Our team recently spent three weeks observing shoppers and colleagues up close at luxury retail stores around the United States. We wanted to know, what's adding to or subtracting from a great customer experience? Here's some highlights from what we learned:
1. The shopping journey starts long before a customer enters the store
Retailers may not realize that the shopping journey can last up to a year, and by the time a customer arrives at a store (or the retailer’s website), the customer has been thinking about, researching, and curating ideas for months.
Retailers assume that they play a part in the inspiration and discovery phases of the journey, but in fact they may not interact with the customer until halfway through the funnel when they are closer to purchase.
Retailers miss an opportunity to be the source of organic inspiration when the customer is not actively shopping, or to be the first place they look for more information about something inspiring they see in the wild.
2. Luxury customers shop for wants, not needs
News flash: high end shopping is often driven by the customer’s own interests, not a pressing product need. This customer shops because she enjoys the experience of shopping - she's seeking inspiration, delight, and human service as much as the products they ultimately buy. Many shoppers say they are “always looking”... they enjoy the process and are looking for reasons to start shopping when they don’t need anything.
The store experience can deliver this delightful, sensory, and social experience – but it doesn’t always. We consistently observed colleagues at luxury retailers who didn’t greet, welcome, or actively engage customers, which makes the store environment feel unwelcoming and downright unfriendly.
Why come to the store at all if it doesn’t engage our senses or spark a human interaction? There’s no motivation to linger, buy, or come back. Retailers miss an opportunity when they focus on conversion (both online and in store), rather than what’s fun and engaging about shopping itself, especially interactions with staff that deliver on the social and emotional customer needs.
In an age when we can get anything online with extreme convenience, the new luxury is to be taken care of … to slow down the process a little, enjoy the sensory experience, and get extra joy from human care.
3. Retail therapy can run deep
Some customers shop to feel better about themselves, and to develop the confidence they need. Interactions with staff (when they go right) can tap into and deliver on these needs - something isn’t right, it’s hard to explain, and I need help.
A few examples we heard:
- “I had a baby recently. My skin and body have changed. People relate to me differently (sometimes not at all) and I don’t like it.”
- “I’ve taken a new job in a new city. It’s my first executive role. I’m not sure how to present myself with confidence in this new environment.”
- “I’m dating, reluctantly, for the first time in years after losing my wife. I don’t know where to begin.”
Huge opportunities can surface when colleagues ask open questions like why are you here and tell me more. But we observed that colleagues don’t ask those questions often; the majority of staff interactions were one-directional and about products and promotions, not the customer.
And that’s too bad… engaging customers on a deeper level can lead to much more satisfaction and loyalty.
4. Most salespeople don’t want to go there
We discovered two types of productive salespeople: one has a natural sense of empathic curiosity. The other may provide great service, but won’t get personal with customers.
Both can excel at what they do — they’re friendly, masterful with product knowledge, and committed to getting things just right for the customer. They regularly hit their sales targets.
The empathic ones, however, have an advantage for growing long-term sales and clients, because they know their customers beyond the walls of the store. They learn customer styles, preferences, birthdays, sometimes even pet names. These relationships don’t have to run deep, just familiar. These colleagues can develop stronger emotional loyalty to themselves and to the brand through personal relationships and connection.
This desire to help may seem obvious, but it’s not the norm. At least 75% of the sales conversations we observed are focused on products or promotions - the immediate sale. Not on why, what’s next, or how a previous purchase did or didn’t quite pan out. That’s another lost opportunity to generate sales now and develop loyalty.
5. Technology can hurt more than it helps
By now, most luxury retailers have invested in digital CRM and POS systems to bolster human connections and make people feel taken care of. This backfires regularly.
Last week I visited a huge, new liquor store in Santa Rosa, California. I wanted to get smarter about tequilas. The salesman scratched his chin when I told him what I already liked. “I’m not a tequila expert, but let me pull up my system here on my phone and see what it says.”
I should have bailed, but I was curious; whatever he was consulting had to be part of an expensive digital CX initiative — what will it tell me that Vivino or YouTube won’t?
He and his system made random suggestions. I bought some random tequilas. After tasting them later, I felt like a sucker; I had served up a perfect selling opportunity - showing I was excited and asking for recommendations - and the response I got was to turn to an app instead of having a conversation.
In our research, we saw similar moments when technology designed to help strengthen a connection weakened it instead, like:
- A conversation-stunting interface on a portable tablet, awkwardly slung around a salesperson’s shoulder (let me just look that up, sigh, the systems sure are slow today ha ha).
- A printed spreadsheet with outdated or irrelevant promo information on it.
- Or a legacy register system built by many and loved by none, because it’s clunky to use and slows down the checkout process as the talented stylist struggles to ring up the sale.
Nearly half of the sales interactions we observed had an element of the waiting sigh, the don’t you already have my information eye roll, the thanks-for-nothing folding of the lips, or the full-body upward glance that silently screams is this really worth my time?
Moments like these make both customers and employees cringe -- and are particularly off in a luxury retail setting, where the expectation is that everything goes right, is seamless and feels good.
About Noel
Noel is a San Francisco-based research and design leader. He helps organizations frame their opportunities for innovation; leads cross-disciplinary teams to hatch impactful ideas; and guides the creation of digital products and services that help people and companies grow. Noel was previously Executive Creative Director with R/GA, VP product and design with Zelle, and VP user experience with Crispin Porter & Bogusky.
