Tech race is pitting customer against retailer, says expert
BT futurologist Dr Nicola Millard said the constantly connected consumer has changed his/her shopping pattern and is often more informed than the frontline sales staff with whom they are dealing.
“We are seeing consumers doing things like show-rooming in the retail space. Where we have people scanning bar codes and we have people using location-based software in shops. They are effectively in the physical and virtual world at the same time,” she said.
The development of the consumer having more information than the sales assistant is transforming interactions in shops, she said, adding that more and more often, the consumer does not even leave the home.
Dr Millard said: “The impact of these behaviours on channel choices are they challenging people in stores. Consumers are going away and purchasing things elsewhere or shopping from their sofa. They are not effectively shopping in the physical space anymore.”
Dr Millard foresees retailers arming their sales assistants with iPads so that they can browse with customers and influence their decisions.
“We need to give the guys on the frontline in store access to the same knowledge that customers have, because if customers are challenging them on what’s on their websites, shop assistants need to know what is on their websites,” she said.
With the growth in video conferencing, thanks to the likes of Skype and Google Hangouts, another development Dr Millard expects to see is experts being available remotely, both at home and in the shop.
She posed the question: “If you have somebody in a store in Cork but the expert is in Dublin, how can you pull Dublin into Cork?”
The answer she offers is to use the camera on an iPad, with the sales assistant on the shop floor using the tablet to help a customer with a complex problem. “You can bring the customer and expert together,” Dr Millard added.
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