Parameter Adjustments and Implementations

In this paragraph, we will put forward some specific recommendations in regard to what need to be implemented by Thiele to differentiate its store image and achieve an attractive high-end fashion position. The recommendations will focus on some separate elements, which are seen as important to fulfill the requirements of being perceived as differentiated and relevant by the target group, and moreover which are seen necessary to be a profitable optician retail brand in the future.

12.5.1 Assortment, Atmosphere and Design

Without knowing the target group’s preferences, it is difficult to pinpoint the specific adjustments needed to differentiate Thiele’s store image optimally in regard to the assortment and design of the stores. It is though considered to be very important to have a broad and deep selection of the popular designer brands, and it is moreover believed to be important to have new collections on the shelves as regularly as possible to avoid that customers feel that the

assortment is out-dated or lack renewal, when visiting the store rather frequently. To be successful in a high-end fashion position, we believe that it is central that Thiele always satisfies consumers, who value being fashionable in regard of their look and very possible visits optician stores more often and have several pairs at a time.

Thiele’s rather low-priced collection, the Thiele Basic Eye, is as mentioned earlier targeting the price-sensitive segment, which now is not seen as the proper signal to send to the target group. Instead, it is suggested that the collection should exist with very low focus and with none communication hereof, or it could be marketed as a collection, which makes it possible for the high-end, high spending consumers to easily buy a spare pair of glasses. Many consumers, who only use glasses and not contact lenses, have an extra pair of glasses as a reserve in case they break or wear them when exercising sports or making other psychical activities.

When looking at the atmosphere and design attribute, it is moreover considered critical that the stores signal the recommended brand personality. Even though design and atmosphere did not get a high score from the participants, when choosing a store, it is still considered to have great influence on the brand image and portraying sophistication. Thiele is already perceived as one of the best delivering optician retail brands within this attribute and should, as mentioned earlier, consequently try to influence the target group in regard of enhancing the degree of importance of the attribute among the target group.

Furthermore, if Thiele chooses to communicate very strongly that the brand is the only true high-end fashion and quality alternative, it is essential that the consumers’ actual store experience is aligned with the communication. Otherwise the consumers will immediately be disappointed when entering the store, and Thiele would loose credibility and damage the ability to convince the consumers about the brand position. The pivotal touch point in retailing is often the minute a customer cross the entrance of the store, and based on our impression from the consumer analysis, this also seems to apply with optician retailing¹⁸³. We are therefore convinced that Thiele should attach not only importance but also increased effort and resources to this critical moment.

183 Hogan s., Almquist E. and Glynn s. 2005: Brand-Building: Finding the Touch points that count. P 11-18

12.5.2 The Staff

Besides the atmosphere and design of the store, the staff is also considered to be a very influential part of the ‘entrance’- touch point and must therefore not be neglected. In the consumer analysis it was strongly indicated that the participants value being quickly met by a competent staff member, which signals professionalism and shows interest in every customer’s need. The staff was especially evaluated on behalf of their credibility, and being too pushy or acting as a rather aggressive salesman is seen as very inappropriate and unsatisfactory. Thiele should be very attentive to these staff behavioral demands and insure that the staff members are employed not only based on their optician skills but also based on the ability to be naturally service-minded. Thiele should in our point of view continuously upgrade the service skills of the staff and create a company culture, which shows appreciation and praises the staff, when the proper problem-solving attitude and in-role behavior are demonstrated. The entire company culture should be build around the brand personality, and the staff should be informed about, how they contribute to signal the personality and how to show brand commitment or brand citizenship behavior¹⁸⁴.

Overall the service experience delivered by the staff seems to be very important in regard to customer loyalty, and if Thiele is set to obtain a profitable high-end fashion position in the market, loyalty and retaining the customer group is considered to be a decisive factor.

12.5.3 Service

In our ‘Attribute Positioning Model’, it became apparent that service seems almost impossible to apply in regard of being differentiated since it appears to be an attribute, which the consumers experience as more or less fulfilled by every optician retail brand. Service superiority is thereby seen as almost unachievable within the current definition of service.

