There are countless products in the store, and the question we face is: Is the intention of product planning really conveyed to consumers? Moreover, consumers themselves are hesitant to select products. To sell well, you have to display well, and the book "Display that Sells" talks about the benefits of how merchandise is displayed and the extent to which it can increase sales. The author, Yukio Nagashima, has been engaged in general consulting for outlets in the areas of management guidance and promotion since 1971. The foundation of marketing is based on the AIDMA (AIDMA) Law, or the AIDCA Law, so how can this law be applied to actual storefront marketing? This book explains how to apply this law to actual storefront merchandising, and explains front-of-store merchandising techniques by comparing illustrations of "best-selling displays" and "slow-selling displays". 80% of Customers Decide Which Products to Buy in Stores The results of various shopping questionnaires show that nearly 80% of customers decide which products to buy in stores. In some cases, the percentage of products purchased in the store is as high as 95%. Generally speaking, most customers decide what they want to buy in the store. In the case of food, for example, most customers decide on the dinner menu when they see the actual item in the store. Even in the case of high-priced items such as durable consumer goods, although customers may have decided on some candidates before coming to the store, most people end up deciding which item from which manufacturer to buy at the store. Therefore, the store is the place where customers decide whether or not to buy their own products. However, does the store allow consumers to recognize the characteristics of the product? Some people think that "the fragrance of the wine is not afraid of the deep alley, as long as the quality of the goods will naturally be purchased". True, good products will naturally have customers to buy. But if you pay more attention to the display of goods, you can make sales get more growth. Or, do not rely on the product itself, just by virtue of the store display of some small skills can make the goods more popular, not better? Chart 1: The system of front-of-house marketing The importance of front-of-house marketing Customers who patronize a store have a significant motivation to buy, i.e., they are "potential customers with a strong desire to buy". Therefore, if you use the right techniques in the store, sales will increase by leaps and bounds. However, if you don't display your products properly, you will lose potential customers who come to your store with great difficulty, and all your marketing efforts may even come to naught. So, what exactly are in-store merchandising techniques? Please refer to Figure 2, the structure of front-of-store marketing. Figure 2: Structure of front-of-store marketing Effectively increase sales by targeting potential customers who visit the store What is the difference between in-store promotion and other promotional media? For example, television advertisements, magazine advertisements, press advertisements, etc. can be very effective. However, these advertisements are aimed at the general public, not a specific group of people. Unlike in-store advertising, in-store advertising is aimed at "potential customers with a strong desire to buy" who have already visited the store and are standing in front of the product. Therefore, the response rate is tens of times higher than that of the non-specific public. Even if a media advertisement creates a desire to buy a product, people cannot buy it on the spot. In contrast, people in a store can buy a product as soon as they want it. In other words, from the seller's point of view, in-store promotion is a promotional medium that is "directly linked to sales. In addition, in-store promotion is much less expensive than advertising. Even if you don't set up in-store promotional tools, you can increase your sales by leaps and bounds if you put a little more effort into the display of your products. Therefore, storefront marketing is naturally very important for large manufacturers, but it is also a worthwhile method for small and medium-sized manufacturers, which will bring good results. AIDMA law applied to the store display Let's take a look at the classic AIDMA (AIDMA) law in marketing, please refer to Figure 3. this chart reveals the six stages of the customer's purchasing psychology, while reflecting the customer's psychological changes before the actual purchase of goods. Chart 3: six stages of purchase psychology and display 1. Attention (Attention) can attract customers to the goods are likely to sell. For example, assuming that every day passing by the store of pedestrians or vehicles have 10,000 people (vehicles), if the store publicity can effectively attract people's attention, the effect is equivalent to the daily distribution of 10,000 advertising leaflets. 2. Interest (Interest) through certain techniques, so that even if customers do not go to consult the sales staff, but also through the display and POP advertising associated with a good image of the product, which is also very important. 3. Demand (Desire) Want to promote the customer's desire to buy, let the customer personally experience the product is quite effective. How to visually simple and easy to understand the characteristics of the goods conveyed to the customer, and arouse the customer's "desire to buy" it? 4. Conviction (Conviction) Sometimes the above three steps can be used to make customers decide to buy. In order to let the customer to buy without worrying, show the credit and added value of the goods is also very important. 