Introduction
The cannabis industry is in the midst of a major transformation. With legal marijuana sales expected to reach $34 billion in 2023, there’s no denying that the industry is growing at an unprecedented rate. And with this growth comes new challenges–how do you get your product into the hands of consumers? How do you make sure it’s not just any product but the right one? The answer lies in analytics tools that help retailers understand their customers’ needs better than ever before so they can deliver an exceptional experience every time they visit your dispensary or online store.
Dispensary Inventory Optimization
Inventory optimization is the process of managing inventory to maximize profitability. It’s a continuous process that requires retailers to understand their customers, compete with other retailers, and manage their supply chain. This requires detailed data about customer demand, competitor pricing, and product availability in order to make informed decisions about what products to buy or sell, when and where they should be placed on shelves (or online), how much should be stocked in each location and more importantly who should have access to those products before anyone else does!
Now more than ever, cannabis retail buyers are looking to their data to understand product and brand affinity among their customer base. It’s critical to ensure that shelf space at your dispensary is stocked with inventory that has a high turnover rate so that product doesn’t expire waiting to be bought. BLAZE Insights provides detailed dispensary analytics on the products, brands, and categories that generate the most profit for your business. Just see how easy it to navigate and utilize this data that can inform your inventory purchasing so you not wasting money on products that don’t move.
Customer Segmentation
Customer segmentation is the process of dividing customers into groups based on common characteristics. For example, if you have a dispensary in Los Angeles and want to know where your customers are coming from, you could segment them by zip code or neighborhood. Customer segmentation helps you understand your customers better and target them more effectively.
Segmenting your cannabis consumers by the type of products they purchase, how often they purchase, their age, their gender, and their location is a good place to start. However, creating specialized customer segments for medical patients, veterans, seniors, social influencers, etc. can also result in higher conversions. BLAZE Insights helps you find customers with unique filtering such as days since their last purchase and how many times they’ve made a purchase in any given time frame. This helps keep your customers engaged with promotions suited to their individual preferences.
Data-Driven Decisions
Data-driven decisions are made with data rather than intuition or gut instinct, which means they’re more likely to be accurate than decisions made without the use of hard data–and making accurate predictions can help you stay ahead of your competition!
One of the biggest advantages of using dispensary analytics is that it allows you to track how your customers interact with your store in real-time so that you can make changes as needed before they become problems or even leave for good (which would mean losing out on valuable revenue).
For example, if a customer finds something he or she loves at one location but isn’t able to find it again when visiting another location within your chain, because someone else bought the last few remaining products, then this might be an indication to adjust your low inventory threshold in your point-of-sale. This would provide enough advance notice to order more of that particular product before it sells out.
E-Commerce Experience
The future of cannabis retail will be shaped by the ability to provide an e-commerce experience that is personalized for each consumer. This can be accomplished through suggestive product selection, promotions, and branded themes. With the right technology, dispensaries will be able to make recommendations based on a user’s purchase history or browsing history. This allows them to provide a more engaging experience while also increasing conversion rates and sales revenue.
It’s imperative for cannabis retailers to have a website up and running if you want your business in this space to succeed long term. To truly understand what consumers want out of their online shopping experience, you need an e-commerce website that can connect to analytics tools like Google Analytics so you can track everything from traffic sources (where they came from) all way down to conversions/purchases made through your site.
Dispensary Marketing
SMS marketing is a great way to reach your customers and build customer loyalty. However, sending blanket SMS messaging can also get expensive and yield lower conversions than targeted campaigns. The more customer segments you create the more specific and effective your messaging will be. Using a powerful business intelligence tool can help you define your customer segments to get the best bang for your buck on SMS marketing.
An alternative that is becoming even more popular is dispensaries investing in building an application for iOS and Android devices. This presents a more cost effective way to market to customers via push notifications. Push notifications sent from a dispensary app can alert customers of limited time deals, new products, holiday promotions etc. and typically convert at a higher rate than SMS messages. If your dispensary is interested in learning more about building an application for customers to engage and shop with, then reach out to the BLAZE sales team to learn more.
Cashless Payment Utilization
If you’re a cannabis retailer, you’re probably already aware of the benefits of cashless payments. Cashless payments are convenient for customers and help to reduce theft and loss. But how do they impact your business?
With the rise of debit cards, digital coupons, and online payments, it’s important for dispensaries to stay current on trends in payment methods so that they can provide an exceptional customer experience. BLAZEPAY provides payment solutions for both in-store debit transactions and online prepaid ACH transactions. It’s important for dispensary staff to educate their customers on these payment options when they visit or run banner ads on their website to encourage pre-paid online orders.
Using dispensary analytics to understand what percentage of your customers are utilizing these payment methods can inform how much education is necessary. Typically, cannabis retailers see an increase of 25%-35% in basket size when customers use cashless payments vs. cash, which can mean a big boost to your bottom line.
Conclusion
As cannabis legalization continues to sweep the country, dispensaries are increasingly moving toward more data-driven retail strategies. Dispensary analytics has been a game changer for retailers in many industries, and it’s no different for cannabis stores — despite the unique aspects of this industry. See how BLAZE Insights can uncover hidden potential in your data and drive more sales for your business.