Having excellent service is though seen as highly connected to a high-end fashion position, and we furthermore believe that it would be almost impossible to be perceived as sophisticated without delivering satisfactory services that meet or exceed the target group’s expectations.

184 Burmann, C.; Zeplin, S. (2005): Building brand commitment: A behavioural approach to internal brand management. Page 279-300

Since service is weighted so high in importance among the participants in our focus group interviews, we recommend Thiele to analyze the importance further among the final defined target group, and if service when appropriately tested for significance, shows to have the same high importance as we have seen implied, Thiele need to act upon this. When this is said, we believe that consumers can only express importance or evaluate attributes, which already exists. If service is to be a parameter, where Thiele excels, the brand needs to break the existing service curve and standards and implement new innovative services. One of our recommendations is therefore to look beyond the optician retail sector, and learn from best practice cases in other retail sectors to be inspired and find solutions, which are possible to convert into valuable new optician services.

Offhand it would be interesting to learn from retailers, which have been in front of the development of offering great store experiences and make the single store a brand universe.

For instance, the retailer of sports apparel and equipment Stadium has changed all the stores from being standard designed and arranged to be accommodated to its field of retailing and introduced as store arenas¹⁸⁵. These store arenas integrate different sports elements in the store and thereby make it possible for the customers to actually shoot some hoops and get into the right spirit, when purchasing sports apparels. In addition, Zara is an interesting retailer, which we believe Thiele could learn from in regard to store design and atmosphere. Zara has been remarkable at delivering a differentiated store experience by presenting low or medium priced clothes as exclusive designer wear and by having new collections on the shelves every 3-4 weeks¹⁸⁶. Zara’s ability to quickly respond to new fashion trends and signal fashion and trends in the window display is also believed as worth noticing and get inspirational ideas from¹⁸⁷.

Another area within service, which Thiele is recommended to look closer at, is different loyalty programs. Thiele should examine, which existing programs seem to be the best performing and which would be most appropriate and have greatest effect within optician

185 http://www.stadium.dk/om-stadium/koncernen/sadan-begyndte-det

186 http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/aug/12/retail.spain

187 http://www.businessworld.in/index.php/spanish-season.html +

http://www.businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/apr2006/gb20060404_167078.htm?chan=innovation_branding _brand+profiles

retailing. As mentioned several times earlier, Thiele should not be competing on price, but there is no reason for Thiele not to reward the loyal customers and give them special offers, discounts or other incentives to return and buy new glasses. A best practice case among for instance large department stores or fashion clothing stores could probably result in many valuable insights about loyalty programs, customer events, newsletter management and much more.

In addition, the optician retail brands currently seem to be too focused on the competition and copying each other, and having a customer-centric focus appears to be shoved into the background. This should be turned around and every single thing implemented by Thiele, should be based on the relevance of the target group and not originate from the actions by the competitors.

12.5.4 CRM

In our point of view, it would be interesting to expand the scope of customer service by continuously take advantage of customers’ data and use the data to appear much more customized and deliver a superior service. Toyota has had great success with the use of a CRM-system, and how the company uses customer information to deliver personalized service. Toyota gathers as much data as possible about the customer, when the order of a car is being finalized and also continuously when the car is checked at a garage. Toyota’s staff members are thereby fully updated and have all the needed information when making after sales services. Furthermore, the rich data makes is possible for Toyota to be very personal and relevant to the customers, since the appointed garage at all times is fully aware of the customer’s model of car and time went since last car-check. Thanks to Toyota’s CRM-system the company manages to be much more upfront with any problems the car-owner might experience, and the customers get the impression that Toyota sincerely cares about the them and always put in an extra effort to help. Toyota has far from the best cars seen from a product quality perspective, but is still the greatest car manufacturer in the world thanks to the ability to deliver satisfactory service and hence the loyal customer base.

