Boosted By Loyalty

Customer loyalty is good for business. In close cooperation with Boostcom, Sørlandssenteret is now experiencing 25 to 30 per cent year-over-year growth in revenues for participating stores.

The global shopping centre industry is challenged by fluctuating visitor count and decrease in tenant turnover. Worries about the economic outlook, coupled with the rise of e-commerce and more spending on eating out leave little cash left over for splurging in the shops. Ruben Storvold, Shopping Centre Director at Norwegian Sørlandssenteret, believes globalisation, digitalisation and polarisation best describes the trends in his industry.

• Digitalisation means that consumers demand more convenience and accessibility. What we’re seeing is that the premium centres, as well as the lower end ones, are doing well. The ones in the middle are being squeezed by competition, Storvold says.

Eating is the new shopping

To survive in the digital age, centres will need to to reinvent themselves. When consumers visit, they are looking for experiences that go well beyong traditional shopping. Storvold has been managing Sørlandssenteret since 2012, and firmly believes in giving something back to his customers.

• We frequently host events, talks and shows. We’ve also developed a strong food and beverage presence, with an increase of five to 20 restaurants only since I started. Eating is the new shopping, Storvold says.

Storvold has been working closely with Boostcom ever since he took up the position six years ago. He needed something that moved him closer to his customers.

• When I started working here I challenged Boostcom to revitalise our customer membership club. I think we had only 2,000 customer profiles registered at the time, and we couldn’t really utilise them in any meaningful way, Storvold says.

Strong growth in revenues

Boostcom and Sørlandssenteret explored various solutions to stimulate engagement and loyalty, and together they started a process of creating more meaningful content for Sørlandssenteret’s customers. Members now have access to their own customer club app where they receive regular member benefits, and the results have been outstanding.

• We basically went from scratch to 60,000 members in only six years. 75 % of our tenants participate in campaigns at least once a year, and most importantly, year-over-year growth in revenues has been between 25 to 30 per cent for the participating shops, Storvold says.

The revived membership club underlines the importance of giving something back to your customers. Sørlandssenteret isn’t just about promoting offers. Equally important elements of their revived customer club include information about activities and events.

• Our cooperation with Boostcom has been excellent, but if I was to single out one thing it would be their customer support. We’ve always been well looked after, Storvold says.

Challenge

Many shopping centres of today are challenged by fluctuating visitor count and a decrease in tenant turnover.

Solution

Boostcom’s Mall Performance Cloud enables shopping centres to get closer to their customers. The Mall Performance Cloud integrates all digital touch points in a shopping centre environment with Boostcom’s powerful data management and loyalty platform built specifically to cater for the needs of shopping centre owners and operators.

Boostcom

Boostcom is a proptech company serving the global shopping centre industry with more than 100 shopping centre customers. The company has offices in Europe (five locations), Dubai, Denver and Hong Kong, and is the only company that integrates all available digital touch points in a shopping mall environment in one data layer – The Mall Performance Cloud.

Sørlandssenteret

Sørlandssenteret is Scandinavias largest shopping centre (by retail size in square metres), and among the largest in Northern Europe. The shopping centre has 165 stores and businesses under one roof, covering a total space of 110,500 m2 following a substantial enlargement in 2013. Sørlandssenteret is owned by Olav Thon Gruppen and Norway’s largest financial services group, DNB. For more information, please visit https://sorlandssenteret.no/ (Norwegian only).

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