Only 2 per cent of UK consumers say retailers know what they like when shopping which is down from 4 per cent a year ago, research by Omnico has found.

This failure in personalising the shopping experience was revealed in the fourth Omnico Retail Gap Barometer, surveying 1,215 UK consumers and their interactions with retailers across all channels.

72 per cent of shoppers said retailers can do more to improve the overall shopping experience, while the overall score measuring performance across all channels fell from 72 a year ago to 69 in the current survey.

Mel Taylor, CEO Omnico Group said, “it is disappointing to see that UK retail still has so much further to go in meeting consumers’ expectations. On some indicators, it is actually travelling backwards. While it may seem comforting that the percentage of shoppers saying retailers can improve has fallen from 81 per cent to the current 72 per cent, we can see that the rest of the picture is far from rosy. There was for example, a double-digit year-on-year drop in the percentage of respondents saying they had enjoyed a seamless experience between online and in-store shopping.”

The research found that half of all shoppers (51%) said they had a seamless experience between online and in-store, compared with 62 per cent last year. Returns policies still remain a big bugbear too, with half of all respondents (50%) saying a free returns policy for online purchases is ‘very important’, which is an increase of 19 per cent on last year. Almost a third (31%) said they want to return unwanted goods by any method, irrespective of how they bought them.

The increase in smartphone use was also reflected in the 19 per cent of consumers who said that one of the most urgent improvements needed in retail is the ability to order and pay for everything on a smartphone. This was an increase of 5 per cent on the same figure in last year’s research.

Mel added, “the pressure on retailers to adapt to consumer expectations is constantly being intensified, whether online, in-store or via mobile. Amazon’s huge investment in technology to recognise customers however they browse or shop, now includes the physical environment in their bricks-and-mortar outlets. It is a significant precedent, one that not all retailers have yet to realise.”

Please follow this link to the full report: www.omnicogroup.com/insights/omnico-retail-gap-barometer-4/