How 600 people were hijacked with technology
Have you ever noticed that in shopping centres there virtually identical shops that sell the same items yet, one shop is full of shoppers whilst the other is virtually empty ? This is a problem that competing retailers face daily and they have to rely heavily on their marketing efforts such as SALES, Promotions, Loyalty programs and coupons are some of tricks-of-the-trade used to lure shoppers in.
When it comes to using technology, I often hear from retailer how they know to use Social Networks to engage with customers and how they have so-many-likes on Facebook etc. etc. etc.
During my Retailer presentation, I often quote this example of how Meat Pack , a trendy shoe company in Guatemala, has pulled together various tech components to create a cheeky way to increase their revenue.
Together with Saatchi & Saatchi and 4am they devised a way to steal customers away from their competitors – literally. The app is called Hijack which interfaced with the app that the typical Meat Pack customer already has installed on their devices at previous visits to the store. What Hijack component did was recognise when the customer was in a competitor store. It then sent an alert to the customer saying that if they get to Meat Pack store instead, they will receive a discount. But here is where this app gets interesting. Unlike other “coupon” apps, the Hijack app showed a discount of 100% and then as each second ticked by the discounted percentage counted down too – the discount clock only stopped counting down when the customer arrived inside the Meat Pack store ! The result: customers would literally run out of the competitor’s store and right to Meat Pack to maximise the amount of discount that they would receive. Their Facebook status even updated with how much discount they received which made the campaign even more attractive to both customers and non customers alike.
Over 600 people were hijacked from competitors and the fastest person managed to receive a 89% discount.
This is a superb example of taking mobile, GPS and gamification and using them in a fun way to increase revenue and still have massive appeal with your sneaker-mad customer who is delighted to spend money in the store.