Thiele could implement a similar CRM and service approach by further developing and utilizing the already existing CRM-system, which all optician retail brands already have implemented to some degree. When a customer gets an eye examination, all data are typically registered on a computer and used to keep track of how the customer’s eyesight evolves over time. Furthermore, a customer of contact lenses often get a reminder or referral every 1-2 years concerning the need of a new eye examination before a new stack of contact lenses are shipped. This system is believed to be expandable in regard to richer information gathering and also to improve Thiele’s customer service in regard to glasses.

Every customer’s choice of frames and type of spectacle glasses should be registered too, and Thiele should furthermore keep track of the popularity of different designers and shapes of frames. The staff could thereby use the information in the personal guidance of the customer by for instance reminding the customer about the last choice of designer brand or other options and also tell the customer, which other designer brands are popular among customers with a similar taste.

In more and more online services, it has become natural to get further offerings within product categories, when a product is chosen, and a preference has thereby become evident.

Amazon has for instance chosen to utilize the gathered customer history to tell the users that a reader of one book also chose to buy another book by e.g. a different author¹⁸⁸. People with similar taste thereby get reference and recommendations in a very trustworthy matter, just as Apple has done with the Genius service on Itunes¹⁸⁹.

Besides creating a better basis of background knowledge, which can be used to train the staff and optimize the composition of the assortment, we believe that Thiele would be perceived as more customized. Thiele could furthermore utilize the gathered data to send out relevant newsletters about new arrivals within the single customer’s preference and thereby give a strong incentive to visit the store more often. If a customer bought a pair of glasses by Tom Ford, the customer should get newsletters about the designer and be informed when new arrivals are available or when a special sale of the designer frames are running.

188 http://www.amazon.com/b/ref=gw m b corpres?ie=UTF8&node=13786321

189 http://www.apple.com/itunes/features/#genius

The idea is to keep in touch with the customers and to make sure that they do not get tempted to visit a competitor, and also keep the service delivery tightly linked to Thiele. In almost every sector, it is much more expensive to keep attracting new customers than retaining the one’s who already have shown interest and bought something. The brand switchers among the target group should be convinced that choosing a new optician retail brand involves switching cost, and the loyal customers should always be reminded about their ‘great’ choice of an optician retail brand¹⁹⁰. In addition, the overall suggestion is based on the thought that Thiele should aim to excel and deliver value within intangible parameters, because succeeding would result in obtaining competitive advantages, which are difficult to copy.

12.5.5 Communication

As touched upon in the market analysis, Thiele has a history of using celebrity endorsement in the different advertising campaigns. Thiele is believed to use endorsements to create both awareness and show some sort of newsworthiness in the advertisements. This is seen as a rightful reason to do since the general advertising noise is considered to be comprehensive.

However, we will stress that especially in regard to the celebrities chosen, they themselves carry and portray certain characteristics in the minds of the consumers, and the selection of celebrities should not only be based on the attractiveness but also the associations, which are brought along. Of course these associations should be aligned with the brand personality of sophistication since otherwise the target group might end up being confused about Thiele’s brand message, and what the brand stands for.

Since Thiele is recommended to strategically position themselves in regard to user-benefits and not product-benefits, this should be implemented in the overall communication strategy.

In closing, Thiele is therefore advised not to communicate about the quality of the service or spectacle glasses, but instead focus on the fashionable and quality conscious consumers, and why Thiele is the right choice as an optician retail brand. Thiele needs to communicate that the brand excels in satisfying the fashionable and quality conscious consumer’s particular needs¹⁹¹. In other words to be successful in obtaining a high-end fashion position, we believe

190 Percy, Larry; Elliott, Richard (2009): Strategic Advertising Management. 3rd Edition. Page 113

191 Percy, Larry; Elliott, Richard (2009): Strategic Advertising Management. 3rd Edition. Page 177

that Thiele needs to communicate internally and externally, which customers should be in focus and see the brand as differentiated and relevant.