A retail purchase takes place in a shopper’s mind long before they reach for their purse or wallet.
Here’s a cold, hard truth of retail: Many shoppers who go into a store or log onto an e-commerce website are simply looking for a quick emotional buzz. This needn’t be bad news for retailers or brands, as there are numerous ways to emotionally engage with shoppers quickly and cost-effectively using shopper marketing.
What is Shopper Marketing?
Marketing to shoppers is entirely different from marketing to consumers. It focuses on understanding how shoppers function inside the sales space, how they make buying decisions in the moment, and how they respond to the shopping experience. You may think you know consumers when you're trying to reach them on their couches in front of the television, but reaching the shopper is an entirely different story.
The goal of shopper marketing is to influence shopper behaviour while people are in the shopping mode in a way that builds brands and drives consumption and growth. Here are a few thought-starters:
Introduce urgency or scarcity
Limited time offers like When It’s Gone It’s Gone (WIGIG) give customers the excitement they crave by creating an illusion of scarcity As does all the media coverage regarding Covid-19. This sense of urgency can often be the deciding factor in whether that shopper decides to make a purchase or not. According to CNBC in USA, 80 percent of young shoppers made impulse purchases online during the last year. This high number is no coincidence, because retailers have started to understand the psychology and emotion needed to create the type of shopping experience that makes shoppers feel like they’re getting the deal of a lifetime.
Creating the perception of significant added value or a limited amount of goods in-stock are two of the ways that retailers can do this. Here are more phrases proven to emotionally engage shoppers:
Limit, only 2 per customer
Any limit makes shoppers fear missing out.
Must end Wednesday
Why do retailers hide the promotion end date of shelf edge labels? As they are powerful motivators to purchase.
Was/Now offers
Tells shoppers they are getting better value than was available previously.
Free
Get the word ‘Free’ into your offer and it triggers activity within shopper’s mental reward centres, bypassing reason altogether.
New
In shoppers minds, if something is new, then it is often perceived as being better
Whether a shopper comes into a store looking to get away from their everyday lives, looking for other humans to engage with, or looking for a quick buzz, retailers that deploy effective shopper marketing executions will give them the emotional experience they’re looking for and will be the more preferred destinations.
