The Marketing Manager's Yearbook 2006
Successful Retail Brands Engage their Customers In-store
Craig Thatcher
Director, fraserdesign
Strong communications are one of the primary foundations of a successful retail experience and increased sales performance. Companies need to stand out and be memorable, and this happens not by wow factor or by shouting the loudest, but it starts with getting the basic communications right. In an in-store environment, 'forensic design' is an essential process in ensuring this is achieved.
High street retail is still experiencing hard times - another year of gloomy figures and forecasts that the cloud is not ready to lift. In addition, the impact of the internet is becoming more and more significant. Today's markets are complex and have unprecedented levels of competition. Consumers have enormous choice and are better informed. New channels mean more and more ways to talk to customers. Right now managing the delivery of communications has never been so important or so easy to get wrong.
Forensic design process and customer communication
This process is all about breaking communications down, deconstructing the customer journey and then reconstructing the communications hierarchy. This process has been developed by fraserdesign over twenty years helping clients like Argos and Homebase to build their brands by engaging with their customers.
In-store communications encompass every method by which a retailer, as well as individual brands and manufacturers, may inform, instruct and motivate customers. Physical manifestations include signage, windows, promotional materials, literature, ticketing, product packaging, live product demonstrations and workshops or increasingly plasma screen displays and interactive kiosks. This involves an extensive and diverse set of communications, with different aims and different target audiences, all vying for attention.
In any store, new focuses, products and promotions unfold over time alongside information and service messages. Some stay up, some are replaced, but too often the overall result in-store is like the build up of a sedimentary rock, more coincidental than planned. Forensic design takes on the crucial task of examining all existing communications, bringing them together so that their combined effect on customers can be assessed objectively.
Deconstructing the customer journey
The first stage is to look at the overall picture of communications exactly as the customer sees it. This is commonly overlooked and when eventually evaluated, it is not as expected. By taking pictures of and recording all existing communications they can be presented in a logical order reflecting how they are met in-store.
By mapping the customer journey you can truly see how people respond to the environment and move through the store. It clarifies what they have to 'fight through' and how this affects their behaviour. When this is presented to a marketing director or manager, it is usually the first time they have been able to stand back and see the entire flow of communications. It invariably reveals inconsistencies, conflicts and confusion. Every piece of communication starts with a reason (some good, some bad) but along the way the customer impact is forgotten.
Each piece of communication needs to be questioned to discover, 'why is that being said there?' Instead of a sound rationale, you often hear, 'oh that's from a promotion we ran in the summer' or 'the old marketing director liked to do it that way'. Whether it's a leaflet, hanging signage or a permanent display, you need to ask quite simply, 'does the customer need to know this?' If the answer is yes the next question is, 'is it in the right place?'The results need to be assimilated, organised and prioritised before the creative stage can take place. This is right at the heart of enabling customers to get the most out of the store.
Reconstructing the communications hierarchy
Once existing communications have been fully reviewed, you can move on to agreeing what the customer should see and hear. Careful consideration will allow you to re-construct a meaningful communications hierarchy. It is crucial to recognise that what the customer needs to see and hear should not to be confused with what the retailers wants the customer to see and hear. This sounds the wrong way round but if you lose sight of the customer's needs then your communications will never be as clear as they should be.
Primarily it's about giving the customer the information that they need to know at each stage of their journey. This involves establishing a hierarchy that divulges the right information, at the right time, in the right place. And there are two broad categories of customer to be accounted for here: the type seeking inspiration and willing to spend time on the process of discovery, and the type who just want to find what they need and get out. The way in which you must communicate to these audiences is very different even though it is sometimes the same customer on a different shopping mission or day. For instance, the pre-planned shopper simply wants clear directional and functional communications to help them locate a product and make an easy decision. The types looking for inspiration however, will respond to communications that appeal to their perception of themselves.
Despite frequent attempts, it is practically impossible to do both at once. Communications - their messages, layout and structure - need to be handled carefully to avoid delivering mixed and inappropriate messages. Ikea provides a good example. It filters customers through two distinct phases and successfully manages to be many things to many people.
Ultimately, creating a hierarchy of information should make the customer journey quick and easy. This theory is in stark contrast to the practice of trying to control and herd customers so they are exposed to the full product offering.
Good retailers will release messages in short but targeted bursts allowing each message a certain 'air time' in store. This way, each different message gets its chance to be seen or heard and the customer, rather than feeling jaded or annoyed, finds it useful. This is particularly suitable for service messages that are only of interest to customers at key points in the journey and therefore can be subtle and longer than promotional messages.
But it's also crucial to remember that brand communications are not solely about imparting practical information. They are part of the experience of a brand and they affect people's associations or perceptions of what and who that brand is. Another question you must ask of each piece of communication is, 'does this meet the design guidelines for the brand?' The messages must not just be consistent with other messages, but with the brand character and its tone of voice, clarity, style and vision. Tesco provides a great example with a 'warm' notice by the tills aimed probably at appeasing the young. Roughly paraphrased it says, 'If you are lucky enough to look under 21, please do not be offended if someone asks you to prove your age.'
Centralising the control process
Communicating varied messages to different audiences is intensively more complex than it first seems. Forensic design identifies the issues and then informs the creation of a considered communications hierarchy. But the internal organisation and management of the process - the design, production, distribution and display in-store - is perhaps the most complex part of the realisation.
One of the main issues creating poor customer experiences is the fragmented way that a retailer is organised internally, particularly within larger organisations. The logistics involve managing numerous stores remotely from a head office. At the same time, different marketing or product managers have different priorities and responsibilities. They often work in isolation and commission different agencies. The result is a 'shouting all at once' phenomenon in-store. Companies with good internal processes tend to have far better in-store communications.
Retail is about simplicity, clarity and prominence. Forensic design concentrates the communications, weeds out the surplus and brings cohesion. Once this has been achieved, the battle is to avoid creep back to bad practice.
Business structures can't be changed overnight, but the best examples come from retailers with small senior teams who have overall control of the communications materials and processes. They work with a limited number of specialist agencies like fraserdesign, opting for suppliers that are used to working across departments. This avoids the situation where store planning is undertaken by the commercial department with the graphics tagged on retrospectively by several people in the marketing department leaving confusing results for customers.
Communication is absolutely key to all human interaction, and the store environment is no different. When you consider the budgets spent on external advertising, it can seem hard to believe that the in-store messages, where the customers is face-to-face with the brand, are so poorly considered and left to deliver a cacophony of noise and confusion. It doesn't need to be like this.
Craig Thatcher – Director
Biography
Craig has over fifteen years’ experience in client services and joined fraserdesign in 1996 to develop and promote the consultancy’s services and to extend the client base. He is involved in the day-to-day running of the business as well as the planning and strategic thinking required for its long term development.
Craig has the ability to assimilate information and understand the commercial issues quickly. He is a clear, logical and persuasive communicator and always has a relevant point of view. He thrives on challenging briefs.
For over ten years he was a visiting lecturer to the Bristol Business School at the University of the West of England.