Synergy! Creating a Cohesive Retail Experience

You walk into a store. Your trip mission? Regular grocery and home supplies. But there is a mission-critical addition. You must find a specific and obscure cereal that is healthy but, more important, your finicky 3-year-old loves it.

This article is about creating a cohesive retail experience that leans into a synergy between wayfinding, décor, print and digital. But, really, it’s about creating the best possible environment to foster a great retail experience for any shopping challenge.

And, yes, “synergy” is a word that gives us pause — sort of buzzy but dated — but the idea of multiple elements combining for a better outcome than their separate capabilities is fundamental to building optimized branded environments.

Let’s consider that process.

Trip mission meets a cohesive retail experience

The above customer could follow a variety of paths to purchase.

• He simply could search for said cereal, employing his eyeballs and the process of elimination to find it… and, hopefully, get home before midnight.
  
  
• He could ask a store associate for help, crossing his fingers that he gets the right associate who knows and doesn’t mind stopping what she’s doing to show the shopper where to go… maybe.
  
  
• After struggling to find the product and hating the idea of talking to another person, he could open the store app and use it for guidance, perhaps even deciding to have it delivered to his house tomorrow… meaning breakfast the next morning won’t go well.
  
  
• He could quickly find the product among his other purchases and exit his efficient trip mission to multi-generational fanfare and celebration when he arrives home.

Hint: Option four is best.

So how did he do it? There was synergy in the store environment where his mobile phone, the store décor elements, printed QR codes and wayfinding signage enabled him to find that magical cereal with no stress or friction. The process was so straightforward that he might not even remember his steps to find the cereal, only that he did and that is why he is loyal to that store and brand.

Consistency in brand, store messaging across different media

Now consider if our intrepid shopper is way across town or on vacation in another state and he sees your store — or specifically searches for it. Why does he want to go to your store and even make a concerted effort to find one? Because he’s hoping to reproduce the ease and customer experience he associates with your brand. And, maybe, earn loyalty points.

Do your stores deliver as well in Atlanta as they do in Charleston, Boston, LA or Topeka? Or do your reviews say your store in north Dallas is way better than your stores in east Dallas and Fort Worth?

You have stores in different counties, cities and states, and there’s a wide variety of layouts and footprints, not to mention regional and demographic considerations. Nonetheless, it’s important to foster brand and messaging consistency for different locations and different media.

“Brand consistency is not just logos, colors and slogans. It's the totality of communication with customers.”

Does your entry at each location consistently communicate — branding, wayfinding, in-store app use — to a variety of customers on a variety of trip missions?

Brand consistency is not just logos, colors and slogans. It’s the totality of communication with customers. And, by the way, associates, too, who appreciate how their jobs are more fun and fulfilling when they fully understand store layout and procedures, and the customers they serve are happy.

Traditional POP display looks good, as it did 20 years ago, but now it includes dynamic QR codes that drive customer engagement and loyalty, not to mention sales. End caps are a retail staple, but now they can include print signage paired with digital displays that provide additional product information and advertising that engage the user and guide them to additional products down each aisle.

These are examples of branding, print, décor and digital integrations that serve customers by combining for better outcomes than their separate capabilities.

A small format Skechers retail store cleverly elevates its  entrance display using digital.

Cohesive retail experiences play the long game

Digital price tags cost more than regular price tags. Today. But over the next five years, what might easy and immediate real-time updates mean for labor hour commitments? And might eliminating the tedious task of regularly changing price tags notably improve the associate experience, too?

Another bonus with digital price tags: After adoption, they can be easily and attractively incorporated into product displays and fixtures that regularly change.

Want more? Print signage using QR codes is not a single-purpose, one-off either. When linked to measurement platforms, they allow you to track the effectiveness of your seasonal or product-specific print campaign — scan rates, user locations, device types, etc. — and calculate the ROI of your campaign.

Further, a big cost benefit of dynamic QR codes is that the content they link to can be updated whenever needed, saving your company the cost to reprint.

Integration of Micro Center app and store design significantly improved customer and associate experiences. Store wayfinding and signage were upgraded to be pleasing and purposeful. 

Retail synergy, from design to execution to ROI

There’s that “synergy” word again. But it speaks succinctly to what retailers will be seeking with their in-store experience, now and well into the future.

That won’t change if, say, the metaverse does indeed eventually rise in retail. Omnichannel is enduring, and it’s unlikely it will feature the subtraction of channels or an end to the continual customer experience evolution.

In-person stores will remain critical for retailers, and they still will need print, fixtures, great décor and intuitive wayfinding to weave together with purposeful technology in the decades ahead. Retailers that see and understand the field at scale and recognize the value of an integrated approach will thrive.

This is our philosophy of innovative pragmatism at Miller Zell. We efficiently develop retail solutions at scale that provide our clients value and peace of mind.

We’d love to chat about the potential synergy we could develop with you.