Peek Into Bathroom Rituals

As a retailer, you’ll gain a profitable edge by knowing how your customers use the products and services you sell. This guides you in stocking items which will be most popular and in telling shoppers those benefits statements which make a sale most likely.
     For some examples of all this, peek into your customers’ bathroom rituals. Consumer rituals consist of the habitual ways products and services are used.
     A few years ago, marketing agency BBDO Worldwide studied consumer rituals. Of the five rituals identified by the study as most common throughout the world, three center around the bathroom:

• Preparing for battle, in which we get ready to face the day. Brushing our teeth. Taking a quick bath or shower to wake up and be clean. Shaving.
• Sexing up, in which we aim to become our most attractive selves. From freshening our breath to painting our face and so on. Special products make us feel special.
• Returning to camp, in which we unwind. This is another ritual in which a bath or shower is common. But analysis of the study results indicates different benefits here than from the “preparing for battle” scrub, rinse, and dry. Here, we seek luxury and, often, solitude. Along with this, of the 5,000 people interviewed for the project, about 50% said their “returning to camp” ritual includes leisurely time spent reading on the toilet.

     The years might change some details of these rituals, but the fundamental characteristics are probably much the same now as in, let’s say, the 1960’s portrayed in the TV show “Mad Men.”
     But there are differences by country. In preparing for battle, about 75% of people worldwide shower or bathe, but among the Japanese, the percentage is closer to 25%. There are also differences by culture and religion. The devout Muslim is forbidden from reading while using the toilet and is to use only the left hand for cleansing.
     What does all this mean for you, the retailer? Carry products, provide services, and design environments to fit the motivators for different types of rituals. The type of soap sought by the consumer might be different depending on whether a person is preparing for battle, sexing up, or returning to camp. So offer all three types. The bathtub ideal for returning to camp should also accommodate the quick cleanup the consumer will probably want when preparing for battle.

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Discuss Attributes to Guide Choices

By discussing with customers the product attributes important to them, you can guide both their choices and your own choices to greater profitability.
     Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and University of Southern California find that with packaged food items with which the shopper is familiar, shoppers pay the most attention to the attributes of taste and brand name, more than they do the size of the package. Researchers at University of Pennsylvania and University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign find that across all product categories and levels of shopper familiarity with products, the attributes of color and shape have special importance.

• Consult online reviews for products you carry. Encourage people to post product reviews. Look at the online reviews maintained by other retailers who sell the same products you sell. Read impartial reviews, such as in Consumer Reports, for the products. In all of this, notice what attributes are being mentioned. Is it color? Speed? Reliability? Guarantees? Support services? Country of origin? Researchers at New York University and University of Florida find that when a shopper sees an attribute discussed in a review, the shopper significantly increases their use of that attribute in product assessments and significantly decreases their use of other attributes. Know what your shoppers are thinking.
• Discuss benefits in terms of attributes. Every consumer from about age 7 pays closer attention when you say what the product can do for them, not just what attributes the product has. But the consumer will be better able to compare benefits of a set of products when you present them in terms of attributes. “Because this can is square and squat, you’ll be able to stack more inside the locker when you take your boat out.”
• Use attribute information to prune down inventory. Remember that I said the attribute information could guide your own choices more profitably? Those Carnegie Mellon/USC researchers found that when a major grocery retailer trimmed back stock-keeping units (SKUs) to omit product and category attributes relatively unimportant to customers, sales did not decrease. They increased 11%. The researchers say this was due to decisions being made easier for shoppers.

     You can guide the choices of your shoppers by the ways in which you arrange the merchandise. But it often works even better to present the alternatives in terms of what attributes you discover your shoppers using already.

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Assume Multiple Personalities to Merchandise

Richard Gottlieb, publisher of Global Toy News and respected authority on the business of play, describes a problem that could be robbing you of profit: A company Mr. Gottlieb was working with wanted to bring to market games designed for senior citizens. Both the game pieces and the print fonts were extra large. But the people responsible for buying games for retailers had trouble conceptualizing in which department these senior citizen games would be merchandised. Games are for kids, not for the elderly.
     The way around this problem is the peanut-butter-and-jelly principle of product adjacencies, but with a psychiatric twist. The PB&J principle is that we stock the jellies on shelves close to where we shelve the peanut butter because when a shopper puts a peanut butter jar into the shopping cart, they're likely to start thinking, “Where’s the jelly?”
     The psychiatric twist is that we take on a bit of multiple personality disorder. No, not the pathology portrayed in the Showtime series “United States of Tara” about a woman with what’s formally called Dissociative Identity Disorder. Instead, let’s think creatively about what different sorts of personalities would be looking for in your store and where would they expect to find it.

