Walk-in customers

Walk-in customers (or opportunity clientele ; English ladder , occasion customer , chance customer ) are in the sales business customers that their needs either a passer- by chance "on the fly" or in each case once after comparing the market data ( market price , quantity and quality ) in ever-changing providers cover . The contrast is the regular customers .

General

The business economist Erich Gutenberg first introduced the division into regular and regular customers in German specialist literature in 1964. For him, all customers are casual customers as long as there is a high degree of mobility in demand . According to Edwards, the occasional customers switch constantly between the individual providers in an industry, despite constant action parameters. The walk-in customer happens to come along and covers a sudden need at the next opportunity.

Companies also rank their customers based on how often they close a deal with a particular customer. Providers can also increase their sales and ultimately their profits by taking customer loyalty measures to ensure that casual customers become regular customers. Suppliers with only walk-in customers show greater fluctuations in sales than companies with predominantly regular customers. In retail in particular , a distinction is made between regular and walk-in customers. If walk-in customers are preferred as customers, the choice of location is of great importance. The estimate of the casual customers must be based on a market analysis on site, which shows the market potential .

Attributes

Occasional customers have no customer loyalty to certain providers and choose the provider based on the price-performance ratio . There is no long-term business relationship that exists with regular customers. Occasional customers are primarily to be assigned to the consumer goods market ; the proportion of casual customers is also very high in the service sector and the entertainment industry . Occasional customer-oriented providers are inns , motels , fairgrounds ( church fairs and folk festivals ) and fairs , organizers with events that take place once , fast-food chains with hasty walk-in customers, customers without a current account at the bank counter ( domestic currency , securities , sorts or precious metals ), kiosks , lawyers or Repair shops . In terms of sales, pedestrian zones and shopping streets are characterized by a high proportion of prospective and casual customers. Typical buyers are shoppers and tourists . Your incidental willingness to buy can often be an impulse purchase .

The occasional customers are completely free of preferences, apart from spatial preferences , they have neither time, material, nor personal preferences. Personal preferences include the attributes of advice or advertising , time- related opening times or delivery times , factual differences in service or market transparency , and spatial preferences are location advantages or the point market . Because of the existing spatial preferences, the location qualification of a retail business with the important criterion of the proportion of regular and walk-in customers is important ("walking location locations").

Regular customers through customer loyalty

Occasional customers can become regular customers with professional customer care, and regular customers can become casual customers if there is no or insufficient customer loyalty. The corporate goal of companies with a high proportion of occasional customers must be to win over regular customers through customer loyalty. Because these ensure higher sales stability, while casual customers contribute to the volatility of sales. For this, the needs of casual customers must be determined through market analysis and needs analysis .

Importance of casual customers for the provider

The sales potential of casual customers is difficult to determine because of the very high probability of chance; even unfavorable weather conditions can affect their purchase decisions. At locations with a high presence of casual customers ( train stations , ports , airports , pedestrian zones , shopping streets , shopping centers ), the casual customer must be made aware of the offer through efficient outdoor advertising ( shop windows ). With special offers walk-in customers are attracted, hoarding triggered and brand and product changes are excited. Pedestrian frequency , target group agglomeration and competition agglomeration characterize the individual locations. The higher the pedestrian frequency within a certain period of time, the more likely it is that casual customers will be present in the affected shops; because the majority of the passers-by from here are the occasional customers, while only a few of them are regular customers. The effect of pedestrian frequency on sales can be determined with the help of a regression analysis. McDonald’s uses the following location factors when choosing a location at train stations and airports :

Size at least 250 m²,
large number of travelers ,
large number of collectors and deliverers,
very high frequency of passers-by and
large number of visitors .

The market potential for casual customer-oriented companies must be quite high so that a sufficient turnover rate can be achieved.

Occasional customer-oriented providers must try to increase their sales with casual customers by cross-selling and increasing the turnover rate. In gastronomy, for example, the goal must be to sell not only a main course , but also drinks , starters and desserts (cross-selling) and to create space for new guests by serving guests quickly (turnover rate). In addition, an extension of the opening times , expansion to outdoor catering , delivery services or drive-ins are available as variables .