There should be a new motto for how to win in retail: location, location, location-based services.
According to a new study by Air Miles operator LoyaltyOne, in partnership with the Canadian Marketing Association, there’s a big opportunity for retailers to send shoppers location-based rewards and offers.
With beacon technology, for example, retailers can deliver real-time targeted promotions and notifications that can direct shoppers to specific aisles, merchandise and discounts.
“The Mobile-Driven Shopper” survey asked Air Miles members what is appealing about connecting with retailers through in-store beacons. Sixty-two percent of shoppers said they like the idea of receiving rewards relevant to their location and more than half (56%) like the idea of receiving alerts relevant to their whereabouts.
Almost half (45%) of those surveyed said they have used a mobile device in-store that has led them to make an immediate purchase.
“Retailers have this great opportunity to speak to consumers via their mobile phone, but when you add in the layer of location, they’re speaking to them in a contextually relevant way,” said Michael Cohen, director of mobile API & analytics innovation at LoyaltyOne.
“It’s nice to get a message from a brand that says ‘today we have a sale,’ but it’s better to get that message when you’re actually somewhere where you can action it… If you send a location-based message to my phone, it’s relevant to me, but it’s relevant to me actually in that moment. That’s really the huge opportunity that location brings. It adds context to what are hopefully personalized and relevant messages.”
The survey also found consumer awareness of location-based services is high. More than half (56%) of those surveyed have used beacon technology at some point while shopping and 86% are aware of beacons and location-based services.
But, retailers have to be careful about how many messages they send, and ensure what they’re sending is relevant. Of those surveyed, one-fifth (23%) of respondents said they have uninstalled or opted out of push notifications from a retailer’s app due to the frequency of messaging, while another one-fifth (20%) uninstalled or opted out due to lack of relevance.
“You really just have to nail relevancy of it,” said Cohen. “They can’t be generic messages. They don’t necessarily need to be one-to-one, but [consumers] need to feel like you’re talking to them [individually] versus talking to anyone who walked by.”
In terms of frequency of messaging, Cohen said there used to a school of thought that the person in charge of marketing at any given company would just decide how many times customers want to be contacted. “Given the tools that marketers have at our fingertips today, you want to let the data drive that,” he said.
“That’s why you start small and do some tests because if you’re delivering great, relevant messages, three times a day might be not enough, or it might be too many. But you’ll never know unless you do tests and learn what consumers’ actual behaviour can tell you. And then you can make data-driven decisions instead of gut feel decisions.”
The online survey involved 1,062 Air Miles members, of which 61% were female and 39% male, and was weighted to be representative of active collectors by engagement segment, age and region. LoyaltyOne and CMA’s full report “Using Digital Solutions to Enhance the Customer Experience,” can be found here.
