How can high street keep customer loyalty?

With online retailing taking such a hold over our new fashion landscape, fears for our ever suffering British high street, have been escalating ever more. Not aided by the recent economic downturn, retailers are all being posed with the same question;

how to retain customer loyalty?

Retail expert Mary Portas is determined not to give up, pushing her vision that the high street should be the "hub of the community that local people are proud of and want to protect." She says that retailers, alongside local authorities, need to experiment and take risks to make town centres places where people want to spend time.

Furthermore by utilising features new digital technology is offering, physical stores can too benefit. Virtual installations are key; encouraging customers to comment on and influence product lines, high street shops could revitalise the relationships they have with their customers. Innovative technology such as interactive dressing rooms combined with social media could transform the shopping experience altogether. Shoppers would be able to get feedback from friends as they try on garments in the dressing room and then virtually try on those items their friends suggest using a touch-screen mirror.

Other possibilities include new social shopping measures; Social retailing isn't just about the changing room – it's much bigger than that. It is how a retail business manages conversations with its customers; how it empowers them to talk about its product lines, share offers with their friends and how a retailer can learn from the conversations that are happening.

Social retailing has the potential to increase sales significantly as customers make product recommendations through their social networks, as well as their friends being able to see the choices they are making. It also has the power to grow a dedicated following of brand advocates that could attract more converts.

Whilst social media and consumer communities also offer retailers an instant source of customer feedback and information; a new avenue to learn exactly what their consumers wants and when. Being able to integrate and synchronise this data to adjust supply chain operations is how high street retailers will be able to breathe life back into their profit margins.