Life and the news cycle both slow down in the summer, giving InternetRetailing readers the chance to catch up on some stories that may have slipped past during the year. This year we’re marking each of the six core summer holiday weeks by focusing on our core InternetRetailing themes and revisiting some of the ways that we’ve explored those themes in print. We’re reviewing, reconsidering and reminding of some of the critical lessons, practical examples, and ideas that could work for others just as well as they already have for IRUK Top500 retailers.
This week we started with Brand Engagement, and we’ll be turning out attention to The Customer, Merchandising, Mobile & Crosschannel, Operations & Logistics and Strategy & Innovation over the coming weeks.
In today’s InternetRetailing newsletter we report that more than a half of customers buy as a result of a purchase-related in-app advertisement, and 75% of UK adult consumers move to competitor sites as slow-loading pages silently kill conversion rates.
As it appears in our reportage, retailers who want to their drive brand engagement and speed-up conversion rates must step up their ’conversion-capturing’ techniques by integrating a mobile-first strategy into their business, as we report on about IKEA’s plans to open a customer-centric and digitalised ’advice store.’ The retailer will link the real world of in-store with the mobile world of its augmented reality (AR) Place mobile app-all in the name of delivering personalised service for customers’ home projects.
This suggests that mobile-first retailers are winning, because of simplistic elements such as
ease and speed of delivery of their desired product. Customers have always wanted the same things, and now with mobile gaining momentum retailers must preserve traditional customer preferences and add innovative techniques to it.
Meanwhile, today’s guest comment comes from Roland van Breukelen who recaps on the value of the GDPR for retailers in delivering tailored experiences based on customers’ data.
Today we are also covering four tried and tested approaches for brand engagement, following an exemplary case study of Wickes, which stands out as a retailer in its way for delivering information into customers’ hands, ranging from advice to inspiration.
We conclude this newsletter with a useful guide on how to use Pinterest for retailers.’ This piece explains how retailers can capitalise on shoppers’ ’me’ time to sell their products.
Photo credit: Fotolia
