A product of our collaboration with Old Navy’s Mission Bay Lab Store

Setting the Stage, Connecting Brands to Customers

Traditional brick and mortar retail is changing. In response to the rapidly evolving environment of online shopping, storefronts are looking at custom digital products to meet the increasing demands of their customers. The hope is that implementing an omnichannel strategy will engage and delight their customers across channels, with multiple points of interaction for an integrated shopping experience whether online or offline. This translation of online to offline experience has become a personal obsession of mine.

At Propeller, we embrace and adapt to these digital shifts for our clients across industries. Not only do we feel compelled to analyze and translate trends for various customer environments, but we identify patterns that help integrate new solutions into existing digital platforms. This mindset allows us to continuously evolve client products and our internal processes, keeping Propeller thinking at the forefront of emerging technologies.

While other industries certainly benefit from the same technologies, we believe traditional retail has an imperative to embrace it. In June of 2015, Gap Inc. approached us to build a set of custom applications for Old Navy’s Mission Bay Lab Store as a test-and-learn type experience. Their focus was to give customers the opportunity to engage with a new type of store — a new digital-first experience. I envisioned it as Old Navy exploring opportunities to steer away from a “warehouse of SKUs” to a boutique store with a curated selection of products focused on deeper personalization, higher engagement, and increased shopping efficiency.

The project started small, but continued over about a year and a half, during which time we created a comprehensive ecosystem of applications for the Lab Store in Mission Bay. We designed and developed three unique digital experiences that tested hypotheses around core in-store use cases (customer, store associate, and store manager). We architected a smart inventory management system that combined various APIs along with automated scraping and packaged that into a single content management system. We built a set of APIs that connected store associates with their customers, addressing everything from cart checkout to fitting room requests, all while allowing store managers to control in-store inventory. While this initiative was a stark departure from the standard Old Navy store, we stayed true to brand identity throughout the process.

Along the way, we gained invaluable insights into the retail industry and believe in a few core principles that improve the brick and mortar store experience by naturally incorporating complementary digital products:

1. Consider every idea, but create a framework.

Try not to think about innovation like an open whiteboarding process. Unstructured and unframed thinking is about as useful as not thinking about innovation at all. It tends to lead to decision fatigue and outlets that may be unreasonable. But with a framework set — let’s say innovating the in-store experience with connected devices — any idea is fair game. This exercise is meant to dissuade strategists from thinking that technology is either infeasible or invaluable.

We consider this a lesson in change management — a part of the strategy phase in our three-prong approach to client work (i.e. strategy, design, and development). If we want to change the way customers perceive the shopping experience for a brand, we need to think radically. For many major retailers, we imagine this shift happens at the transition from “discount leader” to innovative retailer.

Today, many consumers put experiential considerations ahead of price comparisons and the like (e.g. coupons and promotions). Forbes explains this in an article that details customer experience trends for 2017, citing that “72% of businesses say that improving the customer experience is their top priority” (according to Forrester). Is your business part of this 72 percent?

The new shifts in retail are the Amazon Go’s of the world, an innovative concept borne from an idea that we’ve had the means to implement years prior to its release. Not only does the concept impress with its futuristic appeal, it provides additional value to customers by speeding up the checkout process, connecting in-store and online shopping experiences, and simplifying the overall shopping experience. It’s not your out-of-the-box “omnichannel” mobile strategy. These concepts educate consumers on new shopping interactions and drive the industry forward. Now, for the CMOs and CIOs in the world of big retail, what’s stopping your brands from leading this push?

2. Immersive digital solutions need a physical parallel.

New digital solutions shouldn’t just check a box — talking to you “mobile strategy.” While mobile is undoubtedly important, mobile today has become a requirement and shouldn’t be considered an entire omnichannel strategy. Immersive experiences need to bridge the gap between online and offline experiences, making use of mobile devices and in-store sensors to create digital environments that learn and delight the customer.

