How To Create a Buzz in Your Store

BY NICOLE LEINBACH HOFFMAN  

Strong foot traffic does not always equal strong sales, so what can retailers do to help boost a buzz despite foot traffic being strong or slow?

As the year progresses and you experience busy, busier, and not-so-busy months, leverage the power of merchandising to help you along the way. This is especially important during slower times of the year when foot traffic drops yet your bills stay steady.

To help capture both customer engagement and customer dollars during those times of the year, consider how various merchandising strategies can be applied to your one-of-a-kind business.

Leveraging Basic Merchandising for Heightened Sales

Today’s consumers are savvy and aware that where they shop is not the only place they can shop. Their choice of where to spend is influenced by a lot of details. But make no mistake — tried, true, and basic merchandising strategies still go a long way when it comes to capturing customer dollars.

To increase your store’s visual appeal year-round — particularly during slower months where holidays, special events, or other occasions do not demand special merchandising strategies — leverage simple details of merchandising to bring fresh life to your displays. The considerations to narrow in on include:

  • Use practical fixtures to highlight your products. From a basic t-rack to using nesting tables to create a layered, multi-dimensional display combined with inventory, simple fixtures do not have to be stale. Simply incorporate your inventory to bring it to life through frequent changes, interesting combinations, and practical merchandising for easy engagement with your customers.
  • Double expose items to increase the chance of their exposure and their purpose. Every consumer experiences your store differently, so repeating items is a wonderful way to ensure consumers see everything. Specifically, you can bring items to the spotlight in your store while also having them displayed somewhere else. This simple strategy is easy yet impactful when it comes to helping to capture customer attention.
  • Change your displays regularly to keep things inter­esting and fresh. Stores often welcome loyal customers frequently. Therefore, displays need to be updated more than you may currently allocate time for. This may mean a refresh of your most dominant displays every other day for some stores, while at least bi-weekly for others. Many stores find this is only necessary once a week. Consider your traffic flow of repeat customers and encourage your team to prioritize this refreshed approach more routinely. Remember, this refresh does not have to be your entire store but should be your key fixtures.
  • Provide adequate lighting in your store and on your displays. It is amazing how the little things can be the big things when it comes to store impact. And the power of lights — or lack of them — is certainly one of these little things. Through strategic lighting, consider how you can spotlight your store’s key displays, items, and focal points. Nowadays, there are even spotlights and wall sconces that are battery operated and can easily be applied to your store walls without having to deal with electrical changes. The good news is this is also a low-cost effort that can have high returns.
  • Group like-minded products together. The funny thing about being like-minded is this can mean a lot of things depending on your perspective. You can approach this through color-blocking items together, such as grouping all pink things together to welcome the spring season, or by items, such as everything to do with gardening in one spot. Another approach may be displaying locally made items in one spot, handmade items in another spot, items that are plastic-free or organically produced somewhere else, and so on. You get the idea. Just do not forget to add strategic signage to help bring a well-deserved shout out to these groupings. Speaking of signage…
  • Create signage that does not get lost in your store. Whether it is crisp and bold black letters against white in a black frame or bright pink words to support your signature colors in an acrylic frame, the key is to use signage to boost displays and customer engagement. From offering vendor details, product information, interesting facts, and more, signage is a key part of displays that can help communicate directly to custom­ers. Through signage, you can also share news of special events, upcoming promotions, return policies, dressing room policies, and more. Be sure to always use consis­tent signage and avoid hand-written signage.
  • Incorporate marketing messaging into your displays to help move products. Customers are bombarded with marketing impressions all day long. From social media to word of mouth to media messages via the radio, apps, and more, it is nonstop. But do you know what else it is? Expected. Incorporate marketing messaging into your own displays to get creative and bring meaningful moments to your store. When cuing in on ways to gain consumer attention via marketing messages, look beyond your store to see what is going on in mainstream media. It may be a new movie coming out that relates back to a product at your store. Maybe it is more locally centric and aligns with your high school’s homecoming or a community event taking place. The idea is to make a connection to something your customers will instinc­tively relate to and then use your merchandising to tell this story.

Challenge Yourself To Do Better

When reflecting on which strategies make sense for your store, challenge yourself to walk through your entire store with virgin eyes. In other words, pretend you are a new customer experiencing your store for the first time. Ask yourself the following questions and challenge yourself to apply some of the actions for a refreshed store analysis.

  1. When you look at your exterior window, what is your first thought? Remember, put yourself in your consum­er’s shoes and answer from a customer perspective.
  2. . Does your exterior excite you enough to want to walk into your store as a first-time customer? What about as a repeat customer?
  3. Once you enter your store, step only about five inches into your store. Pause. Look around your store. What direction are you most drawn to? What does not feel or look right? What confuses you? What stands out as the good, bad, or even ugly?
  4. At the same time, answer honestly to these questions. If you were a customer, would you want to stay and shop? And if so, what direction would you move toward first and why?
  5. Walk through your store. Using colored sticky note pads, use one color for what makes you satisfied, another color for what makes you feel disappointed or simply not satisfied, and a third color for what makes you smile with confidence. Place these throughout your store on this journey.
  6. Repeat this step with store associates or even an outside friend or business peer. Ask them to do the same. Once completed, review this exercise from a refreshed perspective and then challenge yourself to apply the above basic merchandising strategies to enhance your store experience and displays.
  7. After you do your walk through, how do you feel? Answer this honestly. Are you simply content or are you elated? Do you feel excited or exhausted about your store displays?
  8. Does your store feel clean — dust free, tidy shelves, organized? Be honest.
  9. What are the top three areas you think could be improved?
  10. What is your go-to-action plan for change?

Completing this exercise is a terrific way to position your store and yourself for change. Remember, slow months allow for these refreshes and position you for stronger success when foot traffic is in your store.

In Conclusion

The eyes of your customers are not yours. Always keep them top of mind as you continue to grow and nurture your business. Displays are among the most important and meaningful ways to do this — even if it feels the most basic.

Nicole Leinbach Hoffman is the founder of RetailMinded.com, a well-respected retail industry resource that has been recognized worldwide for its leading business insight since 2007. Her work has been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur, Business Insider, the UK’s Telegraph, CNN, the Today show, and countless other industry resources. Additionally, she has supported American Express’s Small Business Saturday as a spokesperson and is the author of the book Retail 101: The Guide to Managing and Marketing Your Retail Business, published by McGraw-Hill. With a core concentration on small businesses and independent retailers, she welcomes you to connect via Instagram at @RetailMindedWorld and Twitter via @RetailMinded.