In previous posts here at Tech Trends we’ve talked a lot about the convergence of the online and offline worlds and how that applies to shopping and the retail sector, where omnichannel marketing is proving the way forward.

A bit part of that is enabling businesses that do depend heavily on having a physical presence to remain competitive. Many of us love shopping in our “mom-and-pop” stores but whether we like to admit it or not, technology has changed our expectations of what a good shopping experience looks and feels like.

Many of us love shopping in our “mom-and-pop” stores but whether we like to admit it or not, technology has changed our expectations of what a good shopping experience looks and feels like
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We want to support local businesses, for sure, but we expect them to cater to our newly found tastes for customized, on-demand, sleekly presented fare. We want to be able to engage with them on social media with compelling video content, and we want them to “look the business” and not like a tired relic from a bygone era.

But all of that costs money, right? Well yes, but not quite as much as you might think. Like with a lot of areas, technology has brought disruption, but also enabled hacks that mean small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) can achieve dramatic rebranding results with only a fraction of the budget a larger enterprise would spend.

One great weapon in that arsenal is the ability that companies like StickerYou offer to produce customized branding materials which literally enable a business to quickly don a new, fresh skin with no mess and very little in the way of resources.

We want to support local businesses, for sure, but we expect them to cater to our newly found tastes for customized, on-demand, sleekly presented fare
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Companies like StickerYou offer small businesses the ability to produce customized branding materials which enable them to quickly don a new, fresh skin with no mess and very little in the way of resources
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To prove that point, the Canadian company ran a Make It Better contest across North America, inviting small businesses to enter and win a top-of-the-range makeover. Over 700 applicants applied for the prize (which had an estimated value of $10,000) From the 23 finalists, The Knight Butcher was finally crowned the winner, receiving a comprehensive makeover including with window decals, hours signage, floor decals, signs for fridges and freezers and true decals.

The Knight Butcher – a genuine mom-and-pop business owned by husband and wife team Terri and Chad Knight – emerged renewed from its improvements within a single day, highlighting the fact that revamping a bricks-and-mortar shop can be as easy as adjusting the design on your website, as long as you get the right people to help out!

The Knight Butcher - a genuine mom-and-pop business owned by husband and wife team Terri and Chad Knight – emerged renewed from its improvements within a single day
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Revamping a bricks-and-mortar shop can be as easy as adjusting the design on your website, as long as you get the right people to help out!
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For more information on how your business can also get a very affordable makeover, check out the StickerYou website, or if you’re in Toronto, be sure to check out their own brand new store, which is also the largest sticker store in the world.

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a VR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Making Rebranding Stick appeared first on Tech Trends.

Many influential brands such as Coca-Cola and IKEA have used VR and AR to create campaigns to enhance the customer experience. Collectively known as XR, these technologies are becoming much more accessible to retailers looking for additional tools to create engaging experiences.

Many influential brands such as Coca-Cola and IKEA have used VR and AR to create campaigns to enhance the customer experience
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One example of this is the use of technology to create multi-sensory environments, whereby these brands can leverage not only visuals, but also smells, sounds, and touch to heighten those experiences.

The entire StickerYou store is an experiential space designed to surprise and hopefully delight visitors
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Whiskey brand Diageo has experimented with playing the crackling sound of an open fire at the bar, while a, a pop-up for home fragrance brand Glade designed each room inside the location to match a particular scent, aiming to create an emotional response that resonated with visitors.

StickerYou is a trend-setter in its space, deploying an omnichannel strategy that lets its customers engage with the brand both online and in a physical location
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Yet immersive experiences don’t necessarily involve the use of XR technologies, however, they can also achieve this by using physical objects and textures.

Take Canadian e-commerce brand StickerYou, for instance. They are global leaders in providing custom-printed, die-cut products that empower businesses and consumers to create professional-grade materials for marketing, packaging, decor and personal expression, which is a fancy way of saying they have been making awesome stickers since they started their business with one machine back in 2008.

