In Touch With Retailing

Usability: The Key to a Successful Pervasive Retailing Strategy

By Scott Langdoc, Chief Technology Officer, Fujitsu Transaction Solutions Inc.

Retailers have begun to realize that the key to transforming the relationship between the consumer and the store lies not just in improving traditional point-of-sale capabilities, but in establishing a true “front door to front end” level of interaction with shoppers. Merchants certainly aren’t without new technology platforms to choose from, with a growing list of self-service, assisted selling, self-ordering and mobile solutions available to address different shopping stages and different parts of the store.

As retailers seek a true “one-to-one” relationship that can drive bigger market baskets and lifetime value of the customer, there remains a delicate balance in the implicit contract with consumers between effective influence and frustrating intrusion. The objective for both consumers and retailers is not just better store-centric technology, but a better utilization of that technology, resulting in a system and user experience the customer understands intuitively, while realizing incremental value.

LESSONS FROM THE WORLD OF IPOD AND BLACKBERRY

It is hard to argue against the transformational effect that Apple and Research in Motion have had on the world of music and e-mail, respectively. But why have tens of millions of people worldwide embraced each company’s flagship product? What’s the common product development principle that drove both companies’ initial success, as well as their continued leadership and ongoing market dominance? All roads lead to the user experience – a core design priority that helps to combine complex technology with a kind of “elegant simplicity” that is easily adopted by users regardless of age or technical capability.

When coupled with a rock-solid level of reliability, the elements that led to such market success become easily understood. Other companies have had similar success when developing products from a user interface point-of-view. Intuit, Microsoft, and Amazon collectively spend millions on usability lab environments to ensure their latest product versions appeal not only to the broadest user base possible, but also will be quickly adopted for regular use.

KEY PRIORITIES IN RETAIL APPLICATION USABILITY

As retailers look to broaden the use of technology within the store, a number of important strategic considerations surface, including:

• Elegant Design. The look and feel of the interface on solutions drive the interest level and behavior of potential users. Enticing attraction loops, creative yet focused graphic and media elements, and complementary color and font usage all help capture the interest and attention of potential users.
• Adaptive Workflow. One of the most critical requirements for any leading self service application is the ability to automatically adjust to different inputs from different users at different levels, all without skipping a beat from the perspective of the application interaction.
• Associate-Driven Applications. Much of the industry’s attention has been focused on making systems easier to use for the shopping public. But more mobile and interactive technology is being placed in the hands of store associates for purposes of guided selling or other customer service activities. The design objectives of these applications should focus on the combination of deep content management and efficient customer service – all without requiring significant associate training. The best designed associate applications will often serve as an interactive educational tool, allowing the employee to become more knowledgeable about products and processes with each application interaction.
• Transparent Configuration and System Management. Properly configuring a system for usage and ensuring its universal availability is paramount, no matter how easy a self-service or self-ordering application is. Proactive system management capabilities enable inoperable systems to be quickly identified and serviced, either remotely or via a dispatched technician, all with minimal downtime.

Retailers will begin to see the opportunities that result from creating the next generation consumer experience when they combine deeper investments in pervasive solutions with accelerating levels of consumer and associate adoption and usage. It’s critical for retailers to align with technology partners that share this vision of user centric application design. Strong partnerships can help drive higher levels of business benefits that will ensure, not only competitive differentiation, but outright survival.