This morning I was reading
The Shopper Culture Blog and it had quite an insightful post regarding mobile applications, where shoppers can create shopping lists and even populate prices so as to budget their shopping trips properly. I must say, very useful for the recession. The blog ends by suggesting that retailers should tie up their back-end processes with such applications, so that a shopper can be provided the exact availability, pricing, and promotion details right on the cell phone, before the person leaves home for shopping. That would seriously make it interesting.
I am just imagining, I create a shopping list as follows:
- Okra
- Mango
- Fish
- Washing Powder
- Chewing Gum
And then the Shoprite affiliated application suggests options - Mango - Alphonso (Rs. 300 per Kg)/ Kesar (Rs. 250 per Kg); Fish - Rohu (Rs. 25 per fillet)/ King Fish (Rs. 35 per fillet) and so on. It would be so cool. I would be able to figure out what my shopping trip is supposed to cost and budget other expenses.
The application can go one step further and point out the locations of various items in a large supercenter like store (Shoprite in Mulund is one). So that I save time in shopping.
Or otherwise, if a retailer wants the shopper to roam about a bit and make some impulse purchases, it would be easier to calculate the effectiveness of its on-shelf displays, shopper marketing, and signage in triggering impulse purchases. It can drive tremendous value for retailers as they can optimize store layouts, signage, and shopper marketing advertisements.
Funny how a small device that was supposed to enable us to talk to distant people, is capable of a retail revolution by itself.
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