ComQi works shopper insight deal with UK’s Path Intelligence
September 28, 2011 by Dave Haynes
The digital signage hardware/software firm ComQi (aka Minicom/EnQii) has worked a deal with a UK firm that specializes in generating reports on how consumers moves around malls and big footprint retailers.
Path Intelligence passively tracks and logs how mobile phone users move around an enclosed environment, sort out the patterns on where people go, when and how long they hang around.
There are video tracking firms that also do this and produce similar kinds of reports. What’s interesting about the tech is how it can conceivably help better position digital signage screens in larger environments and, as with video analytics, provide a better understanding of how long people dwell in areas by time and day, and therefore have an opportunity to see screens.
If you understand what’s going on, you can adjust and optimize.
The firm, says the news release, provides customized information on how many shoppers there are by department, how long they dwell, how frequently they come back, which stores they visit during their mall trip, and how the full path-to-purchase (and beyond) is mapped. Path Intelligence is currently working with US retailers J.C. Penney and Home Depot as well as a number of UK retailers and mall management companies.
ComQi and Path Intelligence will work to provide retailers with detailed analytics on general shopper behavior in the store as well as specific analytics linked to digital signage. The Path Intelligence system can be used to optimize digital signage installations and measure engagement at the screen level.
“Path Intelligence’s footpath data provides retailers with expanded metrics and quantitative performance by department, enabling management to optimize operations, labor allocations, and store layouts. We are excited to be working with ComQi to bring these, as well as other new features, to the US retail marketplace,” said Sharon Biggar, Path Intelligence CEO.
“We wanted to work with Path Intelligence to bring the power of online analytics to the physical shopping experience,” said ComQi’s North American Managing Director, Stuart Armstrong. “The powerful data and analytics provided by Path Intelligence make ROI measurement and deeper consumer data-capture a reality for retailers”.
This is a partnership and there is nothing that I noticed about actual integration. I’m not sure there would need to be, as the value here is in the extensive, deep reports that could be used by retailers and the people planning or running their in-store digital networks.
I’m not sure this partnership would help close deals for ComQi, but it does say they have a solid grip on retail and retail-centric partners. And Path Intelligence is obviously already through the door with some big retailers that Armstrong and crew would love to chat up.
[…] out the company doing the tracking was Path Intelligence, which recently announced a partnership with ComQi with the idea that the sort of data generated by this technology could offer a lot of insight into […]