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The great success of the Starbucks mobile app has demonstrated that consumers will use a mobile app if it delivers the right value. The capacity to pay with an app alone is not enough, and one of the ways that Starbucks motivates customers to pay with its app is by bundling payment with an ability to earn loyalty points and redeem them for free beverages.
In just a few years, the incentive combined with convenience led to 15% of U.S. Starbucks sales coming in via mobile. After Starbucks rolled out “ Mobile Order & Pay” in 2015 (which allows customers to order and pay for beverages in advance and pick them up without waiting in line), the number spiked to 26% by Sept, 2016. The Starbucks app now processes more than 10 million transactions a month. The coffee chain showed the industry how offering Retailer Pay within a mobile app can be a powerful way to deliver high-value digital shopping experiences to customers and gain their long term loyalty.
Recently, more and more retailers—including Kohl’s, Walmart, CVS, and Sam’s Club—have built retailer pay into their apps and combined it with other features, such as shopping lists, digital coupons, rewards, personalized recommendations, rich checkout at POS with automated redemption of loyalty, rewards, and coupons in a single step, and now self checkout like Scan & Go from Sam’s Club which allows customers to skip long checkout lines. Consumers love these features and are demonstrating stronger loyalty to retailers, instead of defecting to third-party apps like Amazon.
As seen from Starbucks and others, the salient feature of a successful mobile retail app is that it has utility—a value proposition that is compelling enough for a consumer to use it on a regular basis. There are plenty of things beyond payments that customers want to use their phones in store for. In fact, more than 90% of consumers use their smartphones while shopping in retail stores. This is a huge opportunity, but one that most major retailers have struggled to take advantage of, leaving more digitally-savvy competitors (like Amazon) to swoop in and take away their business.
To survive in this mobile, digital age, retailers apps not only need retailer pay but also functions that engage customers in meaningful ways, provide clear value, and enhance the in-store shopping and checkout experience. To have the greatest impact, they need to deliver mobile experiences that are equal to or better than Amazon’s to stay competitive, while delivering a robust, end-to-end, streamlined experience.
First, the retail app needs to have key information, like price comparisons, product details, relevant recommendations, loyalty, rewards, and personalized coupons, so customers don’t go elsewhere to find that information.
Second, earning and redemption of loyalty, rewards cash, and personalized savings through the app, along with payment during checkout, builds an ongoing relationship with customers—boosting traffic, improving conversion-rates, increasing sale values, and incentivizing customers to keep spending more.
Finally, a strong retail app must provide a frictionless and consistent, multichannel experience. Rich checkout at POS or online, self checkout, order ahead capabilities, and personalized engagement through relevant offers and recommendations all make the shopping experience more convenient and fun, and drives sales for retailers and gains long term customer loyalty. As brick and mortar retailers face steeper competition from businesses like Amazon and continue to cut costs, retail apps with retailer pay are not optional. They are a “must-have” to drive loyalty and sales in today’s digital world.
To view an info graphic on how Retailer Pay can benefit retailers, click here.
By Mohammad Khan, Co-founder & President, OmnyPay – Provider of White Label Contextual Commerce platform for Retailer Apps
Click here for the White Paper: Digitizing The In-Store Shopping Experience for Continued Growth
