Chesterfield’s Vicar Lane Shopping Centre wanted to better understand what its local customers wanted from a retail experience. Using Facebook Messenger to proactively survey shoppers, and insights from local social media conversations, Vicar Lane collected 100,000 pieces of customer feedback. Vicar Lane actioned the feedback to improve its retail and entertainment offering over 18 months, winning them the Revo Gold Award for digital innovation.
“The innovative work with Maybe* has allowed us to actively use social media to communicate with our customers to understand what they want from Vicar Lane. This has led to us developing a series of successful pop-up events such as flower arranging, cinema screenings and a micropub to complement Vicar Lane’s current retail offer.” David Goldstein of Alterx, Owner of Vicar Lane
How did they do it?
Vicar Lane ran competitions across their Facebook page inviting users to comment on a post which would then trigger an automated message via Facebook Messenger. This gave Vicar Lane the opportunity to collect user information for their Facebook Messenger list which they grew to over 7,000 customers.
When Vicar Lane was ready with their customer survey, they used Maybe* to build the survey into Facebook Messenger and sent it to their entire Messenger list. The survey achieved an open rate of 90% and returned 100,000 customer responses. The results of the survey could be analysed in real-time, and it was both quicker and more cost-efficient than traditional shopping centre exit surveys.
By listening to the social media conversation in and around Chesterfield, the Vicar Lane team is able to successfully engage with the local audience through both social media and chat channels. The audience insight is then used to inform Vicar Lane store openings and events, all of which help position the shopping centre as a destination at the heart of its community.
How you can succeed with social like Vicar Lane
Build a Messenger list to ask for feedback from shoppers
Engage in local conversations to increase your voice in the local community
Listen to what customers are telling you about what they want
Use customer insight to inform your business strategy
Communicate via social media to let shoppers know how you have listened and what they have to look forward to
Find out how you can engage with your audience in a similar way with a Maybe* Enterprise plan. Contact us via our blue chat button bottom right to learn more.