Neiman Marcus focuses on omnichannel improvements
Lindy Rawlinson says personalization has been a big focus for the luxury retail chain.
Matt Lindner
“There’s differences between the channels both in how the customer interacts with them and why,” says Lindy Rawlinson, senior vice president of customer experience at Neiman Marcus. “Ultimately for us, it’s about how we capitalize on those differences and making sure we remove any barriers for those customers.”
Rawlinson spoke about Neiman Marcus’s omnichannel strategy at the Women’s Wear Daily Digital Forum in New York on Thursday. As a luxury retailer, Rawlinson says Neiman Marcus is focused on providing the “white-glove” treatment online that shoppers have come to expect in stores. For example, Neiman Marcus has made a major push to personalize its online shopping and digital marketing efforts.
“Personalizing the experience for customers both on the website and in the store is a pillar of our customer experience,” she says. “As a customer searches NeimanMarcus.com, as a customer interacts with the site, it gets a little bit smarter.”
Neiman Marcus recently unveiled a new personalization feature on its website that centers around a shopper’s size preferences.
For example, a customer who shops online for shoes and during every site visit searches for size 7 or 7.5, NeimanMarcus.com will show shoes at nearby stores available in those sizes, she says.
Neiman Marcus, No. 36 in the Internet Retailer 2016 Top 500 Guide, also has unveiled other personalization features aimed at customizing online shopping for its customers.
Recent innovations include a “Memory Mirror,” which is a mirror located in Neiman Marcus stores that allow shoppers to record a 360-degree video of themselves trying on multiple items and then save the video to the retailer’s mobile app so they can compare how those items look and either buy them online or in store later.
Neiman Marcus also launched a feature called “Snap Find Shop”, wherein shoppers can take a picture of clothing or accessories that they see and then see if the retailer’s app or mobile site sells theexact product or a similarproduct. Neiman Marcus also has equipped associates in its 42 stores with iPhones outfitted with apps that provide more information about a customer’s shopping history. The app also allows store associates to find items online that may be out of stock in a store.
“We can ship any of our products from any of our stores,” Rawlinson says. “It’s one pool of inventory. Customers can shop online and pick up an item in store, and if we don’t have an item in that individual store, we can ship the item to that store so they can pick it up and try it on.”
Neiman Marcus has enjoyed steady online sales growth over the past three years, growing to $1.338 billion in 2015, up 29.9% from $1.030 billion in 2013, according to Top500Guide.com
Rawlinson says making it easy and pleasant to shop at Neiman Marcus, regardless of the channel, means she and her team are listen to customers and try to stay one step ahead to solve problems before they start.
“As we think about new [omnichannel] features, a lot of it goes back to understanding the customer and what’s happening, whether that’s in direct conversations, usability, and where do we see those opportunities to assist and make it easier or provide something different that you might not even ask for,” she says.
No comments:
Post a Comment