BOSTON —Customers expect a consistent and personalized experience in any shopping journey, one that encapsulates a brand, and standards are continuously rising. Purchasing fuel today, for example, could begin with viewing a brand’s street sign, googling “lowest gas price near me,” a loyalty app or a third-party app, such as Upside or GasBuddy, just to name a few. Beyond the pump, indulging in a brand’s coffee or foodservice offer could begin with signage at the store, a Google search of “food near me” followed by a look into a store’s reviews or through an online ordering platform, like DoorDash.
Bottomline: Successful convenience retailers must compete with innovation standards that have become the norm for customers today, that give them what they want, when they want it, and personalized for them.
Crave-worthy food prepared in a store, that is served to customers by friendly employees with speed and accuracy is a positive experience, but that is just one touchpoint. Following a good in-store experience, the same must be replicated through ordering from a brand’s app or website or initiated through a third party such as Uber Eats.
Everything from the digital experience of ordering, processing payment, and not just the quality of the food, but also the presentation of the packaging matters to a consistent customer journey.
Measuring Experience
So how can a retail brand best measure customer experience? While internal measurement programs have been the historic norm, these are only a piece of the story to consider, and they surely are not how your customers are judging you.
Put yourself in the shoes of a customer who tried a convenience retailer a few times and really liked it. Now imagine this customer is traveling, performs a search for “food near me,” and that same brand comes up, but they have only 3.0 stars on Google. Despite the good in-store experience that the customer had at another location, he or she will likely now seriously reconsider visiting this brand’s other store.
Online reputation management matters. While this may seem complex and hard to manage, there are plenty of providers out there who can help a brand manage and engage with reviews across channels that include search, social media and third-party ordering partners. No matter how good of an operator you are, you will get some bad reviews from time to time. However, retailers that engage with these reviews, in an over and above way, can take a bad scenario, and turn it into a beautiful experience that is permanently posted for all to read.
In a connected world, customer experience becomes a memory, whether it is good or bad. How someone chooses to share that experience with someone else is how it is measured.
More Variables
The multi-channel experience also includes loyalty. Ideally, that loyalty should be personalized. Ninety percent of customers use loyalty apps today, but engagement is significantly lower in the convenience-store industry. As a brand, you have done something really well if you have engaged a customer to download your app, and now your next step is to engage the customer through personalization to build more brand loyalty.
Delivering generic offers for products that customers don’t typically purchase can be white noise to consumers. Even worse, a customer recently shared with me that she became disengaged with a brand that sent her an offer for free peanut butter cups on national candy day. This customer has a peanut allergy. While the brand meant well, that didn’t matter to the customer, who expects personalization.
The good news is that convenience stores have an unparallel advantage over other channels. No other segment of business operates 24 hours or as close to popular essentials, quality foodservice and other services stacked together, at quick in/out locations and now widely also available through delivery platforms.
The multi-channel experience presents more doors of revenue from digital sources leveraging additional efficiency of scale by each location. It’s each brands’ job to open those doors for customers.
Peter Rasmussen is an industry advocate, convenience and energy veteran, and CEO and founder of Convenience and Energy Advisors, Boston. He can be reached at peter@convenienceandenergyadvisors.com.