Immersive experiences don’t necessarily involve the use of XR technologies. They can also use physical objects and textures
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Fast forward to today, and StickerYou is a trend-setter in its space, deploying an omnichannel strategy that lets its customers engage with the brand both online and in a physical location. This is why they’ve just opened the world’s largest sticker store in Toronto on August 12. The idea is for the store to serve as a continuation and extension of the online experience, and customers seamlessly switch between the two as an when it’s most convenient, appropriate, or fun to do so.

Most marketers now recognize there is much more value in cultivating a long-term relationship with a customer
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Below you can check out a time-lapse video showing how the amazing 3-storey tall vinyl graphic (installed in collaboration with applied sciences giant 3M) was put in place for the eye-catching store frontage.

UPDATE: Following the news of @StickerYou setting up shop in Toronto with the world’s largest sticker store, here’s a time-lapse of the building’s exterior vinyl graphic being installed. https://t.co/XqKvZAZ7N9 pic.twitter.com/aEjLupM3SW

— Digital Labels & Packaging (@DigitalLPack) August 7, 2019

The entire store is an experiential space designed to surprise and hopefully delight visitors, giving them something to remember in whether or not they choose to make a purchase at that time.

That last point is also important, as most marketers now recognize there is much more value in cultivating a long-term relationship with a customer, rather than merely trying to cash in on the short term and dealing with people on a purely transactional basis, which builds no loyalty.

Some of the experiential features in the store include:

• Stickerbombed walls

• Custom experience space where customer can see other user-created sticker designs

• Kiosks for creating your own stickers using StickerYou’s online StickerMaker

• Sticker museum (located in the basement) taking visitors through the history of stickers and what has it such a popular art form.

• Sticker art exhibition (slated for the fall) which will feature work from artists from all over the globe, including Shepard Fairey and Matthew Hoffman.

• The brainchild of Toronto e-comm startup and customized die-cut sticker company StickerYou, StickerYou: The Store

“We are proud to open the world’s largest sticker store in Toronto,” says StickerYou founder and CEO Andrew Witkin. “We are excited to give customers the chance to interact with our products and experience the creative potential of stickers for business or personal expression. At StickerYou, we make what matters stick.”

If you happen to be in Toronto, be sure to check out the StickerYou store at 677-679 Queen Street West

Tech Trends offers a broad range of Digital Consultancy services to guide companies, individuals and brands in effectively leveraging existing and emerging technologies in their business strategy.

Alice Bonasio is a VR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Moving Towards Experiential Marketing appeared first on Tech Trends.

Let’s start with a bit of jargon busting; in a nutshell, Ominchannel brings together the benefits of e-commerce and physical – what is known as “bricks and mortar” retailers.

Many start-ups and Small and Medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) would do well to incorporate omnichannel thinking in their own roadmaps
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As with many such things this trend was set by Amazon (which started setting up locations to support and extend its online operations) and others (Warby Parker and Shopify to name but a couple) have quickly latched onto its obvious advantages. Now companies such as Wal-Mart are wisely viewing physical stores as places where customers can pick up and return merchandise, a combination of e-commerce and physical retail that makes the purchase experience more convenient than either an e-commerce or retail store alone.

Ominchannel brings together the benefits of e-commerce with bricks and mortar retailers
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But those big names shouldn’t give the impression that this type of strategy only works on a large scale. Start-ups and Small and Medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) would do well to incorporate such thinking in their own roadmaps.

In an age where (not least because of the advent of immersive technologies and spatial computing) the physical and digital worlds are increasingly blending together, as are the shopping experiences that consumers expect. But while we wait for the world of Ready Player One, where haptic suits will routinely enhance Virtual Reality with physical sensations, humans will still get their tactile experiences in a “real world” shop.

In an age where (not least because of the advent of immersive technologies and spatial computing) the physical and digital worlds are increasingly blending together, as are the shopping experiences that consumers expect
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One company leading this trend is StickerYou, which successfully sells custom stickers and decals online, and is now planning to open the world’s largest sticker store in Toronto later this month. Tech Trends talks to their Founder and President, Andrew Witkin, about why they have decided to take the omnichannel approach, and what other digital retailers should take into account before going down that road themselves.

