Battling The Online Goliath’s: How Retail Owners Can Still Win The Shopping Wars

Do you own a retail business? Chances are you are feeling the pressure of the online competition, which has certain advantages that retail can’t offer. For the customer, it is the ease of use, being able to add a product to their shopping basket without having to queue in a store to purchase something. The world of retail is having to fight to attract customers over to their side again, encouraging would-be sofa surfers to get off their behinds and back onto the high street.

HOWEVER… retail stores do have advantages over their virtual competition, and you need to capitalise on them to gain some traction in the sales wars. Consider the following…

The overall experience

Entering the retail store needs to be an experience unto itself for the shopper, both physically and sensory. If your store is a pleasure to walk around, your customer is going to stay longer. Alternatively, if your store is drab and badly organised, your customer knows where your front door is! Design agencies, such as the people at http://www.design4retail.co.uk/ have some wonderful ideas for transforming your store if you need help in this area.

Hands-on with the products

Unless you have a strict ‘no touching’ rule, a retail store should allow the customer to have a hands-on experience with a product. This is especially important for clothes shoppers, as online customers have no way of trying on an outfit. Dress sizes are one thing, but it’s also the way a piece of clothing feels to the body that counts as well. Whatever product your retail store sells, the same principles are true. Being able to see and feel a product up close is better than an image on a computer screen.

Customer service

As we mentioned at https://thecareercafe.co.uk/blog/, the human touch is preferable to any A.I. software running behind the scenes of an online store. Being able to speak to somebody for advice is necessary for the shopper, otherwise, they may dither over the buying decision and head elsewhere. Customer service is still limited online, but retail owners can capitalise on this. From giving the customer a friendly smile when they enter the store, to offering advice on a particular product, the retail owner and his staff have the power to enhance the customer’s experience and encourage them to buy. After all, it’s easy for an online customer to press the close button on a website and head to another one, but if they have made the effort to come into your retail store, they may not want to waste time walking down the road to a similar business.

Immediate purchases and returns

When shopping online, the customer will normally have to wait about a week before the product arrives. Alternatively, when shopping in a store, they can walk out with the product and make use of whatever they have purchased quickly. The same applies to any return policies. There is less chance of the customer returning something to a store because they should already have experienced what they are buying. However, if it is faulty, they don’t have to worry about postage and packaging, or a faceless online seller to make a complaint to. Instead, they can simply return to the store and get their money back immediately. Of course, you need to be sure of your position in these cases, but all the info you need can be found at https://www.businesscompanion.info/.

Finally

These are tough times for retail owners, but as the David to the online Goliath, you can still win the fight if you capitalise on the potential advantages we mentioned above.