In the past, businesses struggled to predict what their customers would like. Decisions such as which products to stock and which store layout customers found most convenient were made through a combination of trial and error and constantly asking customers for their preferences.
As a result, implementing changes to make their services more customer-friendly required painstaking work and a great deal of time.
To improve the customer experience, businesses must first understand how customers behave in their store. This knowledge can then be used to predict how they will behave in future.
Fortunately for today's businesses, the world has moved on to the point where it is possible to track customer behaviour without disturbing customers or infringing their privacy.
Technology solutions have made it possible to analyse and predict customer actions, enabling retailers to optimise their in-store operations and meet every customer's needs.
Here are some of the best customer behaviour analytics solutions available on the market:
People-counting technology
Thanks to people-counting devices installed in their physical stores, retailers can now count the number of people who have entered their store and the number of people in each section at any given time. As a result, businesses can analyse this data to predict future customer behaviour.
If, for example, a retailer knows which section of a store people are most likely to visit, they can place new products there to maximise exposure. With people counters, they can estimate the conversion rate, the number of people who visited the store after a new advertising campaign and the ratio of people who walked past the store to those who came in. All of these can be used to streamline store operations, attract new customers, satisfy existing customers and increase conversion rates.
Heatmaps
Heatmap technology provides in-depth analysis of how customers move around a physical store. It enables you to identify the busiest areas of your space in order to increase your revenue. It also shows visitor flow and tracks their journey through the store: from the entrance, to the sections they visited, the products they looked at, the ones they bought and finally the checkout.
Heatmap data can therefore be used to adjust merchandising for a better customer experience. It also enables retailers to measure and improve the performance of the store's different areas.
Product placement will no longer be based on guesswork, but on customer behaviour data.
Demographic analysis
Demographic analysis technology enables you to analyse the demographics of the people who visit your store, i.e. their gender and the age group they belong to. This information can be used to predict how they will shop and which products interest them.
If, for example, you sell womenswear and demographic analysis shows that most of your customers are young women under 23, you can stock your shelves with on-trend items aimed at people in this age group.
By knowing how satisfied visitors are in your store and the percentage of customers who left in a good mood, you can tell whether your services are satisfactory or whether there are areas for improvement.
All of the above technologies have multiple uses for retailers.
People counters help retailers test new advertising campaigns and boost conversion rates; heatmap technology can be used to improve product placement and in-store operations; and demographic analysis technology to optimise the product range.
Each of the above solutions is enough to revolutionise the way a store operates. However, combining two or more of them would be excellent for your business.
Every decision will be backed by customer behaviour analytics and the effectiveness of each new strategy can be measured; this opens up a world of possibilities.
With anavid, these possibilities are within reach. Retailers have everything to gain from our people-counting, heatmap and demographic analysis technologies and many other features.
Contact us today to discuss your business needs and how anavid can help you achieve your goals.