The technology behind how consumers buy things has advanced rapidly, making the process faster and easier. These improvements bring clear benefits to retailers, such as quicker sales and happier customers, leading to better profits.
Paul Prior, head of digital, Three Ireland, works closely with customers to select the most appropriate technology solutions to assist their retail channels. He believes that a key driver to the company’s purchasing technology has been Three’s omnichannel strategy where it has worked proactively to facilitate its customers through digital technologies in their channel of choice.
Three is Ireland’s largest mobile telecommunications provider with 46.5 per cent market share and more than 4.5 million customers.
“For example, our in-store discovery tables allow customers to compare different products and services and transfer their shopping basket from the table to the point of sale in-store. Equally, it’s used by our sales staff to support purchasing conversations using whiteboard technology, combined with interactive product information.
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“Customers can also save their cart and complete it later in any channel they choose. Our 3Store Connect platform relocates our in-store purchasing journey from the comfort of the home, including video demonstrations, policy and documentation management, right through to payment and delivery,” Prior explains.
Prior sees four key areas where technology is starting to mature as part of the purchasing journey, beginning with identifying how best to support the customers without requiring their personal data.
Another area of improvement is where systems make purchasing recommendations based on product association without looking at a genuine personalised approach.
A third area to watch is increasing time to purchase; and prior to points to a fourth key area where it’s important to make objective recommendations for improvement on the basis of buying behaviour.
Being flexible is key, as the retail landscape is constantly shifting. Consumer habits and tastes change over time, while developments in technology add another layer of influence.
In 2024 it would be hard to find a product purchasing journey that isn’t underpinned by “new technology”. Everything from houses to pets has some form of technology underpinning the purchasing journey.
The change in checkout culture has been significant. A hundred years ago it was cash only. Then along came cheques and plastic credit and debit cards. Chip and pin did away with the need for a signature, while contactless card payments mean smaller purchases don’t even need one of those.
One big change is that consumers expect to order the latest must-have gadget to arrive at their home – tomorrow.
“Technology has made online shopping easier than it ever was,” says Ian Butler, enterprise product lead at Elavon Europe, a leading payments provider in Europe and North America. Elavon has facilities in Arklow, Co Wicklow, and its European headquarters is in Dublin, employing more than 1,000 people.
Butler says: “The Covid pandemic accelerated the shift towards click and collect, where products are paid for online but collected in person. Meanwhile there’s change in the way services are also paid for with the introduction of food delivery apps or online hotel bookings, for example.”
Butler says: “Today you can pay at the checkout with just a wave of your phone or smartwatch. Digital wallets are one of the fastest-growing ways of paying – they eliminate the need to carry around a wallet or purse but without compromising on security.
“Unlike a contactless payment with a card, there’s no limit on spend either, other than the customer’s available funds,” he says.
Research by Elavon shows people like to visit a bricks-and-mortar shop when buying something they want to see or hold
Prior agrees: “If we limit our thinking to those that would be purchased end to end it’s typically products that have a high degree of social proofing, are scarce, curated or price competitive or are highly innovative,” he says.
“Companies like Starling, Revolut, Google Pay and Apple Pay have worked hard to increase consumer confidence in digital wallets with the size of purchase through these technologies with Irish consumers making €649 million in payments in the 12 months up to March 2024.
“Where five years ago purchases where limited to gift ideas, top-up credit, flowers and taxis, it is now not unusual for purchases such as household furniture to go through these devices. When you add companies like FlexiFi into the mix, you can now even spread car purchases over three payments, offering viable alternatives to high-interest personal loans and hire-purchase agreements,” says Prior.
Online shopping has also improved immeasurably in recent years as businesses focus their efforts on their ecommerce offerings.
“Optimised websites and apps make shopping easy on the go,” Butler says. “This can be linked with social media where consumers can make purchases with just a couple of clicks after viewing an influencer.”
However, research by Elavon shows people like to visit a bricks-and-mortar shop when buying something they want to see or hold.
Ireland excels in back-end technology, whether it be Intercom, which laid the path for Irish software firms globally, to Fenergo, which underpins a life cycle of the banking sectors, or AQMetrics, which is leading the charge in RegTech, a sector particularly strong in the Irish market.
“We excel in highly regulated industries that require robust back-end infrastructure. The reason for this is directly proportional to where Irish investment has been placed in the last 20 years, with innovation often growing from solving problems in areas that the founders are exposed to and historically Ireland has a strong track record in this space,” says Prior.
“Partnerships will be key in supporting the Irish software sector. There are two points that can make or break new technology innovation: product market fit/understanding their customer; and scaling. Irish retailers are excellent at both, given the resiliency that is required to build success in this market. The imparting of this experience will be key to growth in the sector,” he concludes.