Sales associates in stores or even working from home can now sell to consumers using WhatsApp, improving both in-store and online conversions, says the company behind the technology.
Mercaux, a digital transformation company has launched Remote Selling via WhatsApp, providing a new channel for sales associates and leveraging previous online and in-store engagements with a brand. This, says the company, represents a brand-new revenue stream for both online and physical retail.
As retail stores transition from being simple sales channels into multiple purpose centres, remote selling is one of the most transformative areas. By using the skills of the sales associate to sell remotely to customers, the store is able to contribute even more to the success of the business, by both generating incremental revenues and improving customer lifetime value.
According to Mercaux, there are two types of conversations that are facilitated by this new solution.
The first. converts sales with larger basket sizes by replying to inbound requests. Store associates are alerted to inbound requests from customers scanning a QR code, or clicking on a link that’s displayed on a retailer’s website, in a web chat conversation, in a social media post/ bio description, or as a call to action in marketing communications. The most appropriate sales associate based on store location and their recent activity with the Mercaux App is then assigned to the conversation to ensure a speedy response.
The second generates brand new revenues by instigating new outbound conversations. Here, store associates can initiate a conversation from the profile of a customer in Mercaux’s Clienteling Solution. They might like to extend a conversation that originated in-store for customers who have recently visited, or they can send a tailored message based on a topic relevant to that customer from a ‘list view’ in Clienteling, such as upcoming birthdays, new collections or their VIP status.
Olga Kotsur, co-founder & CEO, says: “What makes this new solution stand out is the timing of the conversation and the super high relevancy of the topics being discussed. Whereas other remote selling solutions provide the digital tools to facilitate a remote selling conversation, we’re taking this two steps further by providing tailored talking points for the store associate to use and an easy way to share products with the customer through a seamless integration with our Assisted Selling solution. So, not only do we provide the ability to communicate remotely with customers, but we also provide the reasons why – the tailored talking points.”
To ensure tight control over the messages that are being relayed to customers, every conversation is recorded on to the customer’s profile so they can be viewed by management teams. In addition, every product shared and every product ‘liked’ by the customer is also stored on the customer’s profile to be analysed by HQ Teams or used by store associates and marketing teams in future engagement with the brand.
To see a product demo of this solution, register here
