Flux Trends unpacks hybrid customers

The hybrid shopper has developed a taste for both worlds, as they bring different emotive qualities to the consumer experience. This duality has created a need and expectation of elements of both environments to blur seamlessly providing the best of both worlds.

Last year ecommerce in South Africa entered a phase of rapid acceleration. Sceptics were silenced, as consumers continued to embrace online shopping. (A new PwC survey found that only 15% of South African respondents had never bought anything online.) The current market share of etailing is still small, compared to traditional bricks & mortar business, but the growth potential is huge. However, while the online shopping trajectory rises steadily, it has became clear that retail success does not hinge on two distinct paths - an online offering and/or a bricks & mortar offering - but rather a service offering that straddles both realms.

Exploring new realms

For brands and retailers, this hybrid customer challenges all traditional templates of marketing and consumer engagement and there is no rulebook for this seemingly schizophrenic customer. The new Flux trends presentation will explore the following:

• Emergence of the hybrid consumer: we track the pendulum swing of the tech-savvy consumer from showrooming to webrooming
  
• Bringing cyberspace to the store: how to bring digital elements into a bricks & mortar environment to create a tech savvy consumer experience
  
• Taking the store into cyberspace: even businesses that are solely online are seeing the benefit of introducing tactile, offline experiences for their customers
  
• Everything in between: something old, something new - 21st century retail
  
• Struggling to provide that 'omni channel' presence - this will show you how to communicate with the hybrid customer
  
• Servicing the hybrid customer: Whether it is online or offline, service is the gateway to the now elusive and rare attribute - customer loyalty

Retailers and brands who are either contemplating, or who have already embarked on an online offering, retailers who want to create better retail theatre and marketers and advertisers who need to communicate with a customer that moves continually and seamlessly between the online and offline worlds will benefit from this presentation.

The event will be held at Whitely Street, Melrose Arch Precinct, Johannesburg on 10 April 2014 from 4pm at a cost of R300 per person. Bookings can be done through the office +27 (0) 11 726 5529 or email az.oc.sdnertxulf@ofni.