• In a dialogue with Mr. Gottlieb, branding expert Carol Spieckerman suggests that retailers follow the example of battery merchandising. Batteries are at multiple locations. Think of all the different places the customer might be interested in what you’re offering. Coach your store’s buyers and merchandisers to relax division by department.
• But batteries are small and inexpensive. You can’t stock the foot massagers at ten different locations. So in place of the item, use signage saying, “Also looking for a foot massager? They’re on Aisle 7.”
• Listen to your customers. Ask them, “What items would you like to see in our store that we don’t have now?” If it turns out that you do have the item, notice where the customer is standing and place the item or signage right there.

     Could be that the senior games would offend seniors. Research from Ghent University and Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School suggests, ironically, that the intended audience will think gigantic game pieces and super-large print are for young children, not mature elders. But the lesson from Mr. Gottlieb’s example would still hold. So when merchandising, be ready to assume a variety of shopper personalities.

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Refine Your Psychographics

When retailers talk about psychographics, they’re referring to personal values and the shopper habits affected by those values. Demographics (age, gender, income level) and psychographics are often two ways of looking at the same thing. For instance, women generally have different personal values and shopping habits than do men. But the psychographic approach gives the retailer more focused hints for making sales.
     Except when the analysis is insufficiently refined, that is. A recent Bloomberg Businessweek article describes how Toyota dealers suffered from this happening: Figuring that Toyota is America’s largest producer of cars, the company—along with a number of influential industry analysts—expected Toyota to swipe sales of large pickup trucks from GM, Ford, and Chrysler as the market for pickups picked up.
     But the psychographics of buyers of large trucks are different from the psychographics of car buyers. A more refined analysis using data from Nielsen Claritas indicated that compared to Toyota large truck prospects, the GM and Ford prospects are more likely to dine at Cracker Barrel restaurants, have dial-up Internet, and use the paper Yellow Pages. The Toyota prospects were more likely to dine at steakhouses, shop online, own golf clubs, and subscribe to Runner's World.
     This sort of focus gives specifics to be used in merchandising, marketing, and selling. Psychographic analysis for the PowerBar sports nutrition line produced a recommendation that the products be displayed alongside personal grooming items. The focus from refinement also protects against you being buried in trivial findings, while staying open to being surprised. A collaboration of researchers at Columbia University, Advertising Age, and the Minneapolis Star-Tribune found that people most interested in buying fishing equipment also enjoy listening to Christian rock music and reading Southern Living.
     Whether contracting with a market research firm to provide you psychographic information or gathering and analyzing your own data, always be angling for further refinement.
     At the same time, recognize there will be individual exceptions to the overall refined findings. A comment posted to the online version of the Bloomberg Businessweek article reads, “I've built several computers, use an htpc to watch the internet on my plasma, use voip instead of telco, never owned a gun, but have several bikes. I own 3 F150's and no toytas [sic].”

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Prolong Your Reputation as Cutting Edge

“New and improved” has been a mainstay of retail marketing for forever. But a preference for the cutting edge has exploded in shopper psychology. An upside for the smaller retailer is that it gives an opening to get customers. “Want the latest technology/fashion statement/service delivery method? Come to us rather than to the stodgy retailer that’s been around too long.” At the same time, the challenge for retailers is that once you’ve made “new and improved” a major marketing message, you risk losing that reputation—and your customers—to upstarts.
     Here are some ways to prolong your reputation as cutting edge:

• Continually introduce some new and improved items. A common sense suggestion, I know, but one that is too often overlooked by busy retailers.
• Open pop-up stores. These are stores that remain in business for a very limited time. A Bloomberg Businessweek article from a few years ago describes how even retailing giants Target and Walmart have successfully used pop-up stores. In one case, the Target pop-up was open for only four days. Your objective is to generate excitement about your bricks-and-mortar store and/or ecommerce site. With this in mind, announce the pop-up widely to the media, realizing that even after the pop-up has closed, reporters will figure their audience is still asking, “What the devil happened?” When the Bloomberg Businessweek article was published in 2007, retail was thriving, so the article said, “Unoccupied stores in hot retail locations aren’t easy to come by.” The situation is different now.
• Repackage nostalgia. Australian entertainer Peter Allen thought enough of the saying “Everything old is new again” to coauthor a song by that title. Merchants are accommodating nostalgia fans who want the cutting edge by offering items like antique toasters sold as accent pieces, music tracks from old LP records reissued as MP3 downloads, and traditional house calls augmented with Internet ordering.
• Build customer loyalty. Another common sense suggestion? Maybe, but for a reason you might not have recognized: Loyal customers are sensitive to whether the cutting edge has become overly trendy. Researchers at Concordia University and University of Wisconsin-Madison explored what happened when loyal customers’ shopping selections threatened to be associated with terms like “yuppies,” “metrosexuals,” “urban gangstas,” and “hipsters.” The research findings indicate that loyal customers’ reactions in rejecting these labels strengthen their conviction that their existing store of choice is cutting edge.