Working in-step with the Old Navy product team was invaluable to our learning. We received a crash course in customer empathy, focusing on associate-customer interaction and witnessing how technology played or could play a role in future interactions. Being on-site allowed us to walk in their shoes and tailor our custom digital solutions for both the associates and customers. For the associate, minor enhancements like updating app catalog configurations to match the store layout took careful considerations like Wi-Fi connectivity and overnight inventory downloading. For the customer, the ability to create a digital cart, allow purchase anywhere on the floor, and provide same-day purchase delivery was a breath of fresh air, the likes of which only smaller retailers like Bonobos have implemented.

These days it’s easy to know what customers are clicking online. Cookies and pixels used for retargeting online ad campaigns have dominated the realm of digital retail innovation for some time, but they do little to create a cohesive customer experience online and offline. If the goal is truly omnichannel, shouldn’t retailers be looking at bridging this divide and creating digital products that use online data and analytics and then push offline? Shouldn’t our retail leaders be thinking and implementing the reverse — tracking in-store patterns and using data and analytics to make a better online shopping experience? We’re fortunate to have a partner in Old Navy that thinks along these lines because the future of retail truly lies in retailers’ ability to collectively bridge the gap between digital and physical shopping experiences.

3. Personify the retail store and bring it to life.

When customer-facing digital solutions in retail feel humanized, technology can bring the store to life. This falls into a process coined most commonly as the customer experience (CX). In more common forms, CX takes the shape of high-touch services such as customer service and call centers. The inclusion of proper CX for in-store interactions acts to personify the brand and creates a lasting experience for the customer even after they leave the store.

Mobile applications today are placing a great deal of stress on this factor. Consider the recent popularity of chatbot applications. While this style of software merely takes inputs and produces outputs (e.g. asking a bot to search), the products that stand out among the rest have a human-like appeal. This is the same line of thinking that should go into creating compelling in-store experiences. From the very tangible (e.g. digital greetings and engaging copy) to the passive (e.g. complementary colors and anthropomorphic interactions), an ecosystem of thoughtfully integrated digital products can effortlessly become an extension of the store’s brand that shoppers identify with. This adds tremendous value far beyond the purchase.

Taking positive elements of human interaction and embedding it into an inanimate piece of technology is critical to maintaining a warm and consistent user experience. One specific feature on our apps for Old Navy allowed shoppers in the fitting room area to request an associate on the floor to come assist them. We enhanced the interactive experience by visually showing confirmation, indicating stylist wait times, and showing a welcoming profile photo of the stylist that was assigned to help the shopper. This is just one example of a small, delightful detail that helped bring the store to life.

In a lot of ways, Old Navy’s Mission Bay Lab Store is a test ground for digital innovation in the greater retail ecosystem. Although all of the digital products are catered towards distinct customer interactions for Old Navy and the greater Gap Inc. brand, it has resonating implications across the retail innovation landscape.

If you take any one thing away from our learnings on retail innovation and improving brick and mortar store experiences, consider what the founder of 3Com, Robert Metcalfe, boldly opinionated in 1995: “I predict the Internet will soon go spectacularly supernova and in 1996 catastrophically collapse.” Whoops. Or when Time Magazine predicted in 1966 that “Remote shopping, while entirely feasible, will flop.” Not quite.

Although it’s clear brick and mortar stores are becoming more digital, the right solutions are a perfect combination of crazy, comprehensive, and familiar. How a brand impacts a customer’s experience will continue to outpace and outrank deals and product promotions. Working with a major retail brand and household name in Old Navy has continued to provide us with the opportunity to adapt cutting-edge technology into a relatively stagnated traditional retail environment.

We consider this process an exploration into creating digital solutions. It’s a process that acknowledges the world of omnichannel and kindly sets it aside with all the discarded buzzwords meant to excite retail executives looking at innovation as “a product.” Our solutions think outside-the-box and cast aside the conventional wisdom that a customer experience should be an app because we know it’s not just that.

Propeller is a team of strategists, designers, and developers challenging convention with digital solutions. If you’re interested in learning more or hopping aboard this inherent shift in retail, drop us a line at hello@propellerlabs.co.

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