November 19, 2014
Walmart and Target go for pinpoint accuracy with in-store search
Both Walmart and Target recently added in-store product search features to their mobile apps that are either completely new to shoppers or represent significant upgrades over prior versions.
Both marry real-time inventory data with location-based technology to help shoppers find the exact location of products and see their availability. Many existing in-store mapping technologies only indicate the aisles in which products are located.
With Search My Store from Walmart, plugging in a keyword or product name returns a list of products with images, pricing and the precise aisle location where they can be found.
"Search my Store is a great example of how we are using core online capabilities, such as search, to address key pain points of our Walmart store shoppers," wrote Marissa Coren, mobile engineer and manager, WalmartLabs, in a blog entry. "Think of it as a personal shopping associate for your local Walmart, always with you whenever you need it."
Walmart said that within the first few weeks of a soft launch on its Android app, more than 99 percent of Walmart stores had been searched by Search my Store. "We plan to make additional improvements based on feedback from our customers," said the blog post. The feature was just added to Walmart’s iPhone app.
Target partnered with Point Inside, the provider of location-based technology, to add several new in-store navigation features to its app. Following a 40-store trial earlier this year, the new features include new interactive store maps that indicate item locations with pins. Shopping lists also now provide a product’s aisle location when a guest is in-store and link directly to the new, interactive maps.
On Black Friday, the app will serve up information on door-buster deals at individual Target locations. Said Alan Wizemann, VP of product for Target.com and Mobile, in a statement, "We believe the new shopping lists and maps make it easier than ever to shop Target."
An estimated 10 to 20 percent of shoppers leave stores without buying a desired item because they can’t locate it. Search Engine Land also pointed out that the search feature may eventually link to coupons or other in-store advertising.
The upgrades come as many retailers are investing heavily in improving the functionality of their apps to better position them as shopping tools.
- Search My Store ushers in the end of "Where is (item) located?" as we know it – Walmart Labs
- Point Inside Powers New Mobile In-Store Features for Target – Point Inside
- Walmart Brings Product Search To The In-Store Experience – Search Engine Land
- Walmart streamlines access to in-store product information via app – Mobile Commerce Daily
- Target App Now Features In-Store Product Search And Inventory Maps – Search Engine Land
- Target’s New App Steers You to the Right Aisle for Black Friday – Adweek
- Retailers introduce indoor navigation in apps – USA Today
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Recent Discussions
Discussion Questions
Will robust in-store item location tools offer much appeal to shoppers? What other enhancements may be needed to make store apps truly work as in-store personal assistants?
Poll
It will continue to work well for both of these retailers and any others that offer the service. Why? These are larger stores and finding items continues to be a challenge for most of us men and many women as well. If the item is not in stock it should also offer to order online, to deliver for free or pick up at the store in a day. What about asking a question about the item that would go to an associate to meet the customer or to send the answer to the customer? Maybe offer a coupon or send information for a complimentary item for the item being searched. Retailers can also allow the customer to pay for the item on their mobile device and get out of the store faster. The mobile device becomes a form of personal shopper? Maybe.
At the start of the game is knowing the item is in stock at a select store. Helping the shopper find it fast in the store will always help.
Help the shopper spend more, fast. Searching in the store eats up more possible larger basket creation time. They find it fast and can then look for more things they might want.
Really! Do we really think someone goes grocery shopping in Walmart or Target and doesn’t know where a product is? Both chains have gone to great lengths to improve their signage. Once you’ve regularly shopped those stores, you know where products are (and most of their shoppers, as we’ve seen in this space, are regular shoppers). I’m very skeptical of the 10 percent to 20 percent estimate of people not finding a desired item in the store—this sounds more like confusion with out-of-stocks than difficulty in finding something.
The questions around item locators are operational ones. Are the planograms accurate? Is the inventory really on the shelf? This demands a level of accuracy that I don’t think many retailers have achieved.
I just see a lot of potential risk and frustration if it’s not done well.
