Wi-Fi, retail and word of mouth

Steve Smith PhD, head of thought leadership at Starcom MediaVest Group, shows which supermarkets are likely to benefit from providing Wi-Fi, and how…

What do John Lewis, Ted Baker and ‘Pasty-Tax’ hit Greggs all have in common?

Each was highlighted during Retail Week’s recent conference as just three of a growing number of retailers that are launching free Wi-Fi in their stores.

Café and fast food retail brands like Starbucks, McDonalds and Greggs hope that visitors who use Wi-Fi will have a more enjoyable stay by being able to keep up with emails, social networking and so on.

For retailers like John Lewis and Tesco, which is rolling out Wi-Fi to all its Tesco Extra stores, the aim is more about enabling customers to augment their shopping experience through price comparison and reading product reviews – and so make more informed choices.

However, two questions are how many people are likely to use in-store Wi-Fi, and what other supermarkets might benefit from in-store Wi-Fi?

To answer these, I looked at the propensity of supermarket shoppers to regularly use mobile internet on their phones compared with the average person in the UK. The results were very revealing.

Firstly, by providing Wi-Fi in its Tesco Extra stores, Tesco is clearly going to engage many of its shoppers, as they are more likely to use mobile internet on their phones than the average person. However, the data also shows that Tesco should consider rolling Wi-Fi out to at least some of its Tesco Express stores.

Another highlight from the data is that ASDA and Sainsbury’s (including Sainsbury’s Local) would also be likely to benefit from rolling out Wi-Fi. These too attract customers who have a greater than average propensity to use mobile internet.

A benefit that supermarkets are likely to gain by facilitating shoppers is positive word of mouth. The research shows that shoppers likely to be attracted by in-store Wi-Fi are also more likely to be people who are influential within their personal communities. If supermarkets’ impress these people, they are more likely to talk about them.

Tesco, Sainsbury’s and ASDA are all likely to benefit from word of mouth by Wi-Fi users. People likely to be attracted by Tesco Express Wi-Fi are nearly 1.7 times more likely to be influencers than the average person in the UK.

For more supermarket insights, visit www.emergingspaces.co.uk