Retail Marketing Ideas that Work for Retail Stores

As online stores and e-commerce brands for almost every commodity and service have started to take over the Retail POS Software industry. Brick-and-mortar stores are having a tough time drawing customers. Many brick-and-mortar retail stores still think of discounts and offer as their holy grail for attracting customers. But, it could even lead to losses if the promotional strategies are not carried out efficiently. Don’t do that to your retail store. While you strategically offer discounts to increase sales

on the one hand and improve margins. On the other hand, there are several retail marketing ideas that you can offer and adopt this year. As a result, it will give your store a much-needed boost.

Brick and mortar stores work with a great advantage of connecting with customers, which their online counterparts fail to enjoy. Therefore, brick-and-mortar stores have the opportunity to give customers a great buying experience. Furthermore, this will increase the chances of people choosing your retail store over other stores and e-commerce options.

According to research, 86% of customers are willing to pay more for a better experience. Now that is some good news coming your way. Below, we have mentioned some full-proof retail marketing ideas. These retail promotional ideas will answer all your eternal quandaries about increasing your sales this year.

1) Offering Markdowns can be One of the Best Ideas:

You do not want to miss on this sheer winner when it comes to retail marketing ideas to move out all the slow-moving items and make space for new trendy products. Customers love discounts, and some even wait until their favorite products go down on sale.

However, throwing away too many discounts can be harmful to your store, and it may adversely affect your brand and average order size. Hence, the question arises, ‘when to offer strategic markdowns?’ You can offer a

markdown on products once they start becoming slow stock, probably after a specific season or when something stays in stock for a long time.

For example, if you are dealing with apparel items, you must check on the current trends. Moreover, you need to replace them from time to time with new ones. You can then put the old stock on sale after the season ends, and this way, you get more shelf space as well. This was one of the retail marketing ideas.

2) The Best Retail Marketing Ideas are Getting Advantages from Social Media:

Technology is not just for e-commerce and online stores. Even you, as a brick-and-mortar store, can enjoy its advantages. Various social media platforms are the best option for small and medium-sized businesses to grow and increase their audience. They can use this platform to promote their services and products. However, this is one of the best retail marketing ideas.

However, it is important to do proper research before stepping into the

social media world regarding where you want to get identified, which is the best option to increase the pace of results, and how you want to engage with your customers. In case you have limited bandwidth, it is advisable to start with making a strong presence on one platform and gradually increase the platforms where you appear.

Proper research is important because if you have most of your audience at suppose YouTube or Instagram and put most of your efforts at Facebook, you might not get the desired results. Therefore, you must always be careful and precise with your research before you get into the social media frenzy.

3) Go local:

Be it renting a stand at the local annual fair or choosing locally grown organic products to be placed on the shelves, being a brick and mortar store; your first focus should be attracting and supporting the locals. This way, you can increase the audience base, and with their word-of-mouth publicity, you can mount your customer base.

As a small and new business, many of your potential customers might have already crossed your store or heard about it. If not, then the

presence at a fair or local festival is a good chance to introduce it to them. As the footfall increases, you can also promote your specialties with one of these retail marketing ideas and other merchandise. The best part of this strategy is that you will connect with your customers and the local community. Once a connection with your audience is made, the next step is offering them the right kind of products to win their hearts, as the first impression is important. Many customers have started to go local, they try to purchase products that are locally made, and they tend to stay loyal to such products as well.

4) Loyalty Programs are a must-have in Retail Marketing Ideas:

Loyalty programs are extremely underrated yet exceptionally effective promotional tools to make your customers choose you over and again. For this, you can use the personal data and purchasing history of your customers that you can easily pull off from your POS system.

Using this information, you can create attractive and customized Promotions Management for all your existing customers. As soon as your customers receive the messages or e-mails, they would want to purchase from your store to avail the offers or discounts.

To make these retail marketing ideas even more effective, try sending them interesting offers that are different. This way, your customers will enter the loyalty club. Furthermore, they will feel special when they receive offers according to their preferences and needs. Make them choose your retail store in the blink of an eye.

Final Thoughts on Retail Marketing Ideas

We have mentioned a few promotion ideas above that you can always try for your retail business. But the fact remains, it all comes down to what suits your business type and how you are willing to try and experiment with new things. As there is no rule book on what you should try and what you should not. The more you are willing to broaden your horizons, the better results you can expect from the store. Nevertheless, the key is your business is everything about your customers, how you treat them, and the services and products you offer them. Therefore, make sure you keep their interest first and meet all their expectations.