Mihyar’s strategy of building smarter customer experiences shows success
DUBAI, June 11, 2014: A pilot “Know Thy Customer” initiative has revealed valuable customer insights for Mihyar to further its customer engagement strategy. Driven by Capillary Technologies’ Customer Engagement Management (CEM) solution, the effort marks the beginning of targeted and personalised marketing for this new premium menswear and accessories brand. Mihyar is part of the Kamal Osman Jamjoom Group LLC, a retail heavyweight with over 800 stores across eight countries in the Middle East.
Where the Group’s other owned and franchised brands are women-oriented, Mihyar represents a bold move into the almost non-existent branded traditional menswear market in the Middle East. Mihyar aims to revolutionise the shopping practices of Arabian men by offering branded designer prêts (traditional Arabian men’s dress). Designed to be a one-stop shop for Arabian men, the store offers all kinds of menswear as well as an extensive range of men’s footwear, leather goods and accessories.
Notwithstanding its thoughtfully envisioned ideal masculine profile, Mihyar sought to build profiles of actual loyalists. Factors like a limited marketing budget and planned retail expansion, led the brand to rely on preference-based, targeted marketing initiatives by Capillary to engage customers with personalized experiences, to increase customer stickiness and repeat sales. But a prerequisite for this forward-thinking initiative was a clear understanding of its customers, their profile and buying behaviours.
“Our need of the hour as a growing brand was to better serve our customers. To do this, we needed to better understand them. Capillary’s easy-to-use intelligence integrated into its customer management platform helps us discover the unique preferences and behaviour of each and every of our customers,” said Gaurav Khemani, Brand Director at the Kamal Osman Jamjoom. “For the first time we will be able to meaningfully engage individual shoppers at scale, which was hitherto not possible. We can now take a pulse on customer expectations to better understand where the market is going and act on contemporary trends. This intelligence helps us shape our overall business strategy and is our stepping stone to get to the next level of customer engagement and become a customer company.”
Prior to launch, Mihyar started by engaging customers over telephone calls to glean insights into their likes and dislikes, educational backgrounds, occupations etc. It continued its efforts even after it opened its stores and gradually by analysing purchase interactions and in-store customer footprints, built rich customer profiles and behavioural maps. The brand could now use this behavioural intelligence to run relevant and personalized marketing promotions to delight loyalists and improve shopper experiences with the brand.
Another ongoing and successful customer engagement initiative aims at extending the customers’ lifetime value – by engaging with them at different life-stages across their life-cycle. For example, promotions are sent to customers during their birthdays, anniversaries and other special personal occasions encouraging them to celebrate at the store. Future customer needs are predicted at an individual level and the brand can market well in advance. These lifecycle campaigns have helped the brand re-activate 21% of its inactive and lost customer base till date. In addition, the brand has seen offer redemption rates as high as 17% and lifecycle campaigns have generated about AED 80K extra sales per store in the last quarter alone.
“Mihyar’s customer-centric business operation is a sustainable growth strategy. Creating an attractive identity to firmly position the brand and then moving on to profile those who identify with that personality is a solid base for intelligent targeting,” says Vikas Tayal, General Manager, Middle East and Africa, Capillary Technologies. “They are well positioned for greater growth in the future.”
