Heatmaps are very efficient in the online world, since they can help you identify how customers interact with your website. But what a lot of businesses don’t know is that heatmapping can be used in the retail world as well. Physical stores can also use retail analytics as a way to optimize their presence, customize the shopping experience and provide more value to customers. Tools like retail heatmapping are not only very efficient and accurate, but they can also help enhance the shopper flow and push the experience to new heights.
Why is it a good idea to use retail heatmapping?
By adding new technologies to your retail space, it’s easier to assess the customer journey and see what can be improved. You always want to follow the retail customer journey and see how their experience varies, if you’re able to customize it or not and so on. Relying on video analytics and data is a great way to not only measure the shopper flow, but also how shoppers interact with every stall.
Naturally, some regions within the retail store will be more popular. Others will barely receive any foot traffic. That’s why you want to focus on identifying the right retail heatmapping approach, since it can share all this data and you can learn valuable insights from it.
How are retail heatmaps created?
In order to access the right retail analytics, you do need to have heatmaps. That means you must install wide angle video sensors, which are usually placed on the ceiling of your store. These are designed to collect data and also analyze how customers move around within your retail space. The retail heatmapping technology works just like online heatmaps, and the visitor flow is represented by cold and hot zones.
The reason why these are important is because you get to understand the overall store performance. You can re-adjust and adapt your store layout in order to make the user experience better and more efficient. All these video analytics and data you capture can be extremely useful if you want to generate more clients and return customers in the long term.
What KPIs should you focus on?
There are certain elements that you always want to monitor when it comes to retail shopper journeys. A very important one is the total number of visits. The heatmap technology can identify the number of times a mobile device is detected in a store. You also want to see how many visitors/shoppers your business has within that same day.
Other KPIs you should focus on are the least and most interesting zones. If a specific zone has lots of foot traffic, that’s great. However, if it lacks foot traffic, that means there’s something wrong and you either have to relocate that merchandise, or you have to create a specific flow by adding similar products near it. That makes it easier for customers to reach it, and you can prevent any bad performance in the long term.
You also need to consider other things like the average visit time too. You always want to keep customers in your retail store for as much time as possible. Doing that increases the likelihood of them actually spending money in the store. That’s why you want to know the average visit time, but also the aisles and store regions where you have the most traffic.
Why should you use retail heatmapping for your store?
The most important thing about retail heatmaps is that they can help you track and assess the entire retail customer journey. As we mentioned earlier, you can also identify the store regions with low performance, and you can improve the layout and design of your retail establishment based on the accumulated retail analytics.
Additionally, you will find it a lot easier to optimize the product distribution in your store, something that can help enhance the overall user experience. Thanks to retail heatmapping you can also analyze the overall interest in digital signage advertising. It makes it easier to optimize any type of in-store advertising, without directly asking your customers about it.
There are other advantages related to heatmaps which impact the entire retail customer journey too. For example, if you have multiple stores, you can easily track and measure performance, maybe even learn from the other stores and implement new features for all of them. Maybe the major advantage here is that you get to recommend products based on the customer journey. It becomes easier to show customers the type of products they can access, or you can shift products around to bring more related items near a certain isle. All of these things can help improve the user experience, while also bringing you increased profits.
How can Link Retail help?
Link Retail offers professional retail analytics systems that can help you receive all the insights you need to boost your revenue, while also cutting unnecessary expenses. Understanding the shopper behavior is crucial for ay retail establishment. That’s why it’s imperative to have access to retail heatmapping and video analytics, because all of these are great solutions that can improve the way customers react to everything and how the entire process is adjusted accordingly.
The Link Retail shopper flow system is very efficient and accurate, and it can easily help you find and also view the in-store shopper activity. Video analytics are great for any business, because not only do they help you grow and expand your business, they can also bring in front state of the art results and a very good experience.
What makes Link Retail unique is the fact that you can have detailed heatmaps on the floor plan, which provide a holistic view of your shopper flow. You also get to do zone analysis, which can give you specialized data regarding a certain part of your store. Additionally, Link Retail can offer you insights into route maps, so you can have a better understanding of the shopper navigation within your business.
Moreover, the shopper flow system gives you all the data you need to ensure that you fully focus on optimizing your store. This data can offer you a way to identify all kinds of improvements you can make. Once you have access to this data, you can start performing chances to the store layout, operations and merchandising, then enter an A/B testing session to ensure everything is working as expected. Experimenting with changes and then testing to see the results is crucial, since it can give you a better idea of what works and what you must improve.
Conclusion
Using retail heatmapping is a great way for you to not only expand your business, but also reach new clients and provide a better return on investment. You always want to help your customers and offer them the best possible retail experience. That’s why retail analytics solutions from Link Retail can be a very good idea. Not only will it offer you a simple way to connect with your audience, but you also get to see what changes you can make in order to improve the overall customer experience.
In the end, this will bring in even more people to your store, not to mention the user engagement and overall experience will be a lot better. Avail the opportunity and use retail heatmapping today if you’re looking for a good insight regarding your retail company’s health and growth opportunities you can access right now!