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Time Your Statements of Benefits

Knowing when to do what is essential to maximizing retailing profitability. Offering cold weather merchandise when your target consumers start thinking about cold weather preferences. Ordering the heavy sweaters and recruiting the tire chain jockeys enough in advance of when they’ll be needed.
     Tony Curtis, who died last week at age 85 after having appeared in more than 140 movies, is quoted as having said, “…(M)y longevity is due to my good timing.” I don’t know who first advised, “Timing is everything,” but Albert Einstein associated time with everything when saying, “The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once.”
     Prof. Einstein’s insight applies to the best ways for you to present product and service benefits to your retail shoppers:

• Researchers at University of Connecticut and University of Virginia found that women shoppers vary between thinking, “It’s time for me” and “It’s time for others.” Analyze how your shoppers cycle between these two, then adjust your merchandise mix to fit. Retail store consultants at Envirosell performed an even more sophisticated analysis of timing, resulting in them advising a shopping mall bookstore to use cylindrical fixtures to rotate out different sorts of books for different times of the day. These approaches help you not only to sell more merchandise, but also to even out the flow of customers over the hours your store is open.
• In advertising, describe the range of alternatives you have available to each customer. If your in-store or warehouse range is, in reality, limited, you could expand it by offering special-order services. But once the shopper arrives at your store or ecommerce site, have the products presented in easily understood categories. Researchers at University of Texas-Austin describe how having a broad assortment of products available draws shoppers, but once the shoppers arrive, they seek ease of product evaluation.
• Before the sale, emphasize the number of functions the product can serve and have technical specifications easily available. Once the sale has been completed, state benefits in terms of making it easy to use the functions and reassuring the customer they’ve made the right choice. Researchers at University of Maryland-College Park found that consumers tend to choose the most feature-filled models, but then after purchase, tend to get frustrated with the complexity of what they chose.

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Honor Those Who Love Those Pets

Today is World Animal Day, described by Bloggers Unite as “a special opportunity for anyone who loves animals to acknowledge the diverse roles that they play in our lives.”
     Retailers certainly should love animals for one of those diverse roles: Pets motivate their owners to be wonderful customers.

• The Humane Society of the United States says about 40% of U.S. households have at least one dog and about 35% own at least one cat. That’s a substantial market, even if you don’t add in the horses, birds, lizards, gerbils, and goldfish. Whatever your retailing line, it would benefit you to carry some products of special interest to pet owners.
• Researchers at St. Joseph’s University report that about 90% of pet owners consider their pets to be members of the family and about 75% of household cats and dogs receive gifts on holidays and birthdays. An ethnographic study by University of Utah researchers found a surprisingly high frequency of pet owners wanted to have a picture of their pet—ranging from dog to horse and beyond—taken with Santa Claus. What services do you offer to humans that could be profitably also offered for pets?
• Survey researchers at Eastern Washington University find much stronger loyalty for pet food expenditures than for the owner’s own food expenditures. This indicates that once you establish the habit of owners making purchases from your store for their pets, they’re likely to keep coming back, but to woo pet food purchasers who are shopping elsewhere, you’ll want to do something dramatic to bring attention to what you offer.
• People are more willing to buy premium items for their pets than for themselves. The Eastern Washington research found that about 80% of dog owners said they were serious about selecting healthy food for their dogs, but only 65% of the same people said they were serious about their own food selection. Bloomberg Businessweek reports a high increase over past months in spending on designer-label pet clothing and accessories, a substantial proportion of it via ecommerce. The University of Utah research attributed trends like these to us considering our pets to be more defenseless than ourselves. The Bloomberg Businessweek view is that we can feel luxurious with a lower price tag when the product is for Fido. So be sure you’re ready to defend and indulge pets in your business operations.

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Combine Flavors for Bonus Effectiveness

“The whole is more powerful than the sum of its parts.” That’s the fundamental motto of an approach to human behavior called “Gestalt psychology.” Allow the research evidence for the motto to inspire you to apply Gestalt psychology to your retailing.

