Author: Kurt Schauer
Usually, it is above all the advantages of the online shop over the shop around the corner that are invoked. It is available 24 hours a day, offers a greater selection and is, as a rule, cheaper. However, there is also the other side: Brick-and-mortar stores can convince customers who have not yet decided to buy far more effectively. They can appeal to all the senses – an ability that is denied to online shops. They must replace it with the concept of emotional commerce, which can ideally be implemented through the ideas of storytelling.
Brick-and-mortar retail can create atmosphere
In order to illustrate how emotional commerce works through storytelling, it is advisable to bear in mind what brick-and-mortar retail is able to do that is denied to online shops. It can create atmosphere: For example, you can sit down in a new car, perceive the classic new-car smell and touch the steering wheel. These sensory stimuli set a cinema in your head in motion: What would it be like to own the car and drive it to work?
The atmosphere that appeals to all the senses guarantees that the customer’s mind does not only engage with the product, but begins to develop a desire for it. It is a primal human need to realize fantasies or make dreams come true. Over 90 percent of all purchase decisions are made subconsciously. It is precisely this impulse of desire that an online shop must generate through storytelling within the framework of emotional commerce. Merely listing product information is therefore out of the question.
How Emotional Commerce Works
Emotional commerce begins on the homepage of the online shop or the opening page of the app. Visitors should be greeted here with large banners. Responsive design – i.e., optimizing the shop’s display for the respective end device – is obligatory. Over 50 percent of all purchases are already processed via mobile devices – and this trend is increasing. Users expect shops to be perfectly adapted to the size of their smartphone or tablet screens.
The products themselves should be marketed through storytelling
For example, chocolate manufacturers have had very good experiences offering clips about harvesting cocoa plants. Coffee manufacturers like to show through short videos how they strive for fair trade. Product information can be specifically integrated into such films. They are also suitable for cross-selling offers (for example: „Customers who bought product X also purchased offer Y“). Technically, the integration of such additional elements is solved via Side View or Quick View elements. However, they should always be designed in such a way that the customer’s engagement with the story your shop tells them remains undisturbed.
Advertising without noticeable purchase pressure
Emotional commerce via storytelling is advertising without purchase pressure. Atmospheric images and videos allow customers to fully „immerse themselves.“ Short-term stimuli that could disrupt this process are absent. For example, in a touching film about a family running their own plantation, there should never be a flashing notice stating „that cocoa is particularly cheap here with us today.“ Emotional commerce stimulates a customer’s affection and interest in certain products and lets the limbic system do the rest of the work. Cross-cutting emotional activations, such as the feeling of being able to grab a bargain, should be avoided because they run counter to the original strategy.
Do you need help implementing emotional commerce strategies in your online shop? Are you unable to tell stories that truly touch people? We at the agency kaos are happy to help with our expertise, creative ideas, and great passion. Simply contact us now!
Do you have questions?
Eliana Gramer
Head of Web/Digital
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