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5 Tips for Successful Retail Fitout in Australia

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If you are just venturing into the retail sector, fitting out the shop might be one of the unexpected hurdles that you face. After you have found the right location, repaint it, and buy the display cabinets and racks, you will still need to make it visually appealing. Most building owners will encourage you to improve the building at your expense.

1. Improve the interior Design to Attract Customers

You will need a strategic approach and the right expertise to get the retail interior design right. Great signage, product placement, and visual merchandising can complement this. When you are planning your interior design, always have the customer experience in mind. For a customer, the persuasion to enter the store is the ambience and not the products. Most customers do not notice the merchandise on display. When they come into the store, the first impression is what matters.

One way to grab their attention is to install floor to ceiling wall fixtures. It will allow for the optimal placement of products while encouraging customers to linger. In the trading area, place low-line shelves to allow customers to see products, which will help increasing spending. It also increases customer visibility, which helps to lower shoplifting.

With the right layout, it will also promote signage. This can assist the flow of traffic while helping to build your brand. By analysing and understanding the customer behaviour, you will be able to design a space to guide customers through the store to where they need to be.

2. Make Use of LED Lighting

If you run a retail store, it is important to make full use of shop windows to attract customers. The windows have to be well lit and this will attract customers. The LED lighting is the best option since it helps you to save money on the energy bill. Besides that, it is quite durable and efficient. It also gives you a lot of flexibility when it comes to highlighting certain products that are in high demand. To get it right, consider speaking to a retail fitout service in Melbourne like Unita.

3. Invest in Good-Quality Air Condition

In Melbourne, summer can be quite hot. It is important that you have a good air conditioning unit to maintain a relaxing environment inside the store. Besides that, it preserves the shelf life of your products. The last thing you want is for customers to run off to a more comfortable retail store. If your store is a haven for all weather conditions, you will have more customers who want to come back to your store.

4. Provide Seating for Customers

A great addition to the store that you should consider during the retail refurbishment is seating for the customers. Giving them a place where they can rest their weary feet gives them time to look around and find the products they need. The seating will ensure that shopper take time to discover products they did not know they needed.

5. Do Not Overlook the Security

You have invested a lot of money into your retail business and it is important to protect that investment. Get a professional to install a CCTV system at the store. In case an issue arises, the authorities will have an easier time apprehending and prosecuting the culprits. It can also help to identify serial shoplifters thus helping the entire business community.

Summary

Starting a retail business is exciting but if you want to succeed, you have to do it right. These few tips should prove quite useful in getting things right. If you need expert assistance on how to get the retail fit-out right, consider talking to the experts at Unita.

5 Strategies to Minimize Abandonment of Shopping Carts for Your Online Store

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Once a customer makes a few purchases from your store, they are bound to be loyal. However, abandoned carts are always a problem for most online stores. Luckily, it is easy to manage them and get back your loyal customers to their buying behaviors. Some of the tactics you can use include:

Follow up on abandoned carts

Regardless of how strong your SEO strategy is you need a plan moving forward. Following up on abandoned carts is the first strategy you can make a follow up on. Once you have a SEO agency set up the framework to drive more traffic to your site, you can proceed with your core skills. Follow up on customers who were once buying from your store and lure them back to continue doing the same.

Manage your leads from the start

It is a long road from the time a person visits your online store to when they choose to buy. Most of the time potential customers will give up along the way or take a lot of time before they can buy from your store. Luckily, you can close a sale within a short period if you choose to manage your leads from the start. Once you drive quality traffic to your site with help from the best SEO agency, you can start managing them from there. Allow yourself to ask them for help as soon as they show up on your site. You can offer to help them find an item with ease and close that sale within a few minutes.

Utilize email marketing for buying customers

Email marketing is what every online store should use not only manage abandoned carts, but also to increase the conversion rate. The returning customer is your major asset as they guarantee that you will have sales in future. Always treasure that and by using email marketing, you can win every day for loyal customers. To maintain that spirit of buying, you will need constantly send promotional emails to customers and remind them of the best offers they are missing out on. Consult a SEO agency with expertise in email marketing to optimize your email content for objective marketing.

Keep track of the customers ‘buying behavior

The buying behavior should have an even pattern for a loyal customer. If you identify any deviation from the norm, then you should move in to find out what went wrong. Did the customer change stores, or did the customer move? It helps you to keep a record and remind the customer to come back now and them. If they went to another store, then they might come back when they hear from you.

Respond to views and responses from customers

Since you are running an online store where people are spending their real hard earned cash, then you have to respond to their queries. Whether positive comments or not, you need to keep your composure. It is all about making the customers happy. If the customer is not happy then your business will be in danger or losing revenue. You have to make sure that you follow up on any issue and respond as fast as possible and assure a better service. Also, respond to complements from customers to a cordial relationship.

3 Essential Tips to Buy Darts Online

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Copper Steel Tip Darts Needle UK USA National Flag Dart Flights Play Dart

Dart is a popular game that has been enjoyed in many countries across the world for over 100 years. The game involves two individual players, or two teams of players, each with 3 darts that are targeted at a dartboard in each round. As a dart player, you need to know how to choose the right darts to help improve your skills besides increasing your enjoyment of the game.

With regards to choosing the right darts, whether you are a novice or a veteran dart player, there are a few basic things you need to consider before you buy darts online. You will find the following 3 tips valuable when pondering on which sets of darts to buy.