After all, at Walmart in particular staffs are still too light to keep track of perishables before they go bad. Are these chains really able to come through with the goods? If they can, it’s a winner for sure. If not, they might have been better off spending on different technologies.
These apps are a great first step. The key is providing precise locations and inventory. Now retailers need to take the next steps, linking coupons, promotional offers and loyalty cards to shopping lists contained in the apps, and NFC checkout. Then these apps will be more like personal assistants.
For some percentage of shoppers, being able to identify where an item is in store will prove useful. The question is how does this either drive revenue or lower expenses for a retailer, because at the end of the day that’s really what’s relevant. If my plan was to purchase the item I was searching for anyways, while this helps simplify the process, it’s not clear that it’s growing the basket size.
While on the surface coupons may seem useful, if I was going to buy the item anyways that represents the retailer giving away more margin than they have to, so personally I am waiting for an upsell/cross-sell capability as the most useful way to create some additional benefit for the retailer.
I concur strongly with folks here who assert that knowing an item is on the shelf is more important than knowing the location of the shelf.
Real-time store inventory management (with computer-generated ordering and timely replenishment) is a prerequisite.
I don’t care how clever your store mapping app is. If it sends me to an empty shelf, I’m going to be disappointed.
I think it’s wonderful to see retailers adding these features to their mobile apps. I see so many efforts with mobile that are about messaging for offers, coupons, etc., and the big pain points and wishes from shoppers tend to gravitate to info on product availability, wayfinding and ways to help them in their shopping journey. There are ways to compliment empowering functionality with promotions and offers, but it’s nice to see efforts to give valuable tools to the shopper and let them feel informed and empowered.
I’m surprised at the lack of enthusiasm for these apps here.
Maybe I’m the only one who is reaching the point of needing my GPS to find the Walmart—much less finding the product I was sent for in the darned store! And we all know how easy it is (and expensive it is to provide) to find a friendly, knowledgeable associate in the aisle to help us find the vacuum cleaner bags. (Right!)
I think this one will be a major “thank you!” from a lot of shoppers. And I would definitely frequent a store that I know has this feature over competitors that don’t have it, given roughly equal proximity and selection.
While I love this idea for myself, (I am not a regular shopper at either store and can never find what I’m looking for), I am hardly their regular customer.
This begs the question, does the regular shopper at these stores need an item finder? How much business are they losing to shoppers like me who rarely come in and will leave when they can’t find the item?
The big question here is which customer is more important and what does that customer need to better enable their shopping journey? Is this a customer who whips out their iPhone when they enter the store? And what happens when more and more frequently the item is not found where it is suppose to be or out of stock? Hmmmmm….
Methinks shelf or aisle displays of coupon offerings, great signage, and friendly, available sales associates might have better results for these two brands.
Now if we’re talking Home Depot, that would be a whole other story. And that’s my 2 cents!
This is an obvious next step, and I’m glad to see retailers moving in this direction. Anything that saves customers time adds value.
The navigational aid would surely cut about one half hour off of shopping at Costco. On the other hand, it’s sort of like a treasure hunt.
Neither Walmart nor Target have what I would consider good, trained store personnel willing to assist the customer to locate the items they want. If this truly works, the customers will be pleased. But it might be a forecast of losing jobs as those clerks would not be as necessary as once thought.
I think the app offers the retailers and marketers an opportunity to capture important information about new product searches and the relationship between those searches and actual purchases.
Of course the app is there to assist shoppers. As others have mentioned frequent visitors will have a handle on the location of what they buy most often. But shoppers could experience an added value for those typical purchases from price and other comparisons that can be made on the device and not in the aisle. On the other hand, if the app adds unwanted time to the store visit, it will feel like an inconvenience and shoppers won’t use it.
I don’t see the downside of trying it out. But I sure would look for those unexpected uses that please the customer and build a new resource of insights for the retailer and brands.
On the surface, the apps look to be a significant improvement in the customer experience, provided product in-stock availability is accurate. The new features could definitely help convert some of the 10-20% of shoppers who leave without buying/locating the item they seek into actual purchases.
