It's Customer Experience, Stupid!

20 years ago or so, Dick Morris reputedly uttered the famous words to a campaigning Bill Clinton, "It's the economy, stupid!"

Something similar, albeit a little more complex, could be said to retailers the world over.

Online retailing has certainly changed the retail game, but brick and mortar retailers still have the opportunity to flex their power over online purchasing via the age-old method:  Customer experience.

It's the Customer Experience, stupid!

Hellooo retailers!  Are you listening?  There are 4 other senses to address, to sell, besides just visual, and sometimes audio (online.)  There are taste, touch, smell, and the overall sensory experience of being in the modern marketplace.  People still want to have more than just a "virtual experience".  That has been proven in spades, vis a vis, Apple stores.

You have the advantage, the upper hand!  Use what's at your disposal:  DOOH, in all its forms.
Lots of talk is swirling around mobile, and mobile commerce, but DOOH is a medium that can tie other media together, such as mobile and online.  It can, and should, all integrate.  There is far more than just putting LCD screens, or video walls, or interactive projected displays to work.  Far, far more.  Use your locations, and your DOOH to drive traffic, to introduce new selling propositions, to drive mobile (QR, and especially text coupons, offers and promos.)

Adoption comes in fits and starts.  DOOH must continue to make itself more retail-available.  This means both pricing and ease of implementation, management, everyday use.

Being very self-serving, I offer window video systems as a great example.  Messages, writ large, directly on the front window, displaying and then offering a sales proposition.  Intriguing, and then enticing (text coupons, POS promo offers.)  So much is available, so many possibilities.  Get with a strategic integrator and get your strategy going.  The ability to drive traffic and measurable ROI is here, and it can be very cost effective.  The only time DOOH fails in terms of ROI, is when the objectives are not clearly defined, and the method for achieving ROI not executed well.

If you have a great selling proposition, get it up there on DOOH and watch the sales in your brick and mortar store climb!  DOOH allows the power and flexibility to create both an intriguing customer experience, and a satisfying purchasing experience as well.  Combining the two is the key to the coming brick and mortar retail revival.