IoT Based Approach for the Increased and Improved sales for the Brick and Mortar Stores

Abstract

The consistent use of smartphones in daily life has brought the wave of online shopping and digital marketing into action. Over the last few years, brick-and-mortar store owners have increasingly seen consumers migrate away from retail stores in favor of convenient and quickly accessible digital outlets. Many shoppers feel that, with the ease of smartphone and "one-click" shopping, browsing for products in a physical store is almost obsolete. However, what if the very same technology that caused this crisis in retail industry could be used to drive customers into their stores? Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons provide a great way to guide customers through a larger store and find the intended product. In addition to customer convenience, beacons are a powerful tool for storeowners to deliver targeted product recommendations. Thus, the overall solution consists of two components -Proximity sensing and Product recommendation systems. When a customer comes into the proximity of a particular section of a store, the recommender system generates total and personal recommendation for the customer. The matching entries between recommended products and products from the particular section are the final optimized recommendation delivered to the customer via mobile application. Product recommendations are powered by the purchase history data of Future group stores. That way a new lease of life can be brought to struggling brick-and-mortar stores.