The advancement of technology has amazed the world and shall continue doing so by constantly fusing imagination with reality. It has made the world wonder about what technology is capable of and continues to do so. One of such amazing creations of technology is the Mood and Emotion sensing device and its integration into the retail sector to enhance the overall shopping experience.
It is a universal fact that the human race is always hungry, never satisfied and craves for more and more gratification. One such craving and a wild imagination of some people was to have retail stores extending offers based on time of the day, season and customers’ mood. No one could imagine a technology where machines would detect the customer’s mood and would flash offers according to it. Excitingly, technology evangelists have made it possible in a retail store to help customers make decisions on their way out from the store!
This particular device that is developed can be attached to the kiosks and when the customer is facing the device that is sensor enabled, it scans their mood by capturing their appearances and facial expressions. And based on the emotion or mood detected, the devices flash promotional offers on their way out. These devices can also read and register data from the membership cards; it would have various details like points accumulated, time of the day, season and temperature and very smartly place offers accordingly. For example, if a pregnant woman enters into a store in the month of January, the device on the basis of the situation and weather might flash promos of soups and milk products or if a customer is a regular buyer of music CDs, then the device might flash promos and offers on the latest DVDs and music releases. Although these machines right now are seen and available in few stores in Russia, it is expected to grab the global market very soon.
The new emotion tracing technology helps retailers gain more accurate and real-time data about their shoppers’ interactions with products, salespeople and the store. This allows the retailers to look at the shoppers’ emotional reaction to items or people and this could help them optimise marketing and shopping experiences. This technology mainly can track overall facial emotions including the primary and advanced emotions. The primary ones being surprise, joy, fear, sadness, anger, disgust and contempt and the advanced ones are frustration and confusion. It is cutting-edge technology that allows companies to accumulate sentiments by processing facial expressions anonymously. The technology is expected to be accepted broadly for the kind of services it provides to enhance the customers experience particularly in retail. These devices are at present designed in a way that is best suited for the retail industry to deliver a real time, aggregate view of customer sentiment. It is a powerful measure designed to help retailers and brands increase sales.
The retailers are facing tough competition from their online counterparts with e-commerce websites constantly bringing in various innovations to lure the customer to the online platforms. However these retailers have the advantage of the look, touch and feel which the e-commerce websites cannot offer. They are working hard to up their game and are continuously focusing on improved customer in-store experience. This has brought in this smart technology using data analytics and big data technology which is a win-win situation for both retail industry and brands as it allows them to collect data and come out with new offers. This innovation ensures the customer’s return to the store as it gives him a visual shopping experience and helps in driving company sales. A look at the flip side of it would reveal that there would be some consumers who might feel freaky to accept retailers knowing so much about them. However, there may be millions especially enthusiastic teenagers who may be open to trying something like this. The success of this device depends on the consumer’s acceptance of it, but it’s definitely a masterpiece of data mining technology.
Besides the, technology distribution strategy and value chain dynamics are becoming integrated with existing capabilities to drive business growth. By facilitating the most trustworthy, proficient, and effectual processes, we assist retailers attain higher service levels while reducing costs, thus increasing customer loyalty and brand strength.
Operating on negligible tolerance, the retail industry faces challenges like to those in other industries. The only distinction is that they combine together to put a great deal of pressure on retailers in today’s modern economy. With a fast-paced society and technological progressions, customers want new, different, and customised goods and that too without delay. In such a scenario, a mood and emotion sensing device can probably help retailers to put a spin to their sales and promotion strategy to appeal to customers uniquely. It will help in engaging them with path breaking technological innovations to accelerate profits and even attract customers in the long run.
About the author
Saif Ahmad, President & COO, Xavient Information Systems
