This Coffee with Carrie video blog talks about why there is a Rise of Retail Outdoor Malls (350% in 2018) and why the B-D class malls are closing.
Rise of Retail Outdoor Malls
Why they are growing at rapid rate and consumers are flocking:
- The experience drives longer shopping times + entertainment
- Incentivizes impulse purchases
- Draw in customers from other vendors
- Increase revenue for retailers and mall property real estate
How do you connect consumers virtually to the future shopping experience?
The rise of retail outdoor malls has changed the brick and mortar strategies for retails. No longer is the “biggest box” a driving factor in selecting retail real estate or designing the in-store experience. Retailers are opening small footprints, with much less to no inventory and spending more money on the customer future shopping experience. also presents a unique opportunity to expand your digital footprint.
A segment of customers’ love to go to retail outdoor malls for lunch, happy hour, shopping, music and make a day out of it. However, these luxury retail outdoor malls don’t exist in every city and for a large demographic they are outside of a reasonable driving distance.
Retailers can offer the same in-store customer experience to people outside their normal reach with connecting them virtually through their website or mobile app into the in-store experience. Customers who are hours away or don’t have time for parking, eating and shopping can still enjoy your in-store experience.Video chat technology for retailers allows a customer who wants to see/ feel a product before they purchase it the opportunity to connect to a physical location and/or showroom just for that.
Additionally, consumers now demand more a more personalized experience in which the retailer acts more of an advisor, personal shopper with recommendations.
This can now be done through video chat technology for retailers providing this while scaling significant revenue with smaller “showroom” stores. Retailers have found they can expand the geographic locations that they are digital marketing too while still allowing the customer to have a connected experience to the store.
Finally, video chat technology for retailers if put on a retailers website can increase conversion up to 5x, especially in higher ticket items like sporting goods, luxury items, women’s fashion, home goods, furniture etc.