item price and SKU can also appear if you decide to have that information available.
Similar to sharing product information, you can control the information shared. To avoid cross-shopping, you can hide pricing and SKUs. To use it for quoting, you would enable pricing for shared carts but leave SKUs hidden. For more information on hiding SKUs visit: How to Hide or Display SKUs on the Kiosk & in Emails Sent From the Kiosk
Pro Tip: Set a reply email address that is monitored. When consumers receive shared products and carts and are ready to purchase, they can message you directly from the kiosk. You can check and change these preferences in your Catalog App Manager (CAM) under Device Group Settings.
Visit our resource to learn more about using your reply email address to share products and carts via text or email.
For more information about your overall shopping cart settings please visit: How to Manage the Kiosk’s Shopping Cart Feature
Remote Financing Solution
To continue business as usual during this pandemic, you need to offer remote financing and purchasing methods. The financing waterfall built into the kiosk app makes it easy to get the financing application process started. Enter the consumer’s phone number into the form on the kiosk. They will get a text with a link to complete the application.
Consumers can complete the application at home, on their device, with the Wondersign Financing Waterfall.
Visit wndr.ws/finance for more information on the financing waterfall and to sign up.
Why Not Send the Consumer Over to My Website?
- Cross-shopping. You are opening up your potential customer to a gigantic marketplace of online competition. While they are on your website, they can easily cross-shop other sites to find a “better” offer.
- Lack of control. When shoppers browse on your website, you have no control over the conversation, their shopping journey, or their reservations.
- Limited shopping experience. Without an RSA present to provide a true consultation and give knowledgeable suggestions, consumers are missing out on a large part of the buying experience typically given in your store. There is no one to answer questions or help shoppers find what they are looking for.
- Lower ticket size. Online purchases have significantly lower average ticket sizes. Remote selling suggests add-on items the consumer may want to purchase.
- You’re losing to the Status Quo. Without someone available to answer questions in real time, most shoppers leave your site without making a purchase.
If you are new to Wondersign and are interested in signing up, contact us at sales@wondersign, or fill out this quick form.