• Reinforce your message through consistency. For example, if you make your living from selling merchandise, you might be considering how you can most fully use services as an additional profit center. If so, keep the product-service identity strong. Consumer psychology research verifies the importance of you projecting a consistent personality across products and services.
• Produce attractive offerings by blending components. If you operate a restaurant, you might be looking over the McCormick & Co. Flavor Forecast for the 2010 holiday season. With the best of the blends, one component brings out the strengths of another. In the cinnamon-bacon blend, for instance, McCormick says the robust cinnamon leads our palate to experience the rounder flavors of the bacon which the smokiness usually overshadow.
• Highlight superiority via contrast. This is the rationale for comparative advertising. It’s also one of the reasons we sprinkle in discounted items among regularly-priced items in our merchandising. The value of the discount is made more apparent to the shopper by the easy comparison with surrounding items that are not discounted.

     In choosing what elements you’ll combine, decide if your primary objective is to reinforce a message through consistency, produce attractive offerings from a blend, or highlight superiority via contrast.
     Gestalt psychology emphasizes the importance of trying things out in the real world, not as an isolated study in a laboratory. The real-world context and individual circumstances can make all the difference. Again, this reflects the Gestalt attention to the whole over the parts. So try out various combinations in your retailing.
     Not every blend will be a winner, of course. While announcing their Flavor Forecast combos last year, McCormick & Co. acknowledged that one of the pairs on the 2007 list may have been creatively inspired, but, if truth be told, failed to inspire many cooks in the world: Wasabi and maple.

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Pitch the Synergy of Multifunction Items

Why would your shopper want a toothpaste that only cleans their teeth when they could buy a paste which also freshens their breath? Why did Samsung Electronics gear up to get into the standalone camera business when combination camera/phone/GPS/gaming devices are available in abundance?
     Well, there’s a variety of reasons. But one answer from researchers at Northwestern University is that although shoppers are attracted to multi-solution products, a number of those shoppers believe such products are inferior in each of the capabilities when compared to single-solution products. The product which promises to be a jack of all trades risks being seen as a master of none.
     Carrying multifunction products has an advantage for you. You can reduce the total of different items you need to have in stock. If you’re out of the toothpaste that just cleans, you could point the shopper toward the one that cleans plus more. But this works out only if the shopper accepts the quality of the combination offering.
     The Northwestern University researchers found that one way to overcome the inferred inferiority is to set a premium price on the multifunction product. The extra cost helps convince shoppers that the product can indeed do more.
     But in a retailing environment where consumers are highly price sensitive, you might choose to take a different approach. Research findings from Singapore Management University and Korea’s Kyung Hee University suggest a technique: Describe to the potential purchaser how well the various functions work together. Instead of focusing on the different capabilities, focus on the added benefits that comes from the synergy.
     The Singapore/Kyung Hee research indicates that this is especially useful with items the shopper considers to have a high level of technological performance. It is more important with smart phones than with toothpaste. In fact, the researchers concluded that at low levels of technological performance, people overwhelmingly preferred the combination products.
     Because cultures vary in the thresholds consumers set for high technology, the value and effectiveness of pitching the synergy differs by culture. Assess what works with your customer base.

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

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Recalibrate for Shopper Gender Trends

In the U.S. at least, it’s likely that husbands will be doing more of the shopping than in the past, and when a wife does do the shopping, she’s more likely than in the past to bring along family and/or friends. Neither of these trends is monumental in magnitude. However, it’s your attention to marginal, but persistent, differences that can give you a retailer’s edge in profitability.
     The chain of logic behind the changes is reflected in an analysis conducted at University of New Hampshire of survey data: During the U.S. economic downturn, husbands were more likely to lose their jobs than were wives, and now, husbands are encountering more difficulty than wives in finding employment.
     As a result, a higher percentage of wives than in the past are finding it necessary, in order to pay the bills, to enter the labor force or to expand their work hours. They’d prefer to be home more with family, but that’s not feasible. One likely consequence of this is that more household responsibilities, including shopping, are being handled by the husbands.
     There are broad individual differences among male shoppers and among female shoppers, but a solid body of research finds that, overall, men tend to think about shopping and conduct themselves as shoppers differently than do women. For instance, researchers at Stanford University asked samples of men and women to contemplate the task of shopping for a new wardrobe. Later, each participant was assigned to plot the route for a cross-country road trip.
     The women in the study were much more likely than the men to plot out a scenic route rather than a direct route. Male shoppers are more purpose-driven. Women are more possibilities-driven.
     Along with this, women are more likely to find emotional comfort from shopping than are men. Put this together with the fact that the wives going to work will long for time with family and friends. When the wife does do the shopping, she’ll want to bring along family and/or friends.
     Recalibrate your merchandising and patterns of salesperson-shopper interactions to turn these shopper gender trends to the advantage of both you and your customers.

