Many retailers are exploring strategies around location-based services, or LBS, to engage with shoppers in their brick and mortar stores. It’s clear that understanding where a shopper is can provide significant benefit and value to both the shopper as well as the retailer. Self-service tools on the mobile smartphone, such as indoor mapping and product finder utility combined with navigation and directions, can greatly enhance the shopper experience. The retailer can use the location to understand where the shopper is and create context-aware experiences for them. This approach allows the retailer to add value to the in-store experience, leading to a greater total lifetime value (TLV) of the shopper.
With this objective of maximizing the TLV of the shopper in mind, what always surprises me is how fixated retailers get on getting the X and Y coordinates (or latitude and longitude) of the shopper. Different companies use their own unique approach to determining location using a combination of various technologies that offer LBS such as Wi-Fi, LTE, Audio, Bluetooth tags, magnetic fields - it’s easy to understand where the focus on achieving the highest and most consistent accuracy comes from. Unfortunately getting to the “X&Ys” is only part of the story around location, and more often than not it may not even be the most important part.
Surprisingly, location can be thought of in many ways that don’t involve a dot on a map. Confused as to how LBS can exist without location? It all depends on how one defines location: Location could be the moment in time a shopper is trying to make a decision about purchasing a product, thought process in selection of what store to go to, or a loyal customer browsing the ecommerce site. Location could be as broad as knowing that a shopper is physically at a store or knowing a shopper is near or interested in a specific product without knowing exactly where they are in the store. Location can also be as specific as pinpointing a specific location in the retail environment. Even with this broader definition of location, we still haven’t fully captured the entire location context.
If we take a step back and think about use cases around LBS, almost all of them involve location as one aspect in understanding the context of the current shopper to become effective in growing the TLV. When thinking of a location as a point on a map without the other aspects of context, the value of the data becomes significantly reduced. Context is knowing and understanding the shopper’s past purchasing history, loyalty, segmentation, online activity and predicting their future needs. For example, just knowing a shopper is near a specific product but not knowing how interested they might be in that product would not provide sufficient context for an effective personalized engagement campaign. Alternatively, location context could be important in understanding that a shopper who spent time reviewing a product on the ecommerce site just showed up in the physical store. Location without the context of the shopper engagement would only be marginally more effective than standard broadcast-based marketing.
Clearly an effective LBS strategy would combine shopper context with some form of location to provide compelling experiences that would grow the shopper TLV. What is often not clear is how to get started and the fact that LBS strategy could start today with relatively little investment or new deployment in the store. For example, most retailers have the technological capability to understand when shoppers are in the store, or could provide utility in mobile apps to start getting some location context around the shopper. Getting started today provides immediate benefit and starts creating experiences that will only improve over time as refinements to LBS strategy and technology investments continue. Feedback, experience, and data gathered would be invaluable in building a solid business case to justify future technology investments.
Motorola Solutions is working on ways to help retailers seize the opportunity that location and context present for changing the customer experience. Read more about how you can connect with shoppers here.
Nathan Rowe is the Director of Enterprise Solutions in the Global Services and Solutions group at Motorola Solutions.
Entries » Blog » For Retailers, Indoor Location Tracking is more than Where X Meets Y
For Retailers, Indoor Location Tracking is more than Where X Meets Y
Many retailers are exploring strategies around location-based services, or LBS, to engage with shoppers in their brick and mortar stores. It’s clear that understanding where a shopper is can provide significant benefit and value to both the shopper as well as the retailer. Self-service tools on the mobile smartphone, such as indoor mapping and product finder utility combined with navigation and directions, can greatly enhance the shopper experience. The retailer can use the location to understand where the shopper is and create context-aware experiences for them. This approach allows the retailer to add value to the in-store experience, leading to a greater total lifetime value (TLV) of the shopper.
With this objective of maximizing the TLV of the shopper in mind, what always surprises me is how fixated retailers get on getting the X and Y coordinates (or latitude and longitude) of the shopper. Different companies use their own unique approach to determining location using a combination of various technologies that offer LBS such as Wi-Fi, LTE, Audio, Bluetooth tags, magnetic fields - it’s easy to understand where the focus on achieving the highest and most consistent accuracy comes from. Unfortunately getting to the “X&Ys” is only part of the story around location, and more often than not it may not even be the most important part.
Surprisingly, location can be thought of in many ways that don’t involve a dot on a map. Confused as to how LBS can exist without location? It all depends on how one defines location: Location could be the moment in time a shopper is trying to make a decision about purchasing a product, thought process in selection of what store to go to, or a loyal customer browsing the ecommerce site. Location could be as broad as knowing that a shopper is physically at a store or knowing a shopper is near or interested in a specific product without knowing exactly where they are in the store. Location can also be as specific as pinpointing a specific location in the retail environment. Even with this broader definition of location, we still haven’t fully captured the entire location context.
If we take a step back and think about use cases around LBS, almost all of them involve location as one aspect in understanding the context of the current shopper to become effective in growing the TLV. When thinking of a location as a point on a map without the other aspects of context, the value of the data becomes significantly reduced. Context is knowing and understanding the shopper’s past purchasing history, loyalty, segmentation, online activity and predicting their future needs. For example, just knowing a shopper is near a specific product but not knowing how interested they might be in that product would not provide sufficient context for an effective personalized engagement campaign. Alternatively, location context could be important in understanding that a shopper who spent time reviewing a product on the ecommerce site just showed up in the physical store. Location without the context of the shopper engagement would only be marginally more effective than standard broadcast-based marketing.
Clearly an effective LBS strategy would combine shopper context with some form of location to provide compelling experiences that would grow the shopper TLV. What is often not clear is how to get started and the fact that LBS strategy could start today with relatively little investment or new deployment in the store. For example, most retailers have the technological capability to understand when shoppers are in the store, or could provide utility in mobile apps to start getting some location context around the shopper. Getting started today provides immediate benefit and starts creating experiences that will only improve over time as refinements to LBS strategy and technology investments continue. Feedback, experience, and data gathered would be invaluable in building a solid business case to justify future technology investments.
Motorola Solutions is working on ways to help retailers seize the opportunity that location and context present for changing the customer experience. Read more about how you can connect with shoppers here.
Nathan Rowe is the Director of Enterprise Solutions in the Global Services and Solutions group at Motorola Solutions.
Read additional blogs by Nathan Rowe here.
Watch now to learn more about the Proximity Awareness & Analytics solution. Explore Motorola’s suite of retail solutions at www.motorolasolutions.com/retail.