It might seem counter-intuitive to focus so much attention on user experience during such a short period of time. But the fact is that the holiday season accounts for 30% of yearly spending.

In light of this, the marketing team at springbig has collaborated with some of our partners and using our insight and experience and have put together this guide on how to retain your customers and keep them happy during the holidays. This first installment will be on decorations.

effective dispensary design strategies

If you are lucky enough to be in an area that doesn’t heavily regulate how dispensaries market themselves, you have probably already spent a lot of time and effort creating a unique identity and user experience for customers at your dispensary. (For more details and examples of great Cannabis UX designs check out this article from our friends at Foottraffik).

The holidays are a perfect time to stand out even more in terms of ambiance and customer experience. Decking your halls and spreading the holiday spirit will definitely leave a lasting impression. Putting in the extra effort to make eye-catching decorations will leave your customer remembering you the next time the holidays come around.

Clear the clutter

Many stores make the mistake of overdoing it and bombarding customers, giving them sensory overload.

During the holidays some decide to create new stands and kiosks featuring special products. While this has proven effective, it is important not to spread yourself thin by attempting to draw customers’ attention to too many things at once, leaving them overwhelmed. Pick just one or two items you’d like to highlight and try to keep the rest of the store relatively familiar. Remember loyal customers spend 3 times as much as new ones, so it’s all about attracting them. Because they are already comfortable at your location, you don’t want to change your image too much.

Another example of sensory overload is check-in tablets. Customers want to see a face not another touch screen asking to enter their account info, and especially during the holidays when your store is bound to be busy, you run the missing loyal customers using points. Springbig’s seamless transactional integration with all major Cannabis POS systems does away with the need for tablets because the customer’s loyalty account is accessed simultaneously along with their purchase. This also prevents fraud because deals cannot be double entered or assigned to the wrong person by either the customer or budtender.

Many places will also feature holiday music in their stores. But this doesn’t always work. If you’ve gone for a more subtle approach to your decorations, adding traditional holiday tunes may seem out of place, especially if you do not usually play music during the year.

You should also make sure to not overpower your existing decorations and designs with too much holiday flair. Try to pick holiday themes that compliment your own, You’ll all have plenty of green in the dispensary so add a little red.

Be Inclusive

Cannabis culture is all about spreading the love and welcoming people from all walks of life, so make sure to include decorations that are representative of your area.

holiday e-commerce design tips

E-commerce during the holiday season is more important than ever. Online spending increased 15% this year, and is expected to account for more than half of all holiday spending! Therefore it is vital that your dispensary has effective text messaging software that integrates with your e-commerce provider so you can communicate with your customers who don’t plan on visiting in person.

If you want to capture this huge online market your physical store isn’t the only place you should try to add some holiday flair. Your digital presence should also reflect any physical changes you have made in order to provide your loyal online customers with just as enjoyable of experience if not more as they are used to.

springbig already offers the ability to customize what your digital wallet looks like, and because we know how important your digital look is during the holidays we are now offering free holiday theme packages for all of our clients’ digital wallets!

Subscribe to our blog for more tips over the coming days on maximizing your holiday operations.