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Update Your Niche Whenever Necessary

Bargain hamburger retailer Burger King has been suffering from falling sales and profits. According to a Bloomberg Businessweek article, the niche is probably the reason: Burger King is known in many consumers’ minds as, well, a bargain hamburger retailer.
     That identity might appeal to younger men seeking a filling meal at a cheap price. Burger King’s dancing-chicken style of advertising has amused this target demographic, and there’s evidence the sometimes old, sometimes untidy restaurants have been tolerated by this target demographic. The problem is that members of Burger King’s target demographic have been dining out less often than in the past. The lesson for all sorts of retailers is to regularly assess for a need to update your niche.
     If you’re in Burger King’s marketing position, it’s not that you were wrong in selecting a niche. Considering that McDonald’s has almost three times as many restaurants worldwide as you do, a good alternative to positioning yourself as just an alternative to McDonald’s is to focus on a promising market segment.
     Consumers are drifting from the general to the specific, from the one-size-fits-all to the specialty and the customized. Another recent Bloomberg Businessweek article discusses the growing popularity of niche social networks like GoFISHn, where anglers can brag about their latest catch; Dogster, where members have been debating whether pets and their owners should bed down together; and PatientsLikeMe, where people can share progress notes on treatment for chronic medical problems, such as flea bites from lying down with dogs.
     The venture capitalists backing specialized sites like these are saying that Facebook and Twitter are great places to learn how to do social networking, but they’re insufficiently focused. Here, one lesson for all sorts of retailers is that a specialized social networking site could be a great place for you to advertise to your niche markets. Because it’s online advertising, you can promptly change your social networking presence each time you navigate your niche to a different location. Be on the Dogster pages today and the GoFISHn boards tomorrow.
     The tip from shopper psychology is not to make the changes too abrupt. Reach out with a line extension and then pull in and eliminate your weaker lines. Earlier this month, Burger King announced they were adding to the menu blueberry biscuits, a pancake platter, and seven more breakfast items. But the bargain burger stays for now.

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Balloon Your Profitability with Music

How in the world can music increase profitability for a retailer these days? The market for selling it is competitive, seeing as there are all those 99¢ personalized music downloads. And even 99¢ is too high for some people when Pandora’s free service will learn the kind of music each of us likes best and then play it anywhere we’ve got Internet.
     Well, there are ways:

• Use music to pace customers. When you play faster music in a store or restaurant, people tend to make their selections and complete their purchases more quickly. According to researchers at Western Kentucky University, when slower music is played as background in a fine dining restaurant, patrons stay longer, but eat about the same amount of food. To make it profitable, you’d want to be sure to serve alcohol, since the researchers also found that slower music leads to more alcohol consumption.
• Play music with lyrics if you want shoppers to select items from habit without much thought. Researchers at Columbia University and Northwestern University find that noticeable music helps head off arguments shoppers might make to themselves about the purchase. On the other hand, if you want a shopper to carefully analyze the purchase decision, either do not have music or use music that is barely noticeable. If you’re wanting customers to try new brands or new products, delete intrusive music.
• Use music to project a store personality. Research findings from psychologists at University of Melbourne indicate that the music should reflect a personality that fits how your target customers want to see themselves.
• Sell music that people can’t get elsewhere. Cracker Barrel, Starbucks, Wal-Mart and Target each have arranged to sell house brand special edition CDs.
• Breed earworms. That’s the term University of Cincinnati researchers use to refer to tunes that get stuck in consumers’ brains, repeating involuntarily. When those earworms were bred from melodies heard at your store or in ads for your store, each repetition is a reminder to consider coming back again. Last spring, Holiday Inn featured a song titled “You Always Make Me Smile” in an ad campaign. The song gained popularity on its own, and now there have been well over 800,000 viewings of the music video. Perhaps it helps that the video is documenting 4,000 people setting a record for the world’s largest water balloon fight.

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See Through Consumers’ Boredom Fears

A while back, some Carnegie Mellon students were offered a bonus treat in their economics or history class: They could select snacks to be given to them at the end of three successive class sessions. The choices included Snickers bars, Oreo cookies, milk chocolate with almonds, tortilla chips, peanuts, and cheese-peanut butter crackers.
     Since the offer was part of a consumer behavior study, though, it wasn’t all that simple. Half the participants were invited to choose one item on each of the three weeks. At each session, they weren’t told if there would be additional opportunities to choose in future classes. The other participants were told that in the first class session they were to select the treat they wanted for each of three classes in advance.
     In one of the groups, 45% of the participants ended up choosing three different items. In the other group, only 8% of the participants ended up choosing three different items. Which group exhibited a broader variety of choices, do you think? The ones who chose one each day to have that day? The ones who selected at the start the three to have on the three separate days? And why do you think there was a difference in the variety frequency of the two groups?
     Before I tell you the correct match of percentage to group, I’ll tell you a few of the explanations consumer behavior researchers have for these and similar results:

• People overestimate the extent to which they’ll get tired of eating or using the same item. They think they’ll want to make a change when, in fact, they’ll end up sticking with a favorite.
• When offered a range of alternatives, people see it as an opportunity to try out something new.
• Some people find it easier to say, “Give me one of each,” than to carefully assess the tradeoffs in the choices.