5. Memory (Memory) Customers sometimes even if they have the desire to buy a certain product, but not immediately buy it on the spot. For example, some customers may think, "I'll come back to ...... after I get my bonus. We need to make this kind of customers to leave a deep memory of the product in their mind, so that they will come back. 6. Action This is the stage when customers decide to buy the products, but we should not take it lightly, for example, if the products are off-sale, the customers' enthusiasm for buying will naturally be reduced suddenly, and sometimes the customers obviously have a strong desire to buy, but the sales can not be raised. Not bound by the common sense of the novel display compelling Unprecedented new display methods can sometimes play an amazing effect, not only to facilitate the purchase of customers, customers' attention, some products can also set off a boom. There are countless examples of this throughout the ages. Self-service sales are not uncommon today, but when they were first used in the United States in the 1930s, they were hailed as an epoch-making new sales method. The prerequisite for making this sales method work was to package the goods before displaying them. Fresh food is processed in-store, packaged and displayed in open coolers. The fresh ingredients processed in the store are easy for customers to buy, so fresh food has become one of the main products in supermarkets. Figure 3: Novel display methods to create focus products Novel display focus products Pre-packaged fresh food Fresh food has become the mainstay of supermarkets College style is displayed in matching displays College style craze from hairstyles to shoes College style craze has been created by stacking and displaying Christmas pastries in the store Gradually, the custom of eating Christmas pastries at Christmas was formed Letting footwear models wear pantyhose in front of the people Pantyhose were quickly popularized Denim was displayed in racks in the case A denim store appeared in the racks of boxes, and the denim craze was created. Samples of waterproof watches were displayed in the sink, and waterproof watches quickly became popular. The popularity of store design in the form of boutiques, brand names and famous brands have created a boom in the creation of underground shopping malls, delis, and popular food and beverage outlets These examples of focal point products and focal point displays are numerous. We may be used to seeing them today, but when they first became popular, they used groundbreaking display methods. This is how focal points were created. To give a concrete example, this is the socks display of a short socks manufacturer. Earlier, the display method used by the manufacturer was the popular shelf display and hook display, which gave the impression of being a mass-market display, and could not bring a sense of fashion to the customers, and the display could be easily disorganized, and the image of the product would also be greatly reduced. Chart 4: Novelty of display attracts attention Therefore, try to break the previous common sense, boldly put the short socks into the wicker basket for display, and the result gives customers a fashionable and trendy feeling. Moreover, loading socks into the basket itself is an irregular display, so there is no need to reorganize the products. Of course, this type of loaded display is also "planned irregularity", which means that only one type of item can be placed in a basket. If there are multiple items in a basket, it is difficult for customers to shop. This is just a simple example of how a difference in display methods can bring a new image to customers. So, please don't stick to the old display methods, and think boldly about new methods! Do you really let customers understand the characteristics of the products? Do we really let the customers who visit our stores understand the characteristics of our products? I'm afraid that there are many products that are not well described in the store, so customers are not able to understand their strengths, and therefore they are not interested in the product, which leads to stagnation of the product. Especially for functional products, it is difficult to increase sales just by displaying them on the shelves. For example, in the case of a sneaker made of a new material with good ventilation properties, which is characterized by its ability to absorb heat while being worn and give people a "cool feeling," stores are trying to promote the new product by offering a "product experience. The "Product Experience" offers two sets of products, one for sneakers made of ordinary materials and the other for sneakers made of the new material, so that customers can experience the "coolness" of the new material for themselves. Figure 5: Need for more detailed product descriptions Another example is a men's apparel brand that offers wrinkle-free suits. In order to allow customers to experience the wrinkle-free nature of the suits, it also chose to provide the store with a "product experience" that allowed customers to experience the wrinkle-free nature of the suits by kneading the fabrics themselves. In addition, price tags can be utilized more flexibly. Some products have large price tags on them, but they are not being used effectively. For example, the price tag on a bag of golf clubs has only the product name and price printed on it, but if the product's functions were printed on the reverse side, the number of interested customers would increase. "Popular products can generate interest among customers, so consider displaying the popularity of your products in the store. One way to do this is to display samples of the best-seller ranking list. Chart 6: Displaying Bestseller Rankings Creating an Atmosphere of Popularity Look at Chart 6, which shows the bestseller rankings displayed by a gift store. The store displays the top five best-selling items for each of the three purposes (legal return gifts, birth congratulations, and wedding congratulations). This is the most convenient and quickest information for indecisive customers. This counter is a sample display counter, and the actual products are displayed on other display counters. Therefore, after the display counter has aroused the interest of customers, it is also necessary to put up POP guidelines, so that it can be linked to the actual sales. This can be done by labeling the POP with "Please ask the staff for product descriptions and counter information". It is important to note that even if you use samples to display the best-seller list, you will not be able to increase sales if customers can't find where the product is displayed. In addition, it is more effective to indicate the reason for the product's popularity on the POP. So, while displaying samples, you need to put more effort into POP.