Two Tricks for Retail Marketing

Hi, I’m Saurabh👋. I write in-depth analyses on the growth of popular companies. I cover their early-growth strategies, current growth levers, and the business-building lessons we can learn from them.

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Read time: 2 minutes 38 seconds

If a mall has a Tricky Turkish Ice Cream corner, you are bound to see a crowd mushrooming around the shop with a couple of cameras out. Watching the ice cream seller teasing customers with the cone is fun to watch. 😃

It entices people to imagine themselves in a light-hearted competition with the seller with multiple chances to win a reward, right in front of an audience. This makes people wait, closely observe, learn from other's mistakes, and build their strategy before getting their ice cream.

From the seller's perspective, it does one thing really well: Get customers into the store.

If you are another seller in the mall, you would definitely want that!

So, today, I bring you two viral marketing tactics that go beyond the obvious and bring people into your store.

Tactic 1: Scan me if you can 🤳🏃‍♂️

Glide Pizza, an American pizzeria launched an amazing campaign where customers could scan a QR code and get free pizza. The catch? It’s not so easy to scan. They had a pizza-costumed human with a QR code block on his head running and dodging people from scanning the QR code. Pretty fun, right?

In case people were unable to scan the QR, the name of the pizzeria was written on the block - something people could recall when they spotted it. 

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Absolutely genius!

Tactic 2: Flaunt it for Real 🕺

If you are an Indian 90s kid, you might remember the famous song Chadhti Jawaani Meri Chal Mastani’s video where three mannequins turn into angels and dance. This tactic makes it a reality. (well almost!)

Ditching traditional mannequins, a designer clothing store in China, featured real models walking on treadmills outside their store last month. The models altered poses and attires at intervals, keeping things fresh. This immediately caught people’s attention and you can see them enjoying the show in the video below

Why it works? 🤔 

📺Entertainment Value: When customers are entertained, they retain the experience longer and tend to stick to the brand 

🫢Elements of surprise: Surprise intensifies our emotions by 400%. Live, moving objects in places where we don’t expect them, acts like a punch line of a good joke

📲Shareability: In events like Tricky Turkish Ice Cream and Scan Me If You Can, customers often find themselves in a light-hearted competition with the vendor, which can lead to memorable moments and stories to share later

💡 Ideas on how other brands can embrace it 

Here are some ideas on how other brands can adopt a similar approach.

Athletics brands - 🧘‍♀️Live Yoga performances in the store. Resistance bands: bot vs you?

Bridal showroom -🚶‍♀️Moving red carpets 

Baggage and luggage -. ⛹️‍♀️ Shooting balls into the baggage

Toys: 🚡Employees playing with flying toys

Watches: ⌚ Find Original or Fake and get x% off

Health and Nutrition: 💪Two guys challenging each other on pull-ups

Until next time! 👋

Saurabh