Is your customer journey flat? FITCH partnered with global payments leader Worldpay to unpick the complexities of modern retail. We surveyed 2500 UK consumers and looked at how retailers can use "peak-end rule" to generate greater experiences in-store

1. The peaks of shopping:
Creating a rollercoaster
of emotions

2. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
Connecting
the power
of memories
to revenue
at retail
Global retail and brand consultancy
FITCH and global payments leader
Worldpay have teamed up to
unpick the complexities of modern
retail. Surveying over 2500 UK
consumers, we’ve looked at how
retailers can use the ‘peak end
rule’ to help generate greater
experiences in-store.
Contents
.
04
The omnichannel landscape
.
06
Finding focus with peak end rule
.
12
The PEAK of the experience
.
18
The END of the experience
.
24
Key take-outs
FITCH

3. FITCH
02—03
Thepeaksofshopping
Is your
customer
journey flat?
Creating
memorable
in-store
experiences with
the peak end
rule
FITCH

4. Thepeaksofshopping
FITCH
04—05
The omnichannel
landscape
It’s a jungle out there
—
We are rapidly losing focus as
retailers. Omnichannel retail has
created a myriad of touch-points
to manage. Delighting audiences
at every moment simply isn’t
practical. Where and how do
we find focus for retail budgets?
Our gaze has shifted online
—
Over the past 15 years, digital
channels have accounted for two
thirds of retail sales growth and
this year online sales are expected
to top £60bn1,2
. This has had a major
impact on physical retail, with
footfall in 2015 down an average
of 10% compared with 20143
.
We also face the task of digitising
the store, streamlining everything
from product exploration to pick-up
and payment. More than 50% of
retailers expect to spend more on
technology in 2016, be it online or
in-store4
.
1
PWC, 2015, Retail Trends,
www.strategyand.pwc.com
2
eMarketer, 2015, UK Retail Ecommerce
Sales to Reach £60 Billion This Year,
eMarketer.com
3
Pymnts, 2015, Why a Decline in Foot
Traffic Has Retailers Looking Up,
www.pymnts.com
4
Ecommerce Week, 2016, Retailers to
Spend More on Technology This Year,
www.ecommerceweek.co.uk
5
L2inc, 2016, Dealth of Pure Play Retail,
www.L2inc.com
6
Euromonitor, 2015, How Retailers
and Brands Should Prepare for Gen Z,
www.blog.euromonitor.com
Thepeaksofshopping
But physical retail isn’t dead
—
Physical shopping will continue to
reign. Despite the continued growth
of ecommerce, it is projected that
80% of retail sales will still take
place offline in 20192
.
Similarly, brand behaviour in the
US suggests ‘pure-play’ business
models may be a thing of the past.
Online retailers (including Amazon)
are opening stores in a bid to lower
online acquisition and delivery
costs. A network of ‘experience’
stores has helped US fashion brand
Bonobos reduce digital marketing
costs from 25% to 4% of net sales,
whilst maintaining site traffic
and conversion5
.
The challenge is finding focus
—
Rather than shifting entirely from the
High Street to the web, consumers
will be driven by a seamless interplay
of both, with mobile facilitating the
blurring of channels. We need a means
of defining how and where to focus
investment in both physical and
digital channels.
Finding focus is especially difficult
when targeting the next generation
of shopper, or Gen Z (14-20 year
olds), who have equally high
expectations of both digital
and physical channels6
.
—
2014
£52.72 £60.36 £67.00 £73.70 £80.33 £80.96
—
2015
—
2016
—
2017
—
2018
—
2019
UK Retail Ecommerce
Sales 2014-2019.
Billions of pounds,
percentage change and
percentage of total
retail sales.
Note:
Includes products or services
ordered using the internet
via any device, regardless
of the method of payment
or fulfilment, excludes travel
and event tickets.
—
Source:
eMarketer, September 2015
17.1%
13.0%
14.5%
14.5%
15.7%
11.0%
17.0%
10.0%
18.1%
9.0%
19.3%
13.3%
Retail Ecommerce sales
% change
% of total retail sales
FITCH
The pace of ecommerce growth is slowing.

