Malls, Walking: The Latest Shopping Apps
At least those second-string wishes have come true. A number of recent smartphone apps use either location, mapping or some tech gizmo to log in mall shoppers’ whereabouts, bring up nearby merchants, and drive users to special deals.
In terms of footprint, smartphone app Shopkick is due to grow pretty big pretty fast; the startup signed a deal with Simon Property Group, the nation’s largest regional mall operator, to offer the service in 25 of its centers immediately and in 100 by Christmas. Shopkick offers smartphone users (and later Androids) the chance to log in and earn discounts and other rewards from merchants for certain in-store behaviors.
Including simply coming into their stores. The system uses audio signals to detect a visitor registered with Shopkick. That’s good for users, who can rack up points passively. It also helps merchants know who actually came across the threshold.
GPS tracking can be off by 50 to 1,000 yards and is even less efficient indoors, says Shopkick CEO Cyriac Roeding, so mobile check-in programs built on GPS “could be rewarding someone for being in the parking lot — or worse, next door at your competitor.”
PRODUCT FOCUS Another app startup, CheckPoints, uses a combination of GPS to indicate a shopper’s general location inside a mall or retail outlet and barcode scans to prove that, yes, the shopper is in the aisle. The user gets points for scanning selected products; the merchant gets the advantage that once users pick up that product, they are statistically more likely to become buyers.
“Other shopping applications focus on the location,” says co-founder Todd DiPaola, who with his brother founded performance-based online marketing firm Vantage Media earlier this decade. “We focus on the actual product.”
Rather than instantly redeemable rebates, CheckPoints users earn points they can spend in an online reward store on gift cards, airline miles and rewards not tethered to the original merchant.
Taking a different tack, app FastMall is less a rewards vehicle than a mobile utility for shoppers, telling them what retailers are nearby but also pointing to amenities like elevators, food courts and the nearest available bathrooms, which are instantly available with a shake of the smartphone.
The application uses mapping technology to build accurate maps of (currently) some 615 malls in 21 countries. That database lets FastMall offer turn-by-turn navigation even when the user’s phone is offline, so there’s no reliance on either GPS or a Wi-Fi link. (Except outdoors, where one feature uses GPS and audio recording to find your parked car.)
The latest iPhone version of the app integrates with ShopSavvy, so users can also scan product codes to find online price comparisons.
“We would be the bridge before you get to use one of those in-mall rewards apps,” says Sam Feuer, CEO of MindSmack, the FastMall developer. “Nobody else can get you where you need to go like we can.”
