Get into your Customer’s Head

Having a deep understanding of the expectations and motivations of your customers can really give you an advantage. You may be surprised at what it takes for a person to decide to buy something. There is a deep process of affirmations that must be met before someone will decide to part with their money. Using this knowledge, you can design your store around the customer’s needs. You can train your staff to provoke the feelings that a customer must have before they decide to buy. Customers are savvier than you might think, and there really isn’t a way to ethically “trick” someone into buying something. But, it doesn’t hurt to point out the things that you know they need to consider before they’ll decide to buy.

First, they have to like the type of merchandise that you sell. If you are a small retail store, like a boutique, then you have a real advantage here. Smaller stores have to really focus on one specific target market. They can really get close to their customers and learn how they operate. They can create long-lasting relationships with customers that larger stores simply can’t. Make sure that you are using this huge retail advantage. Develop relationships with your customers. Keep in contact with them on social networking sites, publish a newsletter, or send out monthly mailers. By getting to know your customers and their tastes, you can make more educated decisions on what you decide to sell, really focusing in and becoming an expert in one area.

The next thing to think about is your knowledge. Customers have to respect you and get respect in return before they’ll be comfortable buying something. Let them know that you have a knowledgeable staff. Make sure that your staff is trained well on specific products and brands. Offering unique knowledge or benefits of your merchandise to customers will keep them coming back and help them to feel like they are in control and making an informed decision for themselves.

A lot of people shop for relaxation or for the excitement of buying new clothes and accessories. They get excited because the things that they find will help them to define who they are to others. Whether their style is sporty, eclectic, refined, or totally unique, they feel the need to define themselves with their clothing. Making their shopping experience what they hoped it would be will help you to sell them the items that make them feel good about themselves.

Make sure that you display everything where the customers can easily see it. Using slatwall is one way of displaying all of your merchandise facing outward, towards the customers. People can see what types of things you offer simply by walking by. If they don’t have to dig through a rack or sift through a table, they can simply look and see multiple items that you sell. Slatwall panels are useful for making use of odd spaces in your store, making free-standing displays, and helping you to carry as much merchandise as possible without distracting customers from what you have to offer.

About the Author: Ron Maier is the Vice President of S & L Store Fixtures, a leading online resource for retail displays, including mannequins, dress mannequin forms, female mannequins, slatwall and slatwall panels. For more information, please visit http://www.slstoredisplays.com.

Boutique Visuals: Mannequins

Use mannequin displays to show customers what an outfit looks like when it’s on, but also satisfy the needs of their subconscious that control whether or not they buy. Shoppers today are bombarded by images, ads, outfits and displays that are pleasing to the eye. Aesthetics are thought to have an 85% impact on whether or not a customer buys. Think about how much time and money is spent on packaging, photography, commercials, image and branding. It doesn’t have much to do with the actual product, but with the aesthetics of the product. The goal is always to make the customer feel a certain way when they see and use the product.

Customers associate quality with visual and psychological cues. They will generally decide to purchase something if all areas of their conscious and subconscious appetites have been satisfied. For example, they may go shopping for a shirt. They are not simply looking for a piece of cloth to cover their torso. They want to get a shirt that fits them in a flattering way. They want a shirt that says something about their personality. They feel the need to wear a shirt that makes them feel a certain way, whether it be comfortable, powerful, professional, hip, lovable, cheerful, friendly, superior or any other array of emotions. They may base their decision to buy a shirt based on over one hundred conscious and subconscious factors.

Shoppers associate quality with their impression of your store or web site, but let’s talk about price. If a price is too low, then the customer will most likely automatically assume that there must be something wrong with the shirt. Either its quality is bad, or the imaginary world of peers that have looked at this shirt before have decided, for some unknown reason, to pass it by. This fear of “making a social mistake” will turn a vast majority of customers away.

The same goes for pricing items too high. Customers will be let down or put off that they cannot afford or wouldn’t pay a high price for something that they were considering buying. They will get a bad impression about your boutique. Either the store management thinks they can pull one over on people, they think that they are too good for us, or they think that the boutique is doing so poorly that they have to charge high prices to make their bills.

You never want your customers to think that you’re doing poorly. This brings them back to the feeling that their imaginary peers have overlooked you for some imaginary reason. Keep your displays, promotional displays and garment racks full. Displays that are too empty make the items look like they are being discontinued or clearanced out.

Keep your mannequin displays changing. You want them to make customers comfortable, like putting a face with the idea of wearing the clothing. Imagine that the mannequins are there to make your first impressions. They are promising your shoppers, on a subconscious level, that they would definitely wear this outfit, that it will look this good, and that it will make the customer feel like the mannequin feels. It is so important to give your mannequins feeling by using their position, location, and creating display situations.

Using your mannequins to display and satisfy the aesthetics that your customers are looking for is a very effective way of marketing your boutique and your merchandise. The more of those one hundred reasons to buy you can satisfy, the better your chances are of making a sale.

About the Author: Ron Maier is the Vice President of S & L Store Fixtures, a leading online resource for retail display cases including mannequins, mannequin forms, gridwall and slatwall store fixtures. For more information, please visit http://www.slstoredisplays.com.