Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
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Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#2I do the opposite. I don't want to spend the time driving around looking at stuff, so I research online, and then find where it's sold locally. 'cause I want it the instant I pay for it, and returns are much easier and immediate at a store.
I do buy from Amazon, but Amazon is also one of the best research tools for local buying.
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#3I do the opposite. I don't want to spend the time driving around looking at stuff, so I research online, and then find where it's sold locally. 'cause I want it the instant I pay for it, and returns are much easier and immediate at a store. I do buy from Amazon, but Amazon is also one of the best research tools for local buying.
I am like this also... I wish I could just type into a search engine what I'm looking for and it comes up with
"Hey, this thing is available at these local retailers for these prices, all within 5km of your house. Here are the returns policies for those places. Here are the caveats to their warranty programs. These places have free parking. Caution: Place X, Y or Z only takes cash. Here's a list of ATMs enroute."
I really only buy from Amazon if I don't need something right now. Parting with my money only to have to wait for what I paid for for 4-6 weeks rubs me the wrong way.
Conversely, retail outlets could easily win me back by having their full catalogue on their website, which details in-store stock availability for my closest stores along with their final prices (including applicable discounts and taxes) and allowing me to place a hold on that item so that when I get to the store, it is there, waiting for me. The store locators are good and telling me how many are available in the store I've chosen is a good starting point, but it would be way more useful if I could put in what I'm looking for and then the site tell me the closest store that has availability and allow me to place a hold. Don't make me dig to figure out where I've gotta find stuff - remove the friction.
I've gotta be honest, it would take almost nothing to get me to go back to retail stores. Mostly I don't go because:
- I hate queueing up to wait for stuff - because I hate crowds of people and I hate wasting time. Time is the one commodity that nobody can replace no matter how rich you are. Stop wasting mine.
- The customer service is atrocious. I'm in your store because I need a product that you happen to provide. You're after my money. Appreciate that I could take my business somewhere I don't have to put up with the friction I have to suffer at your store or your diabolical staff attitudes.
- The warranties and provisos to their return policies are intentionally misleading. You have a product I want. You don't have to mislead me to buy it... if you're being so underhanded as to lead me to purchase items that are actually of zero use to me by making me believe that they are of use to me - until such a time as I try to use them and find that they are useless, there's a special place reserved in hell for you.
Find ways to remove those obstacles and I'll be back in a heartbeat. It doesn't take much:
- Appreciate my business.
- Make it easy to do business with you.
- Remove the obstacles and unnecessary friction that make me want to go elsewhere.
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#4Heh. They're dead right about the difficulty of cutting through a million options. I feel lame every time, but I find myself just going to thesweethome.com or thewirecutter.com, and then buying whatever they tell me to :-/ Either online or locally, whichever is more convenient and/or cheaper.
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#5I do the opposite. I don't want to spend the time driving around looking at stuff, so I research online, and then find where it's sold locally. 'cause I want it the instant I pay for it, and returns are much easier and immediate at a store. I do buy from Amazon, but Amazon is also one of the best research tools for local buying.
I am like this also... I wish I could just type into a search engine what I'm looking for and it comes up with "Hey, this thing is available at these local retailers for these prices, all within 5km of your house. Here are the returns policies for those places. Here are the caveats to their warranty programs. These places have free parking. Caution: Place X, Y or Z only takes cash. Here's a list of ATMs enroute." I r…
Agree with all.
On the warranties: I think that the warranties are offered by someone else. The airlines do it that way for travel insurance. It's probably a no brainer for an executive meeting with a warranty rep to say "hell yeah, almost no cost to us, and lots of people are stupid enough to buy this."
The retailer is paid to disrespect you.
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#6Heh. They're dead right about the difficulty of cutting through a million options. I feel lame every time, but I find myself just going to thesweethome.com or thewirecutter.com, and then buying whatever they tell me to :-/ Either online or locally, whichever is more convenient and/or cheaper.
Knowing next to nothing about cameras, I just bought my wife a DSLR (the Nikon D3300) based on the recommendation of thewirecutter.com, and she loves it. I don't think there's a need to feel "lame" about it -- there's a limited number of decisions I can make in a day[1] and an even smaller number that I can truly be well informed on. For all the rest, I'm totally happy to outsource my decision making to online review aggregators like yelp/amazon or curation platforms like thewirecutter.com. It seems to be working so far.
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#7Off-topic: I couldn't find anything online about Benjy's, aside from the HBR article. Anyone know what's going on?
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#8I do the opposite. I don't want to spend the time driving around looking at stuff, so I research online, and then find where it's sold locally. 'cause I want it the instant I pay for it, and returns are much easier and immediate at a store. I do buy from Amazon, but Amazon is also one of the best research tools for local buying.
I'm shocked that people continue to "showroom" items. The local Best Buy has a terrible selection of items and the employees don't know any more about the products than I do. It doesn't make any sense to go to Best Buy for anything at all - there is almost literally zero value added by a big chain electronics store.
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#9Off-topic: I couldn't find anything online about Benjy's, aside from the HBR article. Anyone know what's going on?
Its either a made up company for the case study, or pseudonym for best buy. The case study teaching notes refer to best buy instead of "benjy's".
Re: Case study: Can retailers win back shoppers who browse then buy online?
#10I do the opposite. I don't want to spend the time driving around looking at stuff, so I research online, and then find where it's sold locally. 'cause I want it the instant I pay for it, and returns are much easier and immediate at a store. I do buy from Amazon, but Amazon is also one of the best research tools for local buying.
agreed, an accurate in store inventory listing on retailers' websites are vital for this to work. Nothing more frustrating then doing research online, getting to the store to find out they don't actually have the item in stock, or cant't find it. Then its straight onto an online shop - and not the brick and mortar retailers.