Imagine looking forward to finally getting the outfit you’ve been eyeing or the appliance you’ve been saving for, only to find the dreaded “out of stock” sign in retail stores near you. Chances are, you don’t have to imagine—you’ve probably found yourself in this situation several times.
Unfortunately, this is a burden most physical stores have to carry. Because of space limitations, retail stores stock fewer products than eCommerce stores, sometimes resulting in stockouts during peak demand.
Fortunately, there’s a solution—endless aisles. They integrate digital and physical shopping to offer a broader product range, ensuring your retail marketing efforts don’t go down the drain.
In this post, we delve into the concept of endless aisles and their impact on in-store experiences.
What does “endless aisle” mean?
Almost everyone has caught the online shopping bug because of the convenience it offers. Still, e-commerce stores only account for roughly 18% of global retail sales, showing that modern shoppers still prefer brick-and-mortar stores.
How do you offer the best in-store customer experiences? Add endless aisles to your strategy. The endless aisle concept is a retail strategy that integrates in-store and online inventory systems so customers have a wider range of product choices. Typically, it allows in-store customers to order products that aren’t available for immediate purchase, possibly because they’re out of stock, and have them delivered to their home or preferred stores for pickup.
It’s one of the most popular retail marketing best practices today, as it enables you to offer an omnichannel experience to in-store shoppers. Plus, it enhances the customer experience by providing a wider variety of products and boosts sales even when there’s a lack of space at your physical store, as customers can simply order what you don’t currently have from other locations.
How does endless aisle work in retail environments?
There are various endless aisle strategies, including showrooming, self-serve shopping, and order fulfillment. With showrooming, you essentially turn your retail store into a showroom, where shoppers come to browse products in-store. Your sales associates create digital carts for the customers, and they can then check out using retail QR Codes set up in your store.
To implement the self-serve concept, you set up in-store kiosks with touchscreen displays that show your product catalog. When shoppers want out-of-stock items, they simply need to use your interactive kiosks to view item details and place orders. Self-serve kiosks are popular among small retail stores as they eliminate the need for many store associates, minimizing monthly costs.
For the final strategy, order fulfillment, you typically take customers’ orders at your physical location, process them through your e-commerce store, and send the information to a third-party supplier who packs and ships products to customer addresses.
With endless aisles, you can maintain unlimited inventory levels despite your limited store space. This improves customer experiences and protects your business from losing customers to competitors.
The endless aisle strategy also provides vital customer data that can help you understand consumer preferences, manage inventory more efficiently, and personalize customer interactions. Better inventory management and customer service prevent lost sales and, ultimately, improve business performance.
Key benefits of endless aisles in retail
Implementing endless aisles requires a lot of planning—you must communicate with suppliers to determine which products to offer, invest in the right technology, and let shoppers know about your strategy and educate them on how to use the technology. Is all of this worth it? Definitely! Here are some benefits that make endless aisles worthwhile:
Reducing lost sales from stockouts
Endless aisles reduce lost sales by allowing shoppers to purchase items that are out of stock in physical stores from online platforms. This eliminates the need for shoppers to browse other stores and limits your risk of losing customers to competitors. If you’re looking for ways to boost your conversion rates and retain customer interest over time, endless aisle solutions may be just what you need.
Expanding product selection without additional physical space
Customers have varying needs and preferences. As such, you can’t maintain just a few product selections and expect to capture a broad market. For this to happen, you need to expand your catalog to meet the needs of different groups. Endless aisles allow you to do just that—you can display a wide range of products online that you can ship to the store or directly to the customer. This way, you meet their needs without investing in additional physical space.
Enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty
Endless aisles offer immediate solutions to store inventory issues by providing alternative ways for customers to order products that aren’t currently available. They ensure customers leave physical stores with their needs met, whether through immediate or future delivery, improving the shopping experience. This level of convenience and dependability can enhance customer satisfaction, secure repeat purchases, and foster loyalty.
Optimizing inventory management and costs
No matter how much you want to, stocking every kind of product in every retail store location isn’t feasible. It may lead to overstocks in certain locations and increase holding costs, preventing efficient processes. Endless aisles can streamline operations by eliminating the need to stock all items in every store—you can stock in selected stores and ship them where necessary when you receive customer orders.