The bigger question is: What percentage of consumers will make the effort to download and actually use the app? Utilization is the Achilles Heel.
In-store item location tools are a great example of an app that addresses a real (and real-time) shopper problem. Along the same lines, an app that provides aisle information and an “ideal route” based on a shopper’s shopping list would also be valuable.
The in-store item location tool seems most relevant to a narrow segment of infrequent purchases where the shopper knows exactly what they want, yet do not know where this is in the store. The most logical enhancement is an ability to make individualized recommendations of products that are off the beaten path. For example, popular seasonal or complementary item could appear in this app with a map to its location.
A route planning feature may also be popular. I am curious to learn how shoppers behave when using this service. Are their heads buried in their phones or do they continue to scan the store like normal? If the latter, increasing shoppers’ travel distance has a significant positive impact on unplanned spending. The retailer could accentuate this effect by encouraging shoppers to take routes through new areas of the store.
This app may finally put the nail in the coffin of “keep the customer in the store as long as possible.” Time-starved customers will appreciate the opportunity to locate those items they rarely purchase.
An informed consumer is a happy consumer. Consumer friendly apps that more easily help consumers find their next purchase, or inform them of the cost and availability of their next purchase is one of many steps to getting (and keeping) loyal customers. Need we say more?
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It will continue to work well for both of these retailers and any others that offer the service. Why? These are larger stores and finding items continues to be a challenge for most of us men and many women as well. If the item is not in stock it should also offer to order online, to deliver for free or pick up at the store in a day. What about asking a question about the item that would go to an associate to meet the customer or to send the answer to the customer? Maybe offer a coupon or send information for a complimentary item for the item being searched. Retailers can also allow the customer to pay for the item on their mobile device and get out of the store faster. The mobile device becomes a form of personal shopper? Maybe.
At the start of the game is knowing the item is in stock at a select store. Helping the shopper find it fast in the store will always help.
Help the shopper spend more, fast. Searching in the store eats up more possible larger basket creation time. They find it fast and can then look for more things they might want.
Really! Do we really think someone goes grocery shopping in Walmart or Target and doesn’t know where a product is? Both chains have gone to great lengths to improve their signage. Once you’ve regularly shopped those stores, you know where products are (and most of their shoppers, as we’ve seen in this space, are regular shoppers). I’m very skeptical of the 10 percent to 20 percent estimate of people not finding a desired item in the store—this sounds more like confusion with out-of-stocks than difficulty in finding something.
The questions around item locators are operational ones. Are the planograms accurate? Is the inventory really on the shelf? This demands a level of accuracy that I don’t think many retailers have achieved.
I just see a lot of potential risk and frustration if it’s not done well.
After all, at Walmart in particular staffs are still too light to keep track of perishables before they go bad. Are these chains really able to come through with the goods? If they can, it’s a winner for sure. If not, they might have been better off spending on different technologies.
These apps are a great first step. The key is providing precise locations and inventory. Now retailers need to take the next steps, linking coupons, promotional offers and loyalty cards to shopping lists contained in the apps, and NFC checkout. Then these apps will be more like personal assistants.
For some percentage of shoppers, being able to identify where an item is in store will prove useful. The question is how does this either drive revenue or lower expenses for a retailer, because at the end of the day that’s really what’s relevant. If my plan was to purchase the item I was searching for anyways, while this helps simplify the process, it’s not clear that it’s growing the basket size.
While on the surface coupons may seem useful, if I was going to buy the item anyways that represents the retailer giving away more margin than they have to, so personally I am waiting for an upsell/cross-sell capability as the most useful way to create some additional benefit for the retailer.
I concur strongly with folks here who assert that knowing an item is on the shelf is more important than knowing the location of the shelf.
Real-time store inventory management (with computer-generated ordering and timely replenishment) is a prerequisite.
I don’t care how clever your store mapping app is. If it sends me to an empty shelf, I’m going to be disappointed.