5. Thepeaksofshopping
FITCH
06—07
Find focus with
the peak end rule
Peak End
Pleasure
Time
What is the peak end rule?
—
The peak end rule is a psychological theory developed by
Daniel Kahneman and Barbara Fredrickson, which challenges
the way we judge past experiences. The theory proposes
that we judge an experience largely on our feelings at the
peak (the most emotionally intense point) and the end, rather
than the sum of every moment.
This is a result of our brains trying to ease the decision-making
process and avoid hard work. As a consequence, having
a highly positive peak and ending will drive perceptions of
the customer experience as a whole. Similarly, it will help
to keep the brand top of mind, driving repeat visits both
online and in-store.
Most favoured experience
Least favoured experience
Comparing two experiences
Thepeaksofshopping
Brands
should
focus effort
on the
journey’s
peak
and end
FITCH

6. FITCH
Think like
a film director
What does this
mean for retailers?
08—09
Avoid the logic trap
—
Retailers often fall into the logic
trap of trying to make every
touch-point marginally more
pleasant than competitors, evenly
distributing budget, with no peak
and a forgotten ending. While a
host of design commentators are
talking about the peak end rule,
we see few retailers applying the
theory explicitly.
Take a movie
maker’s approach
—
Imagine a peak scene from Rocky.
For most of us, that’ll be the moment
he runs up the steps and holds his
arms up in victory. Filmmakers use
the emotional response in signature
scenes to drive the overall opinion
of the movie/experience. To stand
out in the category, retailers need
to think like film directors and
invest a disproportionate amount
of their budget in an emotional
spike and finale.
Thepeaksofshopping
Rocky
—
Rockyracingupthe
Philadelphiasteps
andtheconcluding
battleagainstApollo.
JamesBond
—
Thedramaticopeningand
closingsceneswithJames
Bondattheircore.
PrettyWoman
—
TheBeverlyHillsshopping
scenesandRichardGere
traversingupthefireescape.
FITCH

7. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
10—11
Exploring
the peak end
rule in an
omnichannel
world
Thepeaksofshopping
TV Print
Radio
DM
Email
Social
SiteRetail
Screen Search
Mobile CC
Customer
In light of the growing range
of connected channels…
— Where can brands create the
most emotionally intense peak?
— How does the consumer
journey end?
Two key questions
FITCH

8. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
12—13
The PEAK of
the experience
Where can brands
create the most
emotionally intense
peak?
Triggering the right
emotions is key
—
The key to creating a memorable
peak is to trigger intense emotion
through surprise and delight,
because intense emotion activates
the brain for memory encoding
and recall7
.
This means mildly positive emotions
such as contentment or relaxation
are less likely to make an event
memorable than intensely
positive emotions such as surprise,
amusement or excitement.
7
Lewis et al, 2010, Handbook of Emotion
8
Schall, 2015, The Future of UX Research:
Uncovering the True Emotions of Our Users.
User Experience Magazine, 15(2)
Activating emotions
Pleasant
Unpleasant
Deactivating emotions
The
emotional
spectrum
Alert
Excited
Elated
Happy
Contented
Serene
Relaxed
Calm
Bored
Depressed
Sad
Upset
Stressed
Nervous
Tense
FITCH
Activating emotions such as
excitement can make an event more
memorable than neutral emotions
like satisfaction.
The emotional specturm is based on
Arousal/valence model developed by
James Russell & Lisa Feldman Barrett8
Emotional spectrum
FITCH

9. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
14—15
The possibilities
for emotional
engagement are
greater in-store
Opportunities for emotional distinctiveness
—
In a bid to explore the sources of emotional intensity in
an omnichannel world, Worldpay and FITCH asked 2500
UK consumers about the sources of fun and excitement
in shopping across the end-to-end shopping experience.
Shoppers who considered online shopping fun and exciting
largely focused on what is removed from the experience,
be it cost, time or effort. These are areas that offer limited
long-term standout against competitors.
Shoppers who considered in-store shopping fun and exciting
largely cited what is added to the experience, be it socialising,
atmospherics, product engagement, discovery or novelty.
These traits offer far greater freedom for brand expression
and distinction from competitor experiences.
The opportunity for attracting Gen Z (16-20 year olds in
our study) is particularly strong in-store, with 58% of this
age group stating greater loyalty to the brands shopped
for in-store compared with brands shopped for online
(higher than any other age group).
The top sources of in-store
shopping fun and excitement:
—
The top sources of online
shopping fun and excitement:
—
Beingabletotryproducts
Browsing on a whim
Socialising with friends
The store atmosphere
Discovering something
new and novel
—
51%
—
46%
—
30%
Shopping from the
comfort of home
Accessing wider choice
Uncovering great deals
Sourcing products quickly
—
73%
—
55%
—
49%
—
27%
—
25%
—
23%
(48% for Gen Z)
FITCH

10. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
16—17
What does
this mean
for retailers?
Identify your brand essence
and bring it to life with intensity
—
Define the type of ‘movie’ you’re
making. What do you want to
be remembered for and when?
Is it action or romance? Identify
your brand’s essence and use
emotionally intense moments to
make desirable traits memorable.
Hamleys:
Worlds of play
—
Hamleys is a brand associated
with play on a grand scale. FITCH
developed immersive worlds of play
to create a toy destination in the
heart of Moscow. Tree houses and
secret pathways captivate the
entire family as they are led on
a journey through motor city,
a safari zone, an enchanted
forest and more.
PIRCH:
Heightened sensations
—
PIRCH stores offer customers the
opportunity to test products and
enjoy using them before purchasing,
including an in-store spa with
a range of over 30 high-end
showerheads for customers to
use. ‘Try before you buy’ becomes
something new and powerful.
McLaren:
Obsessive engineering
—
A story of engineering obsession,
where every decision exists for a
reason. FITCH brought this to life
in-store by replicating the heightened
precision of the car and making
the McLaren F1 the hero.
FITCH

11. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
18—19
The END of
the experience
The forgotten end of
the customer experience
—
In most cases, the final step of
the customer journey is payment
and it has a significant role to play
in the end-to-end experience.
Yet payment has largely been
neglected or deprioritised as an
area where retailers can add a
positive end ‘emotion’.
To understand the importance
of payment in modern retail,
you only have to look at the
biggest pain point for consumers
today - queuing. Almost 40%
of consumers surveyed thought
that the ‘Queuing and payment
process’ was the most frustrating
part of the entire in-store shopping
experience, more than any other
factor. Consumers won’t tolerate
a long payment process, with 79%
prepared to wait no more than
5 minutes to pay before they
will leave.
—
The question is: why ruin a
great in-store journey with
a poor payment experience?
Approach payment strategically
—
It’s time to start looking at payment
as the strategic end in the customer
journey - redefining the what, where
and when of payment, to ensure
a delightful ending. With queuing
such a pain point for consumers,
why should they have to queue up
at the till? Why do they even need
to pay at any specific location
or indeed have the payment
facilitated by a sales assistant?
How does
the customer
journey end?
—
39%
—
22%
—
17%
—
10%
—
10%
Queuingand
paymentprocess
Finding a
product
Comparing
products
Understanding
or trying a
product
Staff
assistance
Top five frustrations of in-store
shopping experience
End the
experience
with a
payment
high
FITCH

12. Thepeaksofshopping
FITCH
20—21
Pay anywhere
—
Nearly half (48%) of consumers
would find it more convenient to
pay anywhere in-store, not just
at a traditional checkout (i.e. if
staff could take payment with
a mobile device connected to
a card reader).
Despite a clear appetite for a more
flexible and convenient experience,
only 27% of consumers had
experienced this – leaving a huge
opportunity for many retailers to
redefine their in-store journey.
Pay through self-serve
—
This opens up opportunities for
retailers to enhance the customer
experience. An incredible 76% of
consumers were interested or very
interested in being able to self-scan
and pay for an item in-store via
their mobile phone, never getting
their card out, never visiting
the checkout.
This in-store journey has yet to
be realised, but it does highlight the
consumer appetite for a frictionless
payment experience, one that can
ultimately help contribute to that
end ‘peak’.
Pay via smartphone
—
Mobile is not only driving greater
personalisation both in-store and
online, but it’s also opening up
new ways for consumers to pay,
whether that’s an online wallet
or through NFC contactless
payments (e.g. Apple Pay).
In fact, more than half (54%)
of consumers believe that within
five years their phone will replace
their card as the main method
of payment.
Key opportunities
for payment
innovation
Thepeaksofshopping
Payment connected
with other services
—
For Gen Z shoppers in particular,
our research shows that consumers
expect retailers to embrace
technology to help them in-store.
Making mobile part of a more
connected in-store journey could
pay dividends, whether it’s helping
in-store navigation, assisting with
purchase decisions, or helping staff
engage with customers. Payment
can and should be a delightful
end to all of these features.
Payment for a
connected generation
62% would like to leave home without
their wallet, instead paying for
everything with their smartphone.
57% are interested in biometric
payment and using a fingerprint,
palm or iris scanner to pay.
Only 35% have ever had a sales
assistant help them find and pay
for an item with a mobile payment
device. Those that had, 61% found
it very personal and engaging.
Technology for a
connected generation
81% of Gen Z would like to see retailers
make better use of technology in-store
to help with their shopping experience.
49% have used click and collect in
the past three months. When doing
so, 50% have ended up purchasing
an additional item when collecting
in-store.
FITCH

13. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
22—23
Shopping with
a happy ending
Thepeaksofshopping
Monsoon:
Enhancing critical touchpoints
—
Mobile payments that minimise
customer frustration. Monsoon can
take orders anywhere in-store with
a mobile reader and tablet, helping
reduce missed sales as out of stock
can be ordered, paid for and
delivered to a location of their choice.
87% of Monsoon customers say it is
an excellent experience.
Harris & Hoole:
Delight through simplicity
—
Creating a seamless, invisible
payment experience that could
be leveraged by retailers. The Harris
& Hoole app lets users load their
payment card so that payment
becomes truly invisible. After the
card is loaded, the customer
simply checks in, walks into one
of the coffee chain’s stores and
orders. They are then asked, “do
you want to pay with the app?”
They say yes. Done.
World Duty Free:
Driving speed and convenience
—
A slick payment journey when time
is paramount. The mobile payment
solution has reduced queues for
travellers in a rush, empowered
staff so customers can pay anywhere
on the shop floor, and also allows
overseas shoppers to pay in their own
currency. As a result, the average
transaction value has jumped 44%
on the mobile devices compared
with the main tills.
We’ve helped
brands enhance
the experience
at the final step,
using a range of
solutions to create
seamless payment
experiences:
FITCH

14. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
24—25
Key take-outs
The peak
—
Retailers can create a more distinctive
and intense emotional peak by
harnessing the sensory and social
nature of physical retail. Identify
your essence and what your brand
needs to be famous for and bring
it to life with novel experiences.
At the same time, use digital to
remove the ‘lows’ in the journey,
creating a greater sense of speed,
accessibility and simplicity.
The end
—
Retailers can combat the two
most frustrating parts of the entire
shopping experience, as identified
in this research, in one seamless
piece of customer service. An
added-value experience, where
sales assistants can help consumers
find the product they are looking for
and allow them to pay for it on the
spot without queuing. A seamless
and invisible payment experience is
the key to a happy ending.
The outcome
—
A highly positive peak and ending
will drive perceptions of the
customer experience as a whole.
Adopting the peak end is an more
efficient means of keeping brands
top of mind, driving repeat visits
both online and in-store.
So as a retailer, ask
yourself this… Is my
customer journey
flat? Or does it
have a peak and an
ending
to remember?
References:
PWC, 2015, Retail Trends,
www.strategyand.pwc.com
eMarketer, 2015, UK Retail Ecommerce
Sales to Reach £60 Billion This Year,
eMarketer.com
Pymnts, 2015, Why a Decline in Foot
Traffic Has Retailers Looking Up,
www.pymnts.com
Ecommerce Week, 2016, Retailers to
Spend More on Technology This Year,
www.ecommerceweek.co.uk
L2inc, 2016, Dealth of Pure Play Retail,
www.L2inc.com
Euromonitor, 2015, How Retailers and
Brands Should Prepare for Gen Z,
www.blog.euromonitor.com
Lewis et al, 2010, Handbook of Emotion
Schall, 2015, The Future of UX Research:
Uncovering the True Emotions of Our Users.
User Experience Magazine, 15(2)
Worldpay Research, 2,503 UK Consumers,
March 2016
FITCH

15. FITCH
Thepeaksofshopping
26—27
About
Worldpay
Worldpay is a leading payments
company with global reach. We
provide an extensive range of
technology-led payment products
and services to over 400,000
customers, enabling their
businesses to grow and prosper.
We manage the increasing
complexity of the payments
landscape for our customers,
allowing them to accept the widest
range of payment types around
the world. Using our network and
technology, we are able to process
payments from geographies
covering 99% of global GDP, across
146 countries and 126 currencies.
We help our customers to accept
more than 300 different payment
types. Worldpay UK has a 42%
market share in the UK and helps
businesses of all sizes sell more to
their customers by accepting
card payments in-store, online,
via mail or telephone, and on
the move.
www.worldpay.com/uk
FITCH
About
FITCH
Designing the future. FITCH
transforms consumer experience
and accelerates business success.
We deliver seamless solutions by
combining the physical, human
and digital elements of a brand
to create unique experience
signatures.
FITCH is a leading global retail
and brand consultancy with
an integrated offer of strategy,
design and implementation,
which enables us to deliver
across alltouchpoints. We do
this for clients that include adidas,
Dell, Hamleys, H&M, Lego,
McLaren and Mars Retail Group.
FITCH is a WPP company (NYSE).
www.fitch.com
+
44(0) 207 479 0900
—
london@fitch.com
—
@FITCHdesign
—
FITCHglobal
—
FITCH

16. fitch.com