Understanding the visitor beyond footfall
Today's shopping centers need to know much more than the number of people who visit them.
The evolution of retail requires understanding how customers behave within the space: which areas they use, how long they stay, how their habits evolve and what opportunities exist to improve their experience.
Merlin Properties wanted to incorporate a more complete view of its visitors' behavior in order to answer key questions:
- How many unique visitors does each center receive?
- How do visits evolve over time?
- How long do customers stay in each area?
- Which areas generate the most interaction?
- How can performance be compared across different assets?
- How can this data be used to optimize operations and commercial actions?
The goal was to have a global view of the portfolio that would make it possible to manage each shopping center with objective, comparable information.
An intelligence layer to manage data-driven shopping centers
Flame Analytics deployed an advanced analytics platform that allows Merlin Properties to better understand visitor behavior within its shopping centers.
The solution provides information on:
- Number of unique visitors.
- Movement flows.
- Dwell time.
- Areas of greatest activity.
- Behavior patterns.
These indicators make it possible to better understand the relationship between visitors and the physical space, bringing a new perspective to optimize the customer experience and asset management.
In addition, the information generated helps Merlin Properties teams make decisions related to operations, commercial planning, space distribution and marketing strategies.
A common view for a network of shopping centers
One of the great values of the project is having a consistent methodology to analyze different assets within the portfolio.
Having comparable indicators makes it possible to identify trends, detect improvement opportunities and share learnings across shopping centers.
This global view enables smarter management of the portfolio and makes it possible to adapt each space to the real needs of its visitors.
From measuring traffic to visitor intelligence
With Flame Analytics, Merlin Properties has a deeper view of how visitors interact with its shopping centers.
This information makes it possible to analyze behavior patterns, identify improvement opportunities and make decisions from a data-driven perspective.
Teams can use these insights to:
- Optimize the visitor experience.
- Improve operational efficiency.
- Analyze the performance of different areas.
- Design more relevant commercial actions.
- Share knowledge across assets.
A new way of managing shopping centers
The project marks a step forward in the digital transformation of real estate retail.
For Merlin Properties, analytics stops being merely a measurement tool and becomes a strategic capability to better understand the visitor and continuously evolve its commercial spaces.
The combination of data, technology and customer knowledge makes it possible to build more efficient centers, better adapted to users' needs and ready for the future of retail.