Unending aisles can also help you allocate resources more efficiently by providing data to help forecast customer demand in different locations. This way, you can stock products with the highest demand in relevant physical stores.
Integrating in-store and online shopping experiences
Endless aisles promote omnichannel retailing by blurring the lines between in-store and online shopping. Shoppers can browse items in your physical store and access a broader product catalog online, enhancing their ability to interact with your business on multiple sales channels. This can create a seamless shopping journey, ultimately improving customer experiences.
Examples of retailers that use endless aisle
Various retailers have already recognized the power of endless aisles and successfully implemented them in their operations. Some of the most popular ones include:
Note: These brands were found during our online research for this article.
Nike
Nike remains one of the most popular sports brands not only because of its high-quality products but also its dedication to providing exemplary customer experiences. The retailer has implemented the endless aisle strategy in its flagship stores through the Nike mobile app.
Customers in these stores can use their mobile devices to scan products and view available sizes, colors, and similar styles that Nike can ship directly to their homes if not available in-store. Talk about convenience!
This strategy enhances customer satisfaction by ensuring they can always find the items they want and minimizes inventory holding costs by eliminating the need to stock all products in all Nike physical stores.
Best Buy
Consumer electronics retailer Best Buy uses endless technology for a more comprehensive shopping experience that blends online and in-store. The retail giant has an almost 40,000-square-foot space with a vast product catalog to enhance in-store customer experiences.
When shopping at any Best Buy location, you can use your mobile device to scan QR Codes on product tags to access the 40,000-square-foot space and the retailer’s sales associates. The associates are there to help you access more products, product specs, customer reviews, and more that may not be physically in the store, in real time. This strategy improves customer satisfaction and helps the retailer manage space more efficiently.
Walmart
Walmart also uses endless technology to merge its in-store and massive online inventory. The retailer uses both in-store kiosks and the Walmart mobile app to let shoppers immediately order products not in stock or not available in stores.
Customers simply need to open their Walmart apps or Walmart.com to access hundreds of millions of products, displayed through live imagery and videos, to complete their orders. This endless aisle strategy allows Walmart to continuously meet customer demands, boost satisfaction, and increase sales.
Bitly’s role in streamlining endless aisle operations
Want to implement the endless aisle strategy in your store? Bitly can help. Through our platform, you can create custom, trackable branded links, QR Codes, and 2D Barcodes to provide seamless access to your endless aisle and enhance customer experiences. You can link these solutions to product catalogs and reviews to provide more product details or even augmented reality experiences to improve customers’ shopping experiences.
And the best part? We offer real-time tracking and analytics capabilities via Bitly Analytics, helping you see customer interactions with your endless aisle solutions. You can use the data to understand customer shopping behavior and preferences, allowing for well-informed stocking and inventory management decisions.
Bitly also provides scan-and-click data by location, giving you a visual of the products or services customers in specific areas value. If you’re in, say, clothing retail, this data can improve your clothing SMS geofencing efforts by letting you know which information or offers to include in the automated messages customers in specific areas receive.
To set up QR Codes or short links for endless aisle use:
- Determine which products to showcase in your endless aisles.
- Identify the information you want to display: You can include product details, pricing, shipping information, etc.
- Log in to your Bitly account to create QR Codes or generate short links: Select Create New, and depending on your preference, select QR Code or Link and follow the prompts.
- Test the codes and links to ensure they work correctly and lead customers to your endless aisle.
- Choose strategic locations where customers can access the codes and links: You can display them on product packaging, marketing materials, in-store displays, near your point of sale (POS) system, etc.
Work with Bitly to embrace the future of endless aisle solutions
In today’s endless sea of options, you must incorporate innovative solutions into your business to maintain customer interest. Endless aisles are among the best solutions for retailers, as they allow them to expand product offerings, enhance customer satisfaction, and prevent lost sales resulting from stockouts.
With Bitly’s tools, you can create high-quality links and QR Codes to provide easy access to your endless aisles and streamline the shopping journey. Beyond offering reliable solutions, the platform also provides tracking capabilities and analytics, which can help you understand customers’ preferences and improve your inventory management processes.
Create a Bitly account today for access to endless aisle solutions and insights that’ll help you capture more sales and enhance customer experiences!