The first step says Witkin, is to do a thorough audit of what your start-up’s goals are, what products you offer and whether or not these products or services are significantly enhanced by an in-person experience
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“For example, at StickerYou, we offer customized, die-cut stickers, but there is a large gap between ordering stickers online and feeling the quality of a sticker, or being inspired by the creativity of sticker designs right in front of you, which is why we are opening a retail space in 2019,” he says. “When customers can experience these products in real time, it can help drive brand awareness in a way that e-commerce simply can’t. Having a brick and mortar location not only allows customers to experience your products in person, it also opens up a host of opportunities for savvy e-commerce retailers.”

These opportunities can range from hosting product and industry-focused workshops and events to gleaning in-person feedback from customers on products and services, a brick and mortar location, properly leveraged, can be a place for a brand to shine.

When evaluating this benefit, Witkin recommends that business owners look at the retail location as a channel that can push online sales rather than a store that is evaluated solely by traditional retail metrics.

“Your retail location works as both a store and an advertising space for your e-commerce business. As such, weigh the current per-click costs of online advertising against the potential costs of driving individualized shopping experiences through in-store brand interactions, drop-ins and walk-by traffic. If these types of interactions can be considered as impressions, then a physical retail space can break even or operate at a loss and still be ROI positive, as long as it succeeds in driving increases in online sales and overall lowered cost-per-click ad spend.”

“If your retail space breaks even, all marketing value generated by the store could be considered as free. As long as the KPIs of retail marketing campaigns are equal to or less than that of the current online strategies for your business, then the omnichannel strategy pans out for you.”

This alone will make the search experience a more memorable one, kind of like searching through records in a bin and discovering something new you didn’t know you were looking for.

They are getting ready to open a StickerYou store in the next few weeks in Toronto’s hippest quarter at 677-679 Queen Street West, Toronto, Canada, and they are planning to make a splash (this will be, according to the company, the world’s largest sticker store) with a 3-storey tall vinyl graphic in collaboration with applied sciences company 3M.

The trend towards traditional retailers closing has also meant that commercial landlords have become more open to offers of short-term rent deals and pop-up concepts
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The store will be an experiential space, with stickerbombed walls, tangible product, a custom experience space where customers can see others’ designs and kiosks where they can create their own using StickerYou’s online StickerMaker. There will also be a Sticker Museum that details the history of stickers in the basement, and a sticker art exhibition is set to take place in the fall (the first of many), featuring works from sticker artists across the globe such as Shepard Fairey (think the iconic Obama “Hope” illustrations) and Matthew Hoffman (You Are Beautiful).

“Ecommerce retailers need to approach this from an entirely different perspective, and ask themselves what a physical store and buying experience adds to their brand that online channels don’t.”

The trend towards traditional retailers closing has also meant that commercial landlords have become more open to offers of short-term rent deals and pop-up concepts which carry lower risk for e-tailers to dabble in the omnichannel concept, according to Witkin.

“I would first evaluate if the business, merchandise or brand experience can be enhanced by a physical retail location. If the answer is yes, then I would start with a pop-up and test the waters.”

“The ROI on the retail investment can be viewed against the physical store’s sales as well as incremental online sales due to the additional brand awareness that the physical store generates.”

Witkin sees the trend gaining momentum creating a new online/brick and mortar hybrid which is unlike either traditional retailers or online-only stores, but something better than the sum of its parts.

Many online retailers may only open one store, or a handful of stores
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“I believe more online retailers will get into physical retail,” he writes.  “However, I don’t believe the scale of stores will be the same as that of traditional retail chains. Perhaps an online retailer will have a few stores in a city, but I don’t believe many online retailers will go past that. Many online retailers may only open up just one store, or a handful of stores.”

Witkin also sees a paradoxical trend in the opposite direction to some degree with brick-and-mortar stores investing in their online presence. For some time, they focused on omnichannel pick up locations which gave them a good footing. However, he says these traditional brick-and-mortar retailers need to improve the merchandise experience in store so there’s more reason to engage products and not just pick things up from their physical locations.

The StickerYou store will open in mid-August at 677-679 Queen Street West, Toronto, Canada

Alice Bonasio is a VR and Digital Transformation Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio on Twitter.

The post Bringing Digital and Physical Together with an Omnichannel Strategy appeared first on Tech Trends.