For today’s retailers, operating an omnichannel approach to attract customers is critical. A recent study by Forrester found that 50% of all shoppers expect to be able to either buy or reserve a product online to then collect in-store. This is because, as shoppers, we want to find the right product, guarantee that it's available in-store, collect it and take it home with us.
Here at NearSt, we're all about helping you and your customers out! We now provide two purchase methods designed to enhance your online storefront - making shopping as easy as can be.
Local Checkout allows the customer to purchase online and collect in-store.
Reserve a Product is available to all of our customers, allowing your customers to reserve products and then pay and collect in-store.
How does the Product Reservation feature work?
When this feature is activated, shoppers can go to a NearSt product page with buying options when browsing across channels.
The shopper will complete a short reservation form and immediately receive a confirmation email. You will receive the reservation request by email and then all that you need to do is to confirm it via MyShop and prepare the product for collection!
How do I manage the orders?
You will receive an email notification when a local shopper completes the reservation form and orders will be displayed in MyShop, grouped by date and status. You can easily accept or cancel “pending” reservations and mark orders as “collected”.
Both the customer and your team will have each other's contact information so you can contact each other directly if needed.
Is this feature available to everyone?
This feature is available to all NearSt Basic, Growth, Lite, Standard and Advanced plans.
Not sure what plan you're on or need to upgrade? Please email us at [email protected]!
The key eligibility requirement is the ability to manage the end-to-end client experience in-store:
You and your team are responsible for checking the contact email to see pending reservations
The responsibility for confirming reservation requests would sit with you and your team
Finally, you and your team would be responsible for any direct communication with the client - if needed (e.g. item not found, item out of stock)
How do I activate this feature?
Activating couldn’t be easier!
Simply log into MyShop and move to the Product Reservations Page.
From this page, add the contact email - which will be used for email notifications of pending orders. Please ensure that everyone within your team can access this inbox.
Our Customer Success team will then link your free local listings to product pages with the “Reserve online, pick-up in-store” option. This can take up to 7 days, but it’s likely to be much quicker!
You can now receive reservations and manage your orders through MyShop.
FAQs
Are there any transaction fees?
Nope, none! You won’t incur any additional costs.
What happens if I don't confirm the reservation? Is it automatically cancelled?
Not at the moment. The shopkeeper is responsible for communicating directly with the customer if they can’t fulfil the order. We will be adding this feature in the future!
Can I also receive an SMS notification for this?
Let us know if you’d like this feature, we can build it in!
Are analytics available for this?
Yes! You will be able to see insights for your NearSt product pages on your MyShop dashboard. These include product page views, clicks and conversions.
Can I have both this and Local Checkout enabled?
Yes! The experience is seamlessly integrated so you can offer both and manage orders from a single place in your MyShop dashboard.
If our FAQs don't answer all of your questions or you need any further info at all, please contact us via Live Chat, using the bubble in the corner, or email us on [email protected]