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Taking Lessons from Retail Experiential Marketing

In the retail sector, businesses aim to create an experience so seamless and organic that customers don’t even notice the effort. The irony is that creating that type of environment takes quite a bit of work to reach such an effortless experience for visitors. 

When someone walks into a store, the products and services on the shelves and behind the counter are only a part of what draws them in. Much of what customers remember about stores is not what they bought, but their experience. 

One of the best ways to draw customers in and help them enjoy their time in your store is by utilizing print marketing and graphics to build that experience. At The Vomela Companies, this is our specialty. Whether you’re a novice or an expert in the retail world, this blog post will help you gain a greater understanding of how experiential graphics can positively impact you and your customers. 

Is Retail Dying? 

The short answer: Not at all. During the rise of online mega-stores like Amazon, the fear for many store owners was that their stores would soon be out of business as customers shifted their buying habits to the internet. 

However, this has simply not been the case. Customers still really enjoy going to stores, trying things on, seeing things with their own eyes, and making decisions based on their own impressions. This doesn’t mean things aren’t changing – they absolutely are. 

Whereas retail print marketing used to involve heavy promotions and advertisements emphasizing sales, now it’s all about using graphics to build an experience. Stores are trying to build something that people remember or even something people want to share with others. Even if customers don’t purchase anything in the store, many will go to that store, check things out, then go home and buy it online from the same company. That’s why it’s crucial that customers have an immersive, enjoyable experience in the store. 

A Smarter Customer

In addition to offering people the ability to shop online, the Internet has also created a much smarter customer base. People are no longer enticed solely by bright, shiny graphics. Customers in the modern era have seen every trick in the book, and sales or promotions only lead to them looking up the product on their phone to see if there’s a better deal. 

What customers do respond to is the experience in a store. They remember things like pop-up sneaker shops that have an actual basketball hoop to practice on inside, or a soap and skincare store with a small sink and tub to test out the products. Print marketing and signage is one of the biggest ways to create these kinds of experiences for your customers. 

Less is Sometimes More

There are plenty of ways to attempt to make your customers feel relaxed or intrigued as they enter your store, but one of the best ways to know a store has done a great job with their experiential retail marketing is if you don’t even notice it. 

For example, if you go to a hardware store and you don’t get lost a single time, moving from aisle to aisle and grabbing exactly what you need, you either spend a lot of time at the hardware store or the store has done an excellent job using print graphic to show you the way to find items. This is just one of the subtle, effective ways that print marketing can create a seamless, enjoyable experience.

The Foundation of Your Campaign

Now that you understand what retail experiential marketing is and how it can help your business, you might be wondering how you can get started. The best place to start is by partnering with a team or company that has done it before and is an expert in the field. 

Many companies have printing presses and state-of-the-art graphics capabilities, but in order to truly create a successful experience and campaign, you need someone who has done it for decades with a proven track record with their clients. At The Vomela Companies, we’ve helped hundreds of retail clients create incredible experiences for their customers. 

For example, The Vomela Companies recently worked with 3M and Walmart by creating a cardboard dorm room in a Walmart store to showcase 3M’s lineup of products that work for the college student. This meant the customers would walk into Walmart and actually see the product working in a space exactly like the one they or someone they knew would soon occupy. 

The Vomela Companies also worked with Noovie Arcade, which creates augmented reality apps to help customers engage with movie theaters. Our team and designer created an old-school arcade cabinet out of cardboard. This allowed us to ship the box to movie theaters flat so they could assemble it themselves. 

Walmart cardboard dorm roomNoovie Arcade

Biggest Lesson for Success

At The Vomela Companies, we have a lot of experience developing retail graphics for clients of all fields and sizes. We’ve found that the number one way to succeed in your experiential efforts is being prepared beforehand. Figure out what you want for your store – from branding to graphics, size, scope, and budget – and then bring it to your printing partner to discuss how to turn that into reality. 

Whether your business is in a storefront the size of a closet or you operate a massive chain of warehouse-sized stores, we can help create an experience for your customers using retail print graphics. Contact us today to talk with one of our team members to learn more!

Jan 29, 2020 |

Topics: Retail, general printing, marketing

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