Mail America and Showroom Technology announced that Homemakers, a wholly-owned unit in the Berkshire Hathaway family of businesses, drove more traffic into its 215,000 square foot store using the kiosk-based scan event than at any other time in the past year. Leveraging its investment in seven Mail America/Showroom Technology kiosks, Homemakers embraced the new 360° Marketing program, introduced late last year by Showroom Technology and Mail America. Mail America has developed and taken to market their proprietary Webtrax software that enables retailers to incorporate large prize offers into their marketing, increasing response rates and store traffic for participating retailers.
The kiosks run promotional events to help retailers drive consumers into the store and up to the kiosk so as to collect their personal data for marketing and credit application services. Mail America’s partnership with in-store technology leader, Showroom Technology, enables the kiosks to tie together barcoded print promotions with a consumer’s in-store experience. The barcode scan events can be insured for up to one million dollars, enabling retailers to get creative and develop promotions that catch the attention of today’s cautious consumer.
The Homemakers scan event offered an instant win of multiple prizes, featuring a grand prize and different purchase discount percentages as secondary prizes that every customer received. The promotion engine offered Homemakers the ability to develop secret and flexible prizes in order to create more excitement around the event. This, in turn, enticed a high volume of consumers into the store. On the peak weekend day of the event, Homemakers had so much foot traffic that consumers were lined up to scan at the kiosk. As a result of the scan and registration process, the 360° Marketing system showed Homemakers, real-time, data related to the nearly 5,000 consumers interacting with the kiosks during this event.
“We are very pleased with the performance of the tandem promotional campaign between our in-store kiosks from Showroom Technology and the direct mail piece from Mail America,” said Suzy Emmack, marketing director for Homemakers. “The ability to have a customer-specific mailer that drove people to the store and to scan at the kiosk to see their winnings was an excellent way to get current and new customers into the store. The interactive nature of this promotional piece was unlike any other. It is definitely something to repeat.”
Homemakers is planning a follow-on promotion to coincide with the grand opening of its newly renovated and expanded store this summer. They will also add more kiosks to handle the large number of consumers interacting with the kiosks. “The scan event ended up as one of our best promotions of any kind for both foot traffic and sales in the last year, in spite of the down economy,” stated Rick Greth, Homemakers’ information technology director. “By having the consumer come into the store with the promotion, it gave us unique insight and instant feedback as to the consumer’s reaction to the offer, a future benefit as new offers are considered.”
About Mail America: Mail America specializes in print-based marketing solutions for thousands of clients across many retail industry verticals that require delivering the right message, connecting to the right people & reflecting the results of the promotion. Their goal is to provide the newest and most innovative direct marketing solutions, to stay ahead of the industry breakthroughs and to keep retailer’s marketing efforts ahead of the competition. It is their creative vision, diverse knowledge and a commitment to flawless execution, which makes them a company of problem solvers who build marketing programs that work. Mail America has developed and taken to market their proprietary Webtrax software that enables retailers to incorporate large prize offers into their marketing, increasing response rates and store traffic while developing a future marketing database for the retailer. For more information, visit www.mailamerica.com.
About Showroom Technology: Showroom Technology’s SHOW/PRO® kiosk system has rapidly become a key sales tool in the retail store. A SHOW/PRO kiosk allows consumers a self-service way to quickly and privately apply for financing, register for promotions or incentives, and easily browse product information and images. The kiosk system also displays targeted advertising to consumers in the store in order to help influence shopping behavior. As a result, SHOW/PRO kiosks help retailers increase sales performance, improve a consumer’s in-store shopping experience, and streamline the sales floor administrative process, thereby achieving a better return on foot traffic. For more information, visit www.showroomtech.com.