As a busy cannabis retail store owner or manager, it can feel like there’s never enough time to get ahead. So, while you may have a basic tech stack setup to handle the day to day operations of your business – you may be lacking the time to do those extra things that can boost sales.
But as more and more cannabis retailers enter the scene, the more and more retailers are having to do to keep up with the competition. That means, outside of core solutions – like POS and CRM systems, insurance policies, and websites, retailers are increasingly supplementing processes with tools to increase their edge over competitors, profits, and overall success.
That’s where the MJstack team can help!
At MJstack, it’s our mission to support cannabis industry players to maximize their efficacy and efficiency for ultimate profitability and scalability. So, what are the most common customer retention and acquisition tools we find missing in cannabis retailer tech stacks? Keep reading for our top 5 recommendations for must-have services you might be missing.
#1: Upsell Opportunities
It’s human instinct for the eyes to be naturally drawn to screens. So, if you’re a cannabis retail store that doesn’t have screens, you’re missing an opportunity to boost ticket sales. Especially amongst customers who aren’t interacting with budtenders that are skilled in upsells.
Put your upsells front and center by introducing in-store screens and using every possible surface for purchase influence. This automatically and cost-effectively, helps customers view specials or browse appealing new products or offers. This, in accordance with training budtenders to consult customers rather than just taking orders, increases upsell opportunities overall.
Conversely, out of the store, when customers choose to shop online (which nearly 30% of sales are now attributed to), your retail store is missing the opportunity to advertise specials and, again, upsell. By adding an AI budtender to your website, you can easily embed a tool that can help increase cart size and follow up when those abandon a cart to complete the purchase altogether.
#2: Customer Insight
How can you effectively target a customer or audience if you don’t really know what motivates them or converts them to purchase? Retailers from coast to coast are increasingly utilizing tools to understand the science behind the cannabis customer’s minds in order to better tailor proper specials, segmentations, and cadences to attract sales.
One simple tool that can help collect this information is an app like Clique MJ that serves the customer as a rebate tool and provides the brand with direct consumer data, including purchase habits and information on brand affinity.
#3: Pricing Data
Once you know your customer and are actively getting your products and specials in front of them, then it boils down to one last thing to win them over: price. Put simply, if your products aren’t priced right, customers will seek elsewhere! Tools like Pistil Data are helping cannabis retailers appropriately price products by scraping the online menus of retailers in any given area.
From there, retailers can see information like what products are selling out, what products move fast, at what price they’re sold at, etc. This crucial data allows retailers to price their products to maximize margins or to competitively move for optimal profits overall.
#4: Exposure Tools
It seems like every week there’s another cannabis event to attend. If this rings true in your area, rather than sponsoring the event, here’s a better way to increase sales while increasing exposure: gift cards! Simply slip a $5 gift card into the baskets for the first 500 attendees. Not only will this increase your chance of receiving trade show visitors, but if they come in, it’s likely they’ll spend more than what was given as a gift. If they don’t, you haven’t lost a penny!
#5: Retention Solutions
Last but not least, you probably already have a system for collecting reviews as one of your basic core solutions. But by adding one simple solution to your review capture system, you can increase your chances of repairing poor reviews and showing off good reviews publicly. Tools like Eyerate are pivotal in reputation management. This app works by sending a message to customers asking how they’re experience was, with two separate actions depending on their response.
If a positive review is given, the customer is automatically directed to the Google Business Profile, where they can then seamlessly leave you a 5-star rating to boost your rep and SEO. If the customer had a negative experience, the store will be notified, and you can customize the actions your system takes to immediately rectify it. Seamlessly solving the problem and hopefully retaining one customer, you might otherwise lose without this service active.
The Final Word: Best Practices for Retailers
In the cutthroat and fast-paced cannabis industry, it can be hard to find one mentor to trust. Nearly everyone has a product to sell, and no busy operator has all the time in the world to properly vet each vendor their business might very well need. As cannabis consultants, the MJstack team prides itself on being an independent, non-bias third-party with one goal in mind: helping all cannabis businesses not just survive but thrive.
Even better? It comes at no cost to you! Let’s come together to further the success of your cannabis retail business. Schedule a no-obligation consultation today to explore these must-have and often missed best practices for retailers and more.
We look forward to connecting!
