One of the biggest concerns that brick-and-mortar stores are experiencing these days is how to boost customer footfall. Online shopping has become the go-to solution for a vast population in this digital age. Also, the rise of online retailers every day is increasing competition.
Hence, it has become crucial for physical retailers to come up with tactics to make customers walk through their store. More traffic means more sales and customer engagement, resulting in expanded customer loyalty. Furthermore, increasing customer flow provides a ton of insights about how well your business is performing and what measures are required to boost ROI.
The best thing is below are some effective recommendations to boost the footfall traffic. Also, it can help your store stand out from the competition, delivering a consistent customer experience.
10 Tactics to Increase Foot Traffic to Your Brick-and-Mortar Store
Leverage Queue Management System
Managing customer long queues in the physical stores impacts the brand image and decrease footfall. Implementing a retail queue management system like Qwaiting is the best solution. It is a software solution that helps in seamlessly managing and improving visitor flow.
There are several business aspects where retail queue management systems are leaving a positive impact. It includes:
- Seamless Experience: Failing to address customer problems for long leads to negative customer experiences and store abandonment. Integrating a retail queueing system impacts the customer views of the brand positively and results in excellent experiences. Effective queue management makes customers feel appreciated, resulting in improved footfall.
- Cost-Effectiveness: Queue management is a reliable and cost-effective investment. Retailers using this system can minimize customer abandonment rates. Furthermore, such a system helps to gather critical data for better resource allocation, ensuring that staffing costs are balanced as consumer flows grow and fall.
- Customer Satisfaction: Customers will not leave the store without shopping if waits are handled efficiently. Besides prioritizing customer service, queueing solutions appear to have a positive impact on brand loyalty.
As a result, there will be no long lineups, allowing clients to access the offers whenever they want without the need to wait. The queue management software will keep customers informed about estimated wait times, therefore improving their queueing experience.
Maintain Your Storefront’s Appearance
A well-organized brick-and-mortar storefront can dramatically improve its curb appeal. Of course, as customers, we avoid going to a store with dusty windows or poor paintwork. As a result, maintenance is the key to stay at the top. Create a checklist of weekly or monthly maintenance tasks. It may involve sweeping the space and cleaning the windows every day.
Additionally, assess the physical quality of your storefront from the outside to determine the need for improvements. Any of these options may not necessitate extensive work, yet they all contribute to the storefront’s long-term maintenance. Also, employees can focus more on refining the brand experience while employing third-party for storefront aesthetic maintenance.
Build Online Presence
Undoubtedly, people prefer to shop online. It is now your choice to decide whether you will take advantage of the internet or complain about how it is driving traffic away.
Creating a website allows you to expand your store’s internet exposure. Design a company website that displays catalogs and enables customers to explore and shop. As a result, business profits will increase, raising foot traffic and brand awareness.
Enable Customers to Shop Online and Collect In-Store
The majority of individuals enjoy window shopping but dislike paying delivery fees. It is better if you already have an eCommerce site for your brick-and-mortar store. Create it if you don’t have one.
It will enable individuals to shop online and pick up in-store, increasing the number of feet visiting the store. Furthermore, sales will increase, resulting in stronger customer relationships.
Discover Social Media Opportunities
Advertising goods and services is an age-old trick that still works. The best thing about this technology era is that there are more robust advertising solutions than ever before.
Both Google and Facebook include marketing features that allow you to reach out to a wide range of people. Furthermore, Facebook ads are excellent to entice customers to visit your physical location and make purchases. You can even keep track of how many people have been into the store to take advantage of the deal.
If you don’t find Facebook ads particularly useful, you can stay active on your social media accounts. Regularly publish information relevant to your store’s accomplishments, offers, or customer feedback. Remember to update your social media accounts if any special discounts or promotions are going on. This is all excellent stuff that is essential to promote to shoppers.
Furthermore, you can leverage platforms like Instagram to share information with your audience in no time. For example, you can upload images of your store’s latest arrivals.
Organize Events
Hosting events gives customers the reason to enter the store besides making purchases. Organize events that are relevant to your target demographic and services. It might be a charitable event, a game, or something informative. The only thing that matters is that it is done correctly. This way, you will be successful in increasing foot traffic.
You can partner with local artisans, experts, or organizations to host in-store activities. This provides the chance to attract new customers by:
- Utilizing the potential audience growing your clientele
- Providing customer-centric offerings
- Building customer relationships in the respective community
Overall, events and in-store activities can help boost traffic while also increasing customer retention.
Conversion Rate Optimization is Critical
If you can’t convert visitors into potential customers, all of your footfall traffic efforts will be zero. So, an additional tactic is emphasizing conversion rate optimization.
After all, store success depends on customer loyalty and when the traffic and profits move along.
To do so, you can leverage the POS system to track how many visitors made the purchase. Furthermore, you can utilize all such data to find ways to make necessary improvements.
You can also use it to examine any new sales strategy, check how it performs, and see how well it converts traffic.
Enhance In-Store Experience
If you want to build communication with the consumers and increase store traffic, improving in-store experiences is critical.
However, the experiences vary from store to store. For instance, some stores encourage people to take advantage of limited-time specials and discounts. Some businesses focus on developing huge attractions that engage visitors in their brand’s success stories, accomplishments, and so on.
Overall, the key is to find the right experience that works for your specific Brick-and-mortar store and perform it well.
Get GMB Listing Done
Managing GMB profiles is significant to ensure the location information is enhanced, accurate, and involves the right CTAs.
If your store isn’t available on platforms like Google, Yelp, and so on, you are losing potential visitors.
Hence, list your store on the platforms as soon as possible. It includes information such as:
- Name, address, contact number
- Customer reviews
- Business hours
- Store photos, 360-degree virtual tours, etc.
All this may be time-consuming but will result in a more appealing listing and increased store visitors.
Focus on Staff Training
You may have a pleasing storefront or offer the best deals and discounts. What if your employees provide poor customer service?
Of course, it will become hard to drive the visitors to your store. Many businesses fail in customer retention due to poor customer service.
So, one tactic you can teach your staff is to deliver quality customer service. You get one opportunity to create an impression and obtain repeat customers. Focus on educating the employees about how to treat the visitors and meet their needs.
Conclusion
Driving foot traffic to brick-and-mortar stores is important to enhance revenue and brand awareness. However, if your store is lacking in adequate visitor flow, encouraging and enticing people to come in becomes essential. Hence, listing your business on search sites, utilizing queue management, hosting events, offering deals and discounts, and other tactics can be the best ways to attract people to your store. These are the best strategies to improve the customer experience at your brick-and-mortar and raise footfall traffic.
Do let us know about what tactics you will implement to bring people to your retail store!