Digital marketing and traditional advertising outlets provide fantastic opportunities to drive business into your stores. However, there’s a secret tool that is responsible for converting customers once they arrive — in-store marketing.
What Is In-store Marketing?
In-store marketing refers to marketing strategies that target customers while they are in a physical store or brick-and-mortar business. Rather than marketing to customers to drive them into a business, in-store marketing focuses on engaging and converting customers once they are have arrived.
In-store marketing strategies help brands:
- Promote products
- Educate prospects and shoppers
- Drive up-sells and cross-sells
- Generate leads
- Build brand recognition and affinity
- Decrease perceived customer wait-times
- Support sales and customer support teams
In-store marketing allows brands to market to one of the most highly engaged prospects they will ever have — someone in their store. It controls the customer experience, dictates how visitors engage with their surroundings, and eventually drives in-store customers to make purchases.
So, how can your brand embrace in-store marketing strategies?
10 In-Store Marketing Strategies
With just a few steps, you can improve your in-store experience and convince more customers to buy from your brand. Check out these ten in-store marketing strategies to increase sales at your brick-and-mortar store.
1. Offer Free WiFi
One of the easiest ways you can market to customers at your brick and mortar location is with free WiFi. Customers receive your marketing messages when they sign in, allowing you to promote various products and services on offer.
WiFi marketing also has branding benefits that customers appreciate. They are more entertained when they’re playing on their phones and will have more patience when waiting for your staff. This means they are likely to be happier and will return to your business again in the future.
2. Encourage Customers to Check-In and Share
Free customer WiFi also creates opportunities to encourage customers to check-in on social media and share updates related to your brand.
Your customers are already playing on their phones if they are logged-in to your WiFi and it only takes a few seconds to hit the share button.
Consider testing different call-to-actions to get customers to share. You might encourage them to post photos of the products they buy or post before-and-afters from a service. When your brand is tagged, you can expand your reach across the web and grow your business.
3. Upsell Customers With Signage
In-store marketing is all about appealing to customers there and now. Signage is one of your best options to grow your sales and get customers to spend just a few more dollars every time they enter your store.
You can upsell customers by highlighting package deals for additional savings, promoting seasonal products they can try, and explaining the features of your lesser-known options. Clearly displayed and labeled digital signage makes it easy to market to customers and drive sales.
4. Focus on Experiential Marketing
Experiential marketing means turning the shopping process into an experience, rather than a transaction. Healthcare offices do this by offering drinks to patients and creating comfortable waiting rooms, while retail stores create lounges and set up tutorials for shoppers to test.
Look at your business and consider ways to improve the overall experience. This might mean adding more games and activities to your waiting area or changing how your employees interact with clients. Good experiences lead to positive reviews and increased sales from happy customers.
5. Provide Valuable Information to Customers
While entertainment is an important part of the customer experience, so is education. Customers turn to your brand because they think it is the most reliable and that you provide something they can’t get anywhere else.
Make sure you’re providing the right information to customers and positioning yourself as an expert in the field.
Sur la Table is a great example of this. They provide cooking classes to customers to help them prepare delicious meals. Often, customers end up taking some cooking gadgets home, increasing the company’s sales while providing an informational experience.
6. Share Audio Messages With Shoppers
Overhead messaging is a powerful in-store marketing tool to use to talk about upcoming events and promotion opportunities. You can create quick ten-second sound bites that you play in-between songs encouraging people to try a new product or sign up for a service.
The nature of audio means everyone will be aware of the information, even if they’re not looking at your store’s signage or talking to one of your employees.
7. Make Your Entertainment Related to Your Brand
If you distract customers while they wait with music, TV, digital trivia, and other entertainment options, make sure the content is relevant to your brand and supporting your overall vision. Setting up a radio or broadcasting cable TV means you’re at the mercy of other content creators. They might play an inappropriate song or broadcast a competitor’s commercial.
We offer Private Label TV and in-store music licensing specifically to address this problem. You can select the perfect songs and video content to share with your customers, letting you relax knowing the entertainment you feature at your business is relevant to the experience you’re trying to create.
8. Reach Out to Customers for Surveys
Many companies rely on customer surveys to solicit feedback on performance and potential improvements. The cashier typically gives instructions to customers with survey codes on their receipts. However, by the time the customer gets home, they have long forgotten about the survey and won’t make the effort to complete it.
Instead, consider setting up in-store surveys where customers can offer feedback before they leave your location. This could be as simple as setting up a few interactive touchscreens by the exit or asking an employee to survey people before they leave. You can even offer a discount on future services after they complete it. This shows that you’re listening while providing coupons to bring customers back to your business.
9. Host Events Inside Your Offices
Events give customers reasons to visit your location even if they aren’t buying from your brand directly. ABC Wine and Spirits lures people with wine tastings and other samplings. Customers can enjoy the wine and will likely buy a few bottles while they are there.
Most industries are capable of hosting customers for events in some form or another. For example, an automotive business could create a basic car maintenance training course or a spa could host a wellness class or meditation instruction. Even if only a few people attend, in-store events could pay off significantly.
10. Analyze Customer Foot Traffic
If you own a store or business where customers walk around freely to engage with your products or services, then you need to analyze how people experience your set up. For example, retailers in mall locations test how people enter their stores, what they look at first, and what parts of the store they ignore.
To monitor foot traffic, you can use free customer WiFi for tracking. This analysis varies on complexity, but some companies offer sensors that monitor foot traffic and create heatmaps of your store layout with the data.
Launch In-store Marketing Strategies at Your Business
Are you doing everything in your power to convert customers once they enter your business? Are you upselling loyal customers and moving a wide array of products? If you think you can improve your in-store experience, contact Spectrio today. We can analyze your current in-store marketing strategies to learn how you can improve and grow your sales.
For more tips on how to improve the experience inside of your store and upsell customers, check out our free ebook, “How to Provide Exceptional Customer Experiences Using Audio and Video.”