     Yes, that’s right. The students who selected all three treats at once were the 45% group.
     As a retailer, recognize that customers fear boredom, but build out product usage from what’s familiar to them.

• Offer what the consumer sees as variety.
• When promoting new product alternatives, keep more familiar choices in place for a while.
• When shoppers hesitate in selecting among alternatives, encourage them to buy more than one flavor.

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Strengthen Your Barbell Retailing

Retailing is going to extremes. Industry analyst Marshal Cohen calls it the “thinning middle.” I like to place more attention on where the profits are than on where they aren’t, so inspired by a quote of economist Sung Won Sohn, I’ll call it “barbell retailing.” The strength for retailing has moved away from middle markets and toward the low and the high.
     Here are two examples from a recent Financial Times article (registration is required to read the article):

• Mid-market Safeway’s same-store sales declined in the second quarter of 2010 compared with the 2009 results. Premium-market Whole Foods had about a 9% increase.
• Sales at budget-market McDonald’s have grown, as have sales at upper-market Morton’s. Over the same period, mid-market food retailers have not done as well.

     Barbell retailing is an example of what social psychologists call “group polarization.” When a group of consumers are making decisions jointly, they are most likely to move toward more risky alternatives, such as spending on luxury items. But if they don’t move in that direction, they’re most likely to move toward more timid actions, such as spending like tightwads. What they are least likely to do is to stay in the middle.
     This is a change in the consumer behavior many retailers are accustomed to. Traditionally, shoppers show extremeness aversion. When presented with the bargain, midrange, and luxury choices, the average shopper picks the midrange. But group polarization becomes more likely at times of uncertainty, and consumers worldwide are collectively experiencing economic uncertainty.

• In your merchandising, feature both premium and bargain choices for product lines. If you need to save on inventory expenses, deemphasize the midrange choices.
• For any midrange lines you do carry, project a strong lifestyle personality of staying the course and showing perseverance in the face of uncertainty.
• Avoid the extreme extremes. When the weightlifter loads up the barbell for a total 130 lb lift, they’ll put the 50 lb weights on first, then the 10 lb weights outside the 50 lb ones, and then the 5 lb weights outside the 10 lb ones. Keep the shape of that barbell in mind. Your shoppers are moving out from the center, but only a minority are moving all the way out to the highest luxury or the deepest discount preferences.

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Provide Portability for Your Shoppers

Chances are your target customers want portability, so give it to them.
     In a recent interview with Bloomberg Television’s “InBusiness,” Susan Lyne, CEO of Gilt Groupe, Inc. and former CEO of Martha Stewart Living, said, “People expect to be able to shop where and when they want…. [B]eing able to have your iPhone, pull it out,… shop at that moment.”
     Gilt Groupe is a “flash retailer,” at which a product is offered at a substantial discount for a limited number of hours. Ms. Lyne reports that although the percentage of online transactions with Gilt Groupe made via mobile devices is still less than 10%, she expects that percentage to grow rapidly.

• If you sell any sort of mobile devices, select your merchandise on the basis of long battery lives. Although we might remember the Apple iPod as having been an instant success, the truth is that first-generation models frustrated purchasers because they needed such frequent recharges. Micromax, which took on cell phone giant Nokia in India, made initial gains in market share by equipping the phone with a large battery.
• Accommodate the drive to portability for each stage of consumer behavior. Think of ways you can enable your customers and potential customers to be flexible in when and where they seek out information about you and your products; complete a purchase; use the product; and dispose of the product, such as making a return or exchange.
• Be ready for the appeal of portability to stay especially high for as long as our current era of economic and social uncertainty lasts. It’s not just improved mobile technology that’s motivating the trend. Research at University of South Carolina finds that during times of stress and upheaval, we become more anxious to wander to different possibilities.
• Because it’s getting harder to pin down your target markets in their purchasing habits, assess for changes regularly. Where and how they’ll be shopping next month has a fair chance of being at least a bit different from where and how they shopped last month. Don’t overreact to small changes. But do assess.

