Buying Sears Tools Through the Online Store |
||||||
| ||||||
|
When a customer attempts to search for tools at the Sears Online store, this is what he gets to see: A flashy page full of drop-down menus and colored photos. The website presents its choices to the customer through a series of inter-connected, drop-down menus offering two possible options for searching tools: by Category and by Open Stock & Accessories. The design and style of this site suggests an open invitation to the “world of tool lovers.” A Different World of Tools In the world of both household and commercial tools, the mention of Sears conjures up a warehouse concept where several thousand square feet of real-estate space may have been dedicated to storing and displaying the widest possible range of tools related to automotive, power, garden, home repairs, and so on. A separate arm of the Sears tools business acts as a wholesale supplier to other commercial tools dealers. Some of the available choices in Category drop-down menu are sockets, wrenches, carpentry accessories, portable power tool accessories, or welding accessories. So it may take some time and thinking on the customer’s part in deciding which sub-category will be a good starting point for search of a specific item. Whereas, in Open Stock & Accessories drop-down menu, the choices are far more direct and clear and wrenches and sockets are labeled by their types. This site also has a third option for searching tools – the “All” option which kind of opens up the Pandora’s box to the tools world representing the widest possible brand selections and categories. Price Match Plus Policy and Blue Appliance Crew Two excellent special features of this tools business are the corporate policy on un-matched pricing of their stock items (Price Match Plus Policy/Price Protection Policy) and Sears Blue Appliance crew. The first policy makes an open challenge to the customer to find a lower price on an identical item from another source, in which case the customer stands to buy at the lower available price in the market. This is the Sears way of preserving the “fair price competition’ war. The Blue Appliance Crew are kind of “all-in-one” solution for market research, handling, delivery, installation, and maintenance of purchased tools. The Price Match Plus policy page maintains an extensive FAQ section to satisfy additional information needs of the more curious customer. Another interesting feature on this site is an animated advertisement on “price drop Alerts” facility which may be a provision for sending SMS or e-mail alerts sent to interested buyers on periodic sale events for specific items such as garden tools. Marketers, through years of market research, have found out that e-mail and SMS alerts are more direct and instantaneous mechanisms for approaching customers to visit a store sale event. And when one talks of marketing, Sears is way ahead of its competitors. After a careful analysis of all of the above discussions, it’s needless to say that the Sears Online store will satisfy even the most fastidious tool buyer. | ||||||
| Last Updated ( Friday, 26 February 2010 ) | ||||||
Current Articles
Syndicate
