Floor Me with Persuasive Flooring

Researchers at New York University-Stern, University of Pittsburgh, and Drexel University found that a coupon requiring shoppers to travel farther from their planned path to obtain the discounted item resulted in an average increase in spending of about $21.00. When the coupon didn’t require wandering from the planned path, the increase was instead about $14.00.
     So consider the situation where a shopper comes into your store without a coupon, homes in on a particular item, instantly turns into a customer, and then immediately leaves your store after paying for it. A quick profit’s good. Still, considering the potential profits from aisle travel, you might very well prefer to have that shopper wander around a little before completing the transaction. They’re more likely to buy ancillary items on that visit and they’re better able to appreciate all the possibilities your store carries when considering future visits.
     Ecommerce has turned Possibilities Shoppers into Mission Shoppers. Because consumers are now accustomed to learning all about the products, the alternatives, and the prices before entering the store, many more of them bullet in with a target in mind and then leave without even as much as a ricochet toward impulse items.
     To encourage a tour of your business, create progress markers, say store atmospherics experts from Erasmus University, Ghent University, and Université Catholique de Lille. Sequential numbers on aisles or a sign on each describing what’s carried there can serve as progress markers. Prior studies have found that such progress markers might consist of store displays and merchandise arrangements intriguing enough to become mental speed bumps.
     But this latest set of researchers suggests you also get to the foot—well actually, the feet—of the matter. Changes in flooring affect shoppers’ pace. When there’s an easy path to follow, such as continuous carpeting surrounded by hard flooring, people tend to move relatively quickly. If there are variations in the flooring texture along the way, people tend to slow down and look around.
     We can even use flooring to draw attention differentially. University of Minnesota-Minneapolis and University of British Columbia researchers discovered that shoppers who are walking on soft pile carpeting, compared to on hard vinyl tile, attribute extra comfort to offers of products or services they see which require them to walk off the path a bit to reach. They are drawn to these items in the same way accent lighting would attract them.

For your profitability: Sell Well: What Really Moves Your Shoppers

Click below for more: 
Escort Shoppers on In-Store Travel
Charge for Entertaining Possibilities Shoppers
Use Accent Lighting to Build Shopper Interest
Stimulate Shopper Search