Know Your Darts

Darts usually look the same from far. However, if you take a keen look or inspect them further, you’ll realize that darts are not only made from different materials, but they also feel distinct from each other owing to their varying weights. For materials, there are brass darts, wooden darts, tungsten darts, and nickel/silver darts. Tungsten dart is the most preferred dart for professional throwers.

For the weight, darts range between 12 grams and 50 grams in weight. If you are a novice, the ideal darts for you should weigh between 18 and 20 grams. Also, your speed of throwing the dart may be significant when considering which weight to choose. A lighter dart requires a harder/faster throw. The weight location on the dart barrel is also essential. Some darts are back-weighted while others are front-loaded.

Test Your Darts

Professional dart throwers usually opt for tungsten darts primarily because they minimize bounce-outs. They also last longer compared to most of the other dart types. This does not necessarily mean that as a beginner to the game, you should also put an order for tungsten darts online. These darts are quite costly and it could be prudent to go for a more affordable option as a novice. Steel and brass darts are fairly affordable.

The best way to know which darts are good for you is to first test them out in a bid to see how they feel in your grip. Also, consider their weight and how it could affect your throwing style. You may not be able to test out the darts in the case of online purchases, but you can try out the darts that other local players or your friends are using.

Flights are Essential

Flights refer to the wings or feathers toward the end of the dart. They influence the accuracy of the action of the dart through the air. Dart flights can be rough and dimpled or smooth. While smooth flights allow accurate speed when the dart is thrown, dimpled flights usually slow down the speed of the dart through the air, enhancing its stability.

Flights also come in variety of shapes and sizes. Larger flights provide more stability to the dart when thrown. Nonetheless, for professional or advanced players, smaller flights are the best as they don’t get in the way when on the dartboard.

Conclusion

The game of darts is a pleasurable sport, whether you play it professionally or just for entertainment. There are many different types of darts to choose from, each of which suits a different skill level and style of play.

When looking to buy darts online, you should keep the above tips in mind, not forgetting about the different weights, shafts, grips and flights. Once you have identified the perfect dart, you can head to Bulls Eye Darts Australia and buy your dart.

Big Retailers try to block consumers from online shopping

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David Jones Ltd, Harvey Norman Holdings Ltd,( Gerry Harvey ) Myer and Target are among companies joining forces under a new retail coalition calling on the federal government to either impose GST on all goods under $1000 bought online, or remove GST from all products under $1000 bought locally.

Online shopping vs retiailers

More recently ,Wesfarmers( also running the coles group) has thrown its weight behind  this controversial campaign to scrap tax rules that allow Australians to shop on overseas websites without paying GST. Perth-based conglomerate Wesfarmers, also controls retail chains including the Bunnings hardware group, Coles and Bi-Lo supermarkets, Officeworks and Kmart.

According to watoday.com.au

Online retailer Michael Fox, who sells custom shoes through website shoesofprey.com, said big retailers should concentrate on improving their websites rather than blaming the GST exemption for slumping sales.

”For the last five or 10 years the big retailers, and Gerry Harvey in particular, have been saying that online retail is a dead end, nobody makes money in online retail, and they’re not going to invest in it,” Mr Fox said.

The Australian online retail market is set to reach AU$36.8 billion by 2013, up from a forecasted figure of AU$26.86 billion for calendar year 2010 according to PayPal’s ‘eCommerce: Secure Insight’ report from Forrester Research and The Leading Edge

Considering that many of these big businesses are themselves in the process of upgrading  their online business websites enabling  to sell more of their goods  online , this would certainly appear to the online business retailing community as a way to  stifle  the smaller competition by the big businesses. The consequences of this big businesses pushing on for this gst removal can lead to small local online businesses that could probably close down and run out of business and jobs.

Shopping_Trolley

‘There is still  a couple of very big retailers that are not joined this group which  include Harvey Norman competitor JB Hi-Fi, which has a strong online presence, Woolworths’ discount chain, Big W, and the Supre and Sussan groups, which compete with Lew family interests.

This group of companies is running a media campaign  which is targeted against small online retailers  and businesses ,which warns that failing to act will ultimately cost Australians jobs. This coalition of big businesses  also includes Book shops  and  australian designer  fashion stores labels . This has possibly happened  because now people who shop online have  been able to get books  and dresses cheaper  not only from local online shops but also overseas  due to the strong aussie dollar.

Consumers have embraced online shopping  even more  due to  the ridiculously high  prices  they have to pay at the Big retail  shops compared to shopping in other countries  or even online shopping. Prices in big retail shops  and grocery shops  have continued to be on the rise  in spite of the  population  rising  significantly  over the years which has not brought any reduction in these prices therefore leading the consumers towards savings and online shopping.

These group of companies  are just trying to  deny normal people shopping online good bargains that they can have online and instead of trying to compete with them they are trying to make it harder for them to trade online.

Ref www.digitalgrog.com.au

Mr Lew, who has an estimated worth of $1.49 billion, yesterday emerged as the main backer of the push to either scrap GST on goods worth less than $1000 sold by Australia’s struggling retail sector or apply the same impost to goods bought from overseas

According to the Australian Bureau Of statistics more than 1.3 million Australian adults purchased or ordered goods and services for their own private use over the Internet. This was a substantial increase from the 803,000 adults that did likewise in the 12 month period to November 1999.

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