For businesses to really succeed, it’s important that you make a serious effort to connect with your customers on a much deeper level than usual. It can’t all be about trying to just sell as many products as you can - customers crave a fully-formed experience that engages them personally and with studies showing that 86 percent of consumers state that they’d actually pay more for better customer experience, it’s vital you put on emphasis on that.
So, here’s how you can measure customer engagement in retail based on the experiences you provide.
The metrics you should measure for customer engagement include:
How Long Your Customers are Waiting in Queues
“The psychology of queuing is more important than the statistics of the wait itself.” That’s something MIT theory professor Richard Larson believes, stating that we all tend to think we’ve been standing in a queue a lot longer than we actually have.
With studies finding that long queues seem to be a problem for customers and can impact their satisfaction, this is a metric you need to analyse.
Analyse how long your customers are waiting in queues, on average, at different stages throughout the week. Measure this metric on different days at different times in different periods, such as when your store is the busiest and quietest.
You might find that you need to make several important changes if the queues are too long and those same customers aren’t coming back for that reason, such as having more staff available at desks to shorten the queues.
How Long Your Customers are Spending in the Centre
You should also measure how long your customers are staying in your retail centre as well as the areas in which they tend to spend the most and least time.
Measuring this metric gives you an indication of how long customers are staying in your centre before either making a purchase, engaging in some way or leaving entirely without doing either of those things. This shows that what you’re doing currently is working or that you need to make changes.
By analysing the areas in your centre where customers tend to spend the most or least time, you can also make changes to your store layout. Monitor foot traffic and patterns that are created when customers move from area to area. You can use this to improve displays to increase dwell times.
You can even try the tactic of placing concession stands at popular dwell points to encourage your shoppers to make further purchases and boost revenue.
How Many Complaints or Positive Feedback You’re Getting
Perhaps the biggest way to see whether you’re providing a stellar customer experience or if you’re falling short is to see how many complaints you’re receiving on average from customers, as well as the level of positive feedback shoppers provide.
Asking for both positive and negative feedback is a good method of maintaining customer loyalty in the first place. It shows customers that you genuinely care about their experience in your store and want their input on what you did well and areas in which you can further improve.
By asking for this level of feedback, you can analyse the results of this metric to work on fixing the common complaints you receive and continue excelling in the areas where your customers are most engaged and impressed.
How Engaged Your Customers are with Your Loyalty Programme
Loyalty cards like Nectar card or even in restaurants like Nando’s offer customers points for how much they spend in-store. A study in 2015 showed that almost 46.5 million people, equating to 92 percent of the adult population, were registered with at least one loyalty card programme at the time, with the average shopper signing up to three.
It shows that businesses are offering a reward that warrants shoppers signing up. This encourages them to spend more so that eventually they can redeem the reward on offer, such discounts or other enticing benefits.
Measure the effectiveness of your own loyalty programme. Analyse how many shoppers are currently signed up to your loyalty programme, how many are signing up or opting out on a monthly basis and even ask for feedback from customers that aren’t signed up to your loyalty scheme.
Amazing figures show that your loyalty scheme is working and your customers are engaged and loyal enough to keep returning and spending more money. If you find that shoppers are losing interest and are opting out or some are just refusing, then it might mean you need to tweak your rewards and the scheme itself to get more shoppers engaged.
How You Can Measure it all Much Easier
Measuring all of the metrics above can be tricky unless you have the right platform or tool in place, such as a WiFi provider that lets you own all of the data for you to analyse. A fully-branded WiFi provider, like WiFi SPARK, not only keeps your brand at the centre of attention but lets you integrate with loyalty databases so your schemes are much easier to analyse.
The data lets you better understand the demographics of your customers, their interests and the way they behave. For example, heat maps allow you to see the areas in your store where shoppers tend to spend the most time compared to the least. You can also monitor foot traffic, how customers move throughout your store and the patterns they create along with identifying the busiest and quietest times.
Owning all of this data and analysing it means you can increase dwell time in your store and measure just how engaged customers are in your store. If the data signals that the figures are relatively low, it shows which areas you can improve on engaging your shoppers.
By using a platform like WiFi SPARK, you can interact with customers on a personal level, getting to know what makes them tick and keep them engaged to the best of your ability.
Find Out More on How You Can Keep Your Customers Better Engaged Through WiFi
By getting smarter about your marketing tools and integrating them through WiFi, you can enhance your brand awareness, improve shopper satisfaction, increase loyalty and more. To find out more on how you can collect data to target advertising, introduce loyalty schemes and keep your customers informed, download our free customer engagement guide.
It'll show you everything from boosting brand exposure through a WiFi network and actionable tips on increasing repeat business to upselling to current customers and so much more.
Click on the link below to download your copy.