I think it’s wonderful to see retailers adding these features to their mobile apps. I see so many efforts with mobile that are about messaging for offers, coupons, etc., and the big pain points and wishes from shoppers tend to gravitate to info on product availability, wayfinding and ways to help them in their shopping journey. There are ways to compliment empowering functionality with promotions and offers, but it’s nice to see efforts to give valuable tools to the shopper and let them feel informed and empowered.
I’m surprised at the lack of enthusiasm for these apps here.
Maybe I’m the only one who is reaching the point of needing my GPS to find the Walmart—much less finding the product I was sent for in the darned store! And we all know how easy it is (and expensive it is to provide) to find a friendly, knowledgeable associate in the aisle to help us find the vacuum cleaner bags. (Right!)
I think this one will be a major “thank you!” from a lot of shoppers. And I would definitely frequent a store that I know has this feature over competitors that don’t have it, given roughly equal proximity and selection.
While I love this idea for myself, (I am not a regular shopper at either store and can never find what I’m looking for), I am hardly their regular customer.
This begs the question, does the regular shopper at these stores need an item finder? How much business are they losing to shoppers like me who rarely come in and will leave when they can’t find the item?
The big question here is which customer is more important and what does that customer need to better enable their shopping journey? Is this a customer who whips out their iPhone when they enter the store? And what happens when more and more frequently the item is not found where it is suppose to be or out of stock? Hmmmmm….
Methinks shelf or aisle displays of coupon offerings, great signage, and friendly, available sales associates might have better results for these two brands.
Now if we’re talking Home Depot, that would be a whole other story. And that’s my 2 cents!
This is an obvious next step, and I’m glad to see retailers moving in this direction. Anything that saves customers time adds value.
The navigational aid would surely cut about one half hour off of shopping at Costco. On the other hand, it’s sort of like a treasure hunt.
Neither Walmart nor Target have what I would consider good, trained store personnel willing to assist the customer to locate the items they want. If this truly works, the customers will be pleased. But it might be a forecast of losing jobs as those clerks would not be as necessary as once thought.
I think the app offers the retailers and marketers an opportunity to capture important information about new product searches and the relationship between those searches and actual purchases.
Of course the app is there to assist shoppers. As others have mentioned frequent visitors will have a handle on the location of what they buy most often. But shoppers could experience an added value for those typical purchases from price and other comparisons that can be made on the device and not in the aisle. On the other hand, if the app adds unwanted time to the store visit, it will feel like an inconvenience and shoppers won’t use it.
I don’t see the downside of trying it out. But I sure would look for those unexpected uses that please the customer and build a new resource of insights for the retailer and brands.
On the surface, the apps look to be a significant improvement in the customer experience, provided product in-stock availability is accurate. The new features could definitely help convert some of the 10-20% of shoppers who leave without buying/locating the item they seek into actual purchases.
The bigger question is: What percentage of consumers will make the effort to download and actually use the app? Utilization is the Achilles Heel.
In-store item location tools are a great example of an app that addresses a real (and real-time) shopper problem. Along the same lines, an app that provides aisle information and an “ideal route” based on a shopper’s shopping list would also be valuable.
The in-store item location tool seems most relevant to a narrow segment of infrequent purchases where the shopper knows exactly what they want, yet do not know where this is in the store. The most logical enhancement is an ability to make individualized recommendations of products that are off the beaten path. For example, popular seasonal or complementary item could appear in this app with a map to its location.
A route planning feature may also be popular. I am curious to learn how shoppers behave when using this service. Are their heads buried in their phones or do they continue to scan the store like normal? If the latter, increasing shoppers’ travel distance has a significant positive impact on unplanned spending. The retailer could accentuate this effect by encouraging shoppers to take routes through new areas of the store.
This app may finally put the nail in the coffin of “keep the customer in the store as long as possible.” Time-starved customers will appreciate the opportunity to locate those items they rarely purchase.
An informed consumer is a happy consumer. Consumer friendly apps that more easily help consumers find their next purchase, or inform them of the cost and availability of their next purchase is one of many steps to getting (and keeping) loyal customers. Need we say more?