New technology designed to interpret shopper behaviour in fine detail and across various categories has arrived on Australian shores for the first time.
The state-of-the-art ShopperLAB research facility, by global research firm Nielsen, is now fully installed in Nielsen’s Sydney head office, and is the first full shopper experience lab to be built in the Pacific.
The lab, which was on trial at the recent Consumer 360 conference in the Blue Mountains, enables manufacturers and retailers to better understand shopping behaviour and test concepts through observation, interviews, eye tracking and neuroscience.
Aimed primarily at marketers, category managers and sales directors, the interactive and private environment can deliver genuine and dynamic insights into how shoppers react to packaging, point of sale, range alterations, layout changes and aisle activation.
Nielsen has also confirmed that the ShopperLAB can be used across a number of retail categories, with great capabilities in the fashion and apparel sector.
Commenting on the breakthrough, Nielsen’s Shopper Practice associate director Rachel Shaw said the ShopperLAB will help brands to better understand how shoppers act – and allow marketers a better chance for success.
“Nielsen research shows that 25 percent of new products fail in market. However, proper testing can dramatically increase a new products’ chance of success. Shoppers generally spend just 15 seconds interacting with a product category, so brands need to know how, when and where to communicate their strongest messages to shoppers,” she said.
The Nielsen ShopperLAB uses a range of technologies to gain a better understanding of shopper behaviour, including neuro technology to understand what shoppers think, eye-tracking equipment to determine what shoppers see and virtual shopping devices to comprehend what shoppers do when faced with different products and shopping conditions.
Nielsen has confirmed that research of this kind is particularly useful as 99 percent of behaviour is subconscious; what shoppers say does not necessarily equal what they do.
Therefore, it’s important to observe and analyse shopping behaviour in real-life situations, and the ShopperLAB enables brands to test concepts without encroaching on a working retail store.
“How shoppers feel when they interact with products can even impact on buying rates. Designs based on neuro shopper research have seen uplifts of up to seven percent just by making point of sale marketing friendlier to the human brain., Shaw added.
The Nielsen ShopperLAB also marks a significant investment in expanding Nielsen’s comprehensive suite of insight capabilities, and is a key part of Nielsen’s shopper maximiser process – viewing and analysing the entire customer experience before, during and after purchase.
Nielsen Holdings N.V. (NYSE: NLSN) is a global information and measurement company with leading market positions in marketing and consumer information, television and other media measurement, online intelligence, mobile measurement, trade shows and related properties. Nielsen has a presence in approximately 100 countries, with headquarters in New York, USA and Diemen, the Netherlands.