Today, consumers spend hours and hours on their smart phones, every day, to stay connected to real-time and personalized world of the modern digital landscape. They expect the retail providers to be available digitally and provide them with more opportunities at any time of the day.

In today’s world, retail is all about personalization .Today’s retailers have never had more demands. It will be correct to say that they are no longer involved in selling things but are engaged in selling the experience of buying those things. The latest digital marketing strategies offer some of the best opportunities to drive footfall and in-store sales. It is time for retailers to incorporate the latest and biggest technologies that are currently impacting the industry to stay in the game.

Let’s have a look at few technologies that are constantly helping potential retailers in shaping their digital retail strategy:

1. Create Google Local Business Listing

The first and foremost step in any local SEO strategy is to verify your local business’ Google My Business (GMB) listing . This feature helps you to increase your chances of appearing in Google Maps, Google’s Local Pack, Local Finder, and organic rankings. Using the free listing feature on Google, one can include information about their company, like their address, business hours, phone number, and types of payments accepted. Using the advanced feature of Google My Business, companies can grab viewers’ attention and can improve their ranking in local search results.

An example of a Google My Business (GMB) listing:

2. Improve Google Business Listing

There may be a situation where people can’t find your business in their local area. To maximize how often your customers see your business in local search results, one can optimize the complete the Google Business Listing. This way you can improve your business’s local ranking on Google and enhance your presence in Search engines and Maps.

• Enter complete information about your business in Google My Business so that customers know more about what you do, when they can visit you and where you are.
• Verify your business locations.
• Mention the hours of operation accurately: Entering and updating your opening and closing hours lets potential customers know when you’re available and when the store is closed.
• Reply to reviews: Interacting with customers by responding to reviews shows that you value your customers and their feedback, which they leave about your business.
• Add relevant photos: Accurate and appealing pictures show potential customers about the products or service your offer.

3. Focus on Local Business Directories

One of the best ways to advertise your business is to advertise through Yellow pages. It helps the local community in your area to locate you easily. If you want to reach the largest audiences in your area, invest in creating an engaging ad and publish it with all the details.

4. Optimize your Local SEO

To attract footfall, retailers need to optimize their SEO strategy. There are huge opportunities for those retailers who optimize for local search. With a well-optimized SEO plan in hand, retailers will be able to cut competition in that area.

5. Personalized Emails Or SMS Using the right channels

Millennial and Gen Z live on mobile. According to a report published on www.smarterHQ.com, 95% of millennials are doing other things while they shop, binge, travel, watch favorite shows etc. In order to grab their attention, it is important to send them personalized notifications over the right communication channels like emails. Emails are good, almost free and have the highest ROI.

Another effective digital strategy is SMS marketing. As per experts, Texting has the highest engagement rate of any marketing medium by far. Customers prefer to receive notifications via text messages over all other channels. They also prefer to get reservation approvals, order status alerts, and appointment reminders via text.

6. Focus on local area promotion through AdWords

Marketers cannot ignore the latest prevailing trend of ROPO (Research online, purchase offline). Thrifty shoppers and bargain hunters generally look for better deals locally before making a purchase. The purpose of Adwords is to drive foot traffic to your store or business locations so that they can take advantage of local promotions and services. Few Adwords hacks that you can incorporate into your Ad campaigns are:

• Add location ad extension to your ad campaign to display your store’s address. For example:
• Use promotion ad campaigns to display your store’s current promotions in your ad.

In an era, where every industry is witnessing a rapid digital transformation, it is important for retailers to accept change. They need to understand that not all technologies will be right for their products, service or clientele, but if they adopt a flexible digital strategy, they’ll be better equipped and prepared to try new technologies that will eventually help them to attract more clients.