The retail landscape is tough at the moment. Scores of shops around the country are shutting down and closing up for business every day. How can you make sure that your retail business does not follow suit?
Say it with Service
No matter what you sell in your retail outlet, you won’t be selling much of it without customers. I am sure you will have heard of the saying that the customer is always right. Whilst this may not always be true, you can make your customer feel like kings and queens, offering to gift wrap and carry items to their car etc. They are all small little things, but they breed repeat business. There have been studies made where it is claimed that if a person loves a store they will tell two friends, if a customer has a bad experience they will tell ten friends. With those odds, you have to be building some great rapport with you customers.
Use your Strengths
If your particular niche or product has a really busy period, use it to maximise sales. When a customer comes in to buy your product in say May, which is your busy time, give them a voucher that can be used during your lower times. It doesn’t have to be the earth on a slip of paper. Make it scalable, if they spend ten dollars with you, give them a dollar off. Spend fifty and get five off and so on. Another alternative is to make a loyalty type card from barcode key tags. These can be used with most modern POS systems and will allow you to build up a profile of what certain customers buy. You can also incentivise them by giving something back should they make x purchases in a certain time frame.
Offer Gift Vouchers
I am sure we have all done the same thing. A friend’s birthday is coming up, and they are a bit fussy. You know roughly what they like, but you don’t want to give them cash as it is rather impersonal. Vouchers are a great idea for your business. They boost footfall. Expiry dates mean that many customers will forget about them before they expire, which means essentially free money. The best part though is that most people will use the voucher towards their purchase, which means your voucher wielding customer is spending even more with you.
Opportunities
Put some low-cost items near your till points. They don’t even have to be anything even moderately related to your business. People who are queuing will be looking around, and more than likely will pick up some items before they reach the POS.
Advertise
If you run your business from a retail unit why not talk to your neighbours. Providing that you are not a clothes store which is next door to another clothes retailer, strike up a friendship. Other stores that are on the same road as yours might all chip-in to one communal advertising scheme. This will boost footfall to all of you, and you never know what other inspiring ideas you can all come up with together.
