Do you know why your customers buy from you rather than your competitors? Having the answer to this question will show you consumer buying behavior and allow better navigation toward purchase.
All companies, from the local corner shop to a gigantic store chain, aim to create shopping experiences which end with a sale. And at the same time, everyone tries to provide great customer experience in order to create customer satisfaction and thus, loyalty. In doing all of this, businesses employ psychology of shopping. Discounts, store odor and background music are just few details of psychology of shopping. In this entry, I want to talk about how GAP’s sales funnel incorporated a brilliant decision making process navigation for a buyer.
1. Are you guiding your potential customers?
Think of guiding your customer like the trailers shown before the movies. You make your client realize the buying potential. Trailers make you wonder about that movie and make you want to watch it. So, you should start showing your products at strategic locations inside your store; don’t limit yourself to the storefront of your store.
GAP is able to guide customers through its stores successfully. What they do is categorizing the products smartly and feature the most popular products on the mannequins. This prevents GAP customers from getting lost among the myriad of products in the store.
2. Can you solve the fitting room dilemma?
The dilemma starts off with a very normal process. After a customer chooses some clothes, he or she goes to the fitting room. And then most customers fail to make a buying decision in the fitting rooms. Scott Bearse, a retail expert, has a detailed research about consumer behavior related to this issue. His research mentions that “customers leave shops empty-handed more often because they are “unable to decide”, rather than due to prices being too high.” The fitting room experience is a huge part of the entire experience of a customer. So, in order to overcome this dilemma, you need to create an excellent customer experience in the fitting room.
GAP uses Pisano real-time digital surveys in front of the fitting rooms. Through the surveys, GAP both collects customer feedback and gives a discount coupon to use within the day. This provides a solution to the fitting room confusion. Thanks to Pisano-enriched sales funnel of GAP, sales visibly increased. For its next step, GAP plans to give its customers another discount coupon to use in its online store when they provide feedback via Pisano digital surveys. As a result, GAP will have incentivized its customers to experience both online and offline shopping.
This joint project of GAP and Pisano is an excellent opportunity for GAP to learn its brand value in the eyes of its customers. The process takes place anytime and anywhere, and it serves to also guide GAP’s customers toward better experiences and more purchase.