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Be Creative, But Only Sometimes

Merchandise to Fit Purchasing Cycles

Annual weather cycles are somewhat predictable and they affect large segments of your target customers the same way, so you can plan your merchandising to take account of them. In early January, you can pretty much count on everybody being cold if they go outside when your store is in Buffalo, New York and quite warm when outside a store in Adelaide, South Australia. So you’ll stock more stay-at-home and go-out-protected items at one time of year than at the others.
     Consumer behavior research shows that there are also monthly cycles which influence successful merchandising. What makes them different from weather cycles is that the effects vary by customer segment. Still, by being aware of these cycles, you might gain a retailer’s edge.
     Here are two examples to get you thinking about purchasing cycles your store encounters and how to merchandise to fit those cycles:

• Researchers at University of Utah and University of Iowa find that monthly paycheck cycles affect not only how much money people will spend on merchandise, but also the types of merchandise they’ll find most attractive. In the days soon after receiving a paycheck, consumers with full-time jobs become more interested in products and services that help them gain more than what they currently have. This is a time for you to feature the latest technologies and the toothpaste which promises to whiten teeth. Then as the days after the paycheck pass, the person becomes progressively more interested in products and services which help them avoid losing what they have now. They'll become more interested in nostalgia items, familiar brands, and the cavity-fighter toothpaste. The researchers determined that this cycling was not due to a declining checking account balance or to the pricing of different types of products.
• Researchers at University of Minnesota, Texas Christian University, and University of Texas-Austin find that women near the most fertile point of their monthly cycle are about 10% more likely to seek out sexier fashions than at other times of the month. When shopping for shoes, they’ll lean toward the stilettos over pumps and toward revealing blouses over roomy sweaters. The evidence is that this cycle involves competitiveness. If the females in the study were told that attractive women frequented the neighborhood, things moved from 10% more likely to 25% more likely.

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

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Sell Either Protection or Promotion
Acknowledge the Power of Cycles

Ease the Guilt for Adult Unhealthy Eaters

Talking about the origins of a fast food success store, Wallace Fowler, who owns sixty KFC franchises, told Bloomberg Businessweek, “Kentucky Fried Chicken hit the streets with eleven herbs and spices, pressure-cooked, and by and large, the general public doesn’t give a damn how many calories are in it.” The stimulus for his statement was efforts by KFC Corporation to reach health-conscious consumers by emphasizing grilled chicken over the fried chicken recipe.
     My advice to you, retailer, is that if your adult customers choose to take the unhealthy route, ease the guilt for them. Feel no need to go beyond fully informing them and obeying the law. When Giant Foods, reportedly inspired by President John. F. Kennedy’s “Consumer Bill of Rights,” formulated their own list of rights decades ago, it included “Right to choose. Consumers who want to purchase possibly harmful or hazardous products (such as food with additives) can do so.”
      My advice is different regarding child consumers. There, choices need to be restricted and to the degree that the retailer can arouse guilt in a child for making unhealthy choices, it could help parents and guardians shape the child’s long-term eating preferences. This is an important issue where retailers can fulfill a social responsibility. The U.S. National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion says that over the past thirty years, obesity rates among preteens has tripled and among adolescents has nearly quadrupled.
     But when it comes to adults, the customer likes to be in control, so there are better health motivators than retailer-induced guilt.

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Balance Healthy and Indulgent in Merchandise
Have Fun Items Throughout the Store
Inform Consumers, But Don’t Intrude

Distinguish Accelerating from Slowing Trends

Retailing professionals—especially those who gained most of their experience during the fifteen bountiful years that preceded the global economic crash—know the rules have changed, but they’re not sure how. Which changes in consumers’ thinking are accelerating, so retailers need to move quickly to stay ahead of the curve? Which changes are slowing, so retailers might want to rein in resources being expended on them?
     To answer those questions, researchers at London-based Trajectory Partnership analyzed the effects of previous economic downturns and recoveries on consumer psychology. They then took into account how bad the latest downturn is compared to those previous ones, and they overlaid all this on consumer psychology trends that are operating independently of the downturn.
     Here are two changes in consumers’ thinking that seem to be accelerating:

• A desire for simple alternatives. A recent New York Times article begins with the tale of a couple who achieved greater happiness by giving away loads of their possessions—including their cars—and finally moving to a studio apartment. Most consumers won’t go to those extremes, but the article gives more evidence of seeking simplicity. A corollary of this is that people are spending money on experiences—where the memories don’t cost much to maintain—instead of merchandise that has to be cleaned, repaired, and eventually replaced. In a Euro RSCG Worldwide survey of 5,700 adults residing in France, the Netherlands, England, the U.S., Brazil, Japan, or China, about 70% said they wished simple products were available to them.
• Seeking variety. The Trajectory researchers call it “a tendency to flit from one offering to another.” There will continue to be less brand loyalty and more openness to trying out unknown brands. Give your shoppers choices so they feel in control and do not feel as if they’re being manipulated.

