Excitement or Fear? The Effect of a Personalized In-Store Experience on Consumers: An Abstract

Abstract

In fear of the online competition and increasingly demanding customers, retailers strive for their competitive edge through a great retail experience. Opposed to the consequent anonymity and interchangeability in retail stands the consumer need for individualization as an expression of personal appreciation and a unique self. While consumers are already used to a personalized shopping experience in online environments, a personalization in brick-and-mortar retail is still in its infancy. Supported by recent technological advancements, it is not surprising that retailers put great efforts into equipping their stores with smart technology that enables personalization. In contrast to personalization online (Aguirre et al. 2015) and traditional personalization in brick-and-mortar retail through face-to-face encounters with store employees (Gwinner et al. 2005), in-store personalization enabled and conducted by technology is an unexplored phenomenon. As research points out that shopper-facing in-store technology should answer to actual consumers’ expectations and preferences (Pantano and Viassone 2014), this paper aims to elicit implication-relevant consumer concerns and expectations regarding personalization in brick-and-mortar retail. Identifying consumers’ expectations and concerns is essential to meet their future preferences, proactively address anxieties, and thereby overcome innovation rejection. This study is further guided by the question of whether the type of technology by which the personalization is conducted impacts consumers’ reactions. First results based on an exploratory qualitative study indicate that consumers expect technology-mediated personalization (TMP) to have a positive impact on their future shopping experiences by offering greater convenience and depending on the shopping mission, inspiration, or efficiency. In particular, the majority of participants expect the content to be context-specific, thus being based on their actual in-store behavior. While most respondents would prefer discreet messages on retailer-owned devices, only a few would favor receiving messages on their own smartphone. The main concern raised by the respondents is the fear of being watched by others. Privacy concerns towards other customers seem to surpass privacy concerns towards the retailer. We plan on empirically testing the proposed relationships in a lab as well as a field experiment. Further, we intend to extend the knowledge on personalization in offline retail by taking novel technological opportunities into account. Specifically, we take a consumer perspective and identify expectations and concerns in regard to the content of the personalized message as well as the medium over which it is transmitted. In addition, we contribute to retailing literature by identifying novel ways to address consumers’ in-store with innovative and interactive shopper-facing technology. Implications to theory as well as practice are discussed.