Retailers across Asia are trying to find new ways to boost sales, whether it’s by giving shoppers more reasons to visit a retail location, or by using new technologies to reduce friction for customers, shortening the gap between attention and sales.
Consumers are spending more on things “that are meaningful to their life, health, and happiness,” Chadatip Chutrakul, CEO of Bangkok-based retail mall developer Siam Piwat, said at Fortune’s Southeast Asia 500 Summit in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. “Retail is just a part of it… It’s not [only] about shopping, but creating experiential destinations.”
In October, Siam Piwat announced ICONPHUKET, a retail and entertainment development in Thailand’s Phuket province. Scheduled to open in 2029, the project will include green spaces and health and wellness facilities alongside shops, residences, offices and hotels.
“Shopping malls in Thailand—and I think in Asia—are like a second home to customers,” Chutrakul explained. “So besides shopping, we [also try to] offer everything else.”
Malina Ngai, CEO of global drug and beauty chain AS Watson, agreed that today’s consumers need a reason to choose one particular retailer over another. “Ultimately, the retail game is about relevance,” she said. “It’s not so much about whether you have more products or technology… customers are looking for a brand that they trust.”
Online, social media and influencers are pushing consumers to develop relationships with brands faster.
“[In the past], consumers built a relationship with a brand over [a span of] five years, but that cycle has been cut down to a couple of months now, because people start to adhere to a brand identity very quickly,” Saemin Ahn, managing partner at Rakuten Capital, the venture capital arm of Japanese conglomerate Rakuten Group, said.
Platforms also need to ensure views are turned into purchases. In February, Rakuten Ichiba—the company’s online marketplace—partnered with Google via the YouTube Shopping affiliate program, which allows viewers to tap ‘View Products’ during YouTube videos and navigate straight to Rakuten Ichiba’s webpage to make a purchase.
“In Rakuten Ichiba, there’s about 40,000 to 50,000 merchants that we have to keep happy, and those happy merchants keep the users happy,” Ahn explained.
Physical retailers are also using new tools to help shoppers find what they need. AS Watson is using AI to study how customers shop in different sections of its stores, from supplements to oral and hair care, Ngai said. The aim is to identify where shoppers struggle and change the layout or signage to help them.
“If we know that they spend about 56 seconds on this aisle, and they couldn’t find the product they need, we would have to improve how we arrange our products, put up signages, and work with our suppliers to make it easier for customers to make decisions,” she said.
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