     On the other hand, here are two trends that seem to be waning:

• Green consumption. The Trajectory researchers believe this trend will resume its prerecession upwards movement when the economy recovers, though. Target stores will be ready. They now sell what they call green-friendly home products along with more than 700 organic food items.
• Seeking extreme experiences. Experiences are in, but for most consumers, risk tolerance is way down for the count. The Trajectory researchers point out how many people who lived through the Depression pinched pennies for the rest of their lives.

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Offer Fundamental Indulgences
Sell More by Adding Variety
Give Shoppers Variety for Control
Attract with Social Consciousness
Reduce Unwanted Risks for Your Shoppers

Offer Neatness to Creative Shoppers

Last week, I hung around the Lululemon Athletica store in Corte Madera, California. Lulu, as some have nicknamed the chain, has fully stocked stores and limited selection showrooms in Canada, the U.S., Australia, and Hong Kong. They also sell their branded merchandise through other retailers, and they have an ecommerce site. The company has gained attention for friendly store design.
     I wanted to observe that friendliness for myself. One impression that came through to me was a handmade look. Another was neatness. Research at University of Colorado suggests that a handmade look might not appeal to all types of consumers, but would be attractive to shoppers who see themselves as creative or aspire to be more creative. Findings from surveys conducted by the Boston Consulting Group indicate that women shoppers—the major target audience for Lululemon—like their creativity combined with practicality.
     Here are two lessons about creativity and practicality from Lululemon:

• Although the stores carry a range of apparel, the company home page says they sell “technical yoga clothes.” The store I visited had large full-color photo posters on the walls, each poster featuring a yoga instructor affiliated with that store. Yoga is a disciplined art. Are you doing ustrasana? Hey, there’s only one right way and many wrong ways to channel the spirit of the camel when posing as one. At the same time, yoga practices are designed to relax constraints on creative thought. Which of your lines of merchandise and services would appeal to creative shoppers? For those lines, what words, phrases, and images can you use in ads, signage, and personal selling to project your technical approach to relaxing constraints on creativity?
• On a main window outside the store was what looked like a hand-painted calendar of special in-store and area events to be held during the month. It was done neatly, so it was easy to read. Inside the store, the shelves and racks were well-stocked with merchandise neatly arranged. Large shelf tags describing the different types of merchandise were done in a handwriting font. On the website and in the store, the Lululemon Manifesto resembles a collage, with mottos facing in a variety of directions, but everything printed neatly. What presentation styles, including standards for employee dress, can you use to portray a blend of creativity and neatness that your shoppers will find appealing?

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Help Shoppers Use Their Imagination
Exercise Cultural Sensitivity in Color Use
Manage Store Clutter Strategically
Train Staff About Dress Standards

Keep Ecommerce Product Returns Pleasant

In a survey of 2,000 United Kingdom ecommerce shoppers, 60% of them said they'd completely stop doing business with an online retailer who handles deliveries or returns badly. The survey was commissioned by Collect+, a parcel service that provides over 3,500 UK locations to which customers can have packages delivered or can return merchandise to the retailer. The survey was conducted by YouGov, an independent consumer research company.
     Smart in-store retailers long ago recognized the profitability which comes from making product returns pleasant. Customers become more willing to buy when they know they can receive a refund or exchange if things don’t work out. Use the same approach with your ecommerce business.

• Keep the policy clear and announce the policy clearly. At the store, when customers are waiting in line at a returns desk, can they easily see the policy? On your website, is the policy easy to access? In the Collect+ survey, about 50% of respondents said they always check the return policy before making an ecommerce purchase.
• Ask the reason for the return and use an analysis of the reasons to improve your merchandising. When someone comes to the returns counter in-store or is completing the form for a return to be shipped, ask them to tell you the reasons for the return, and then record those reasons along with the person’s identification information. Never make this procedure a prolonged inquisition, and always have in mind that it is more important to keep a customer than to keep to a policy. And tell your customers the advantages to them of sharing those reasons. Your staff and the screen message might say something like, “I know it’s a bother to you to have to return merchandise you’ve bought from us. I want to be sure we deal with suppliers who will provide you, your family, and your friends with reliable products the first time, every time.”
• Encourage ecommerce customers to make returns at your store. Then once a dissatisfied consumer is in the store, transform them into a curious shopper. This is especially useful when the person making the return received the item as a gift. People returning a gift may not know your store. Here’s a wonderful opportunity to introduce to them all the products and services you offer.

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

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Simplify Item Returns for Customers
Ask for Specifics on Merchandise Returns