Digital technology provides vital and immediate boost for retail sector

This article is brought to you by Retail Technology Review: Digital technology provides vital and immediate boost for retail sector.

Cutting edge digital technologies have the power to drive customers back to physical stores and provide a welcome boost to the retail sector, according to experts at a Belfast-based marketing agency.

Velocity Worldwide recently worked with Parkway Shopping in Newbury, West Berkshire, to develop a 'Summer Series' marketing campaign which drove direct sales of over £300,000.

Using its unique cloud-based shopper engagement platform, Darius™ combined with an innovative events programme, Velocity was able to deliver personalised digital promotional content and bespoke offers to members of the centre's Shopper Club.

Pictured at the Purple Apple Awards Ceremony is (L-R) Edith Bowman, Awards Host; David Pickett, Centre Director, Parkway Shopping Centre; Mark Bourgeois,  BCSC President and Executive Director at Capital & Regional Plc and Alex Herbert, Velocity Worldwide.

The success of this engagement campaign was recognised by the British Council of Shopping Centres, which awarded it a prestigious Purple Apple award for strategic marketing. Velocity Worldwide was the only company in Ireland and Northern Ireland to win an award of this type in 2016.

Enda McShane, chief executive of Velocity Worldwide, said: "In today's retail world, shopper engagement is central to success. For all the talk of technology it is actually the shopper that is the new disrupter in retail so having a platform like Darius™ to engage at all stages of the shopper journey is essential for all aspects of a retailers business. Darius™ connects retailers, brands and shoppers to deliver a personalised shopping experience with benefits for all three stakeholders.

He continued: "Almost all of the centre's retailers were fully engaged with the Summer Series campaign as it made an immediate and measurable impact on their sales and provided a platform for them to promote directly to the shoppers over the course of the year and target them with relevant products that they knew the recipients were interested in."