Case Study:
Prime Communications

Founded in 1999 with a single mall kiosk at Baybrook Mall in Houston, Texas, Prime Communications set out to build one of the most successful wireless retail businesses in the U.S.

The company's focus on growth is evident, having tripled in size and becoming AT&T 's largest authorized retailer with nearly 2,000 store locations nationwide.

The company prioritizes the customer experience and credits Sensormatic Solutions' Shopper Insights technology with creating engaging shopping experiences and improving store operations.

Prior to using traffic counting technology, retailers like Prime Communications didn't have visibility into their store operations. Sorting through manual reports to gain a true perspective on store performance made it difficult for management to make informed decisions.

People-Counting Technology Offers Actionable Insights

Prime Communications relies on traffic-counting technology to help gain control of store performance operations while measuring and improving their customer experience capabilities.

A customer since 2009, Prime Communications incorporated traffic-counting as part of their growth initiative to help ensure customer satisfaction was maintained while tripling in size.

“With a large number of stores across the country,” says Naushad “Nick” Kermally, Executive Vice President at Prime, “it’s difficult to manage what you can’t measure. Having a reliable and accurate data source helps us understand what’s going on at the store level and make important decisions that improve our operations and maintain the quality of shopper satisfaction our customers expect.”

One way Prime Communications uses traffic analytics and insights is by helping improve close rates, or store conversions by giving store sales managers a true understanding of how many people in the store are actually buyers.

Kermally states, “You can have 5,000 shoppers entering your store, but if only 200 are buying, that’s valuable information you need to know so you can do something about that.” Each store has a close rate goal. This can vary by location type. Sales field leaders utilize traffic insights to understand each of their locations' true opportunity in order to optimize close rates.

Kermally explained traffic varies door-to-door and they rely on comparing stores by conversion rates. “Having this data allows us to set appropriate conversion goals and evaluate trends. The data also allows enhanced scheduling of staff at peak times based on traffic patterns.”

• Customer satisfaction is prioritized and consistency is measured across all 2,000 locations
• Store conversions offer insights to optimize labor cost
• Each store has a close rate goal, customized by location

Prime Communications finds that the traffic-counting technology has become such an integrated part of their organization that it helps employee morale. Kermally states, “Using our traffic system as a scheduling tool helps drive our success. Corporate and field teams are diligent with engaging with the tool on a daily basis.”

Customer experience continues to be at the forefront of Prime’s core business value. During the 2020 pandemic, Prime — along with all retailers — had to pivot their standard store practices to manage the different store regulations throughout the country. Kermally states, “A lot had to change last year. Everything from PPE to cleaning supplies. It was important to manage the number of people in our stores at one time. In Apr/May/June, we went to a 1:1 setup. We allowed the local municipalities to make calls on occupancy restrictions. The other thing that has changed – the popularity of Buy Online and Pick-Up in Store (BOPIS). We also added curbside services for our customers to purchase online and pick up their purchase curbside.”

Traffic-counting technology has been very successful in driving the business forward, empowering Prime to make data-driven decisions during times of growth and when needing to react swiftly to changes such as the 2020 pandemic. The metrics have empowered management to deliver on their promise of high-quality customer satisfaction in every Prime Communications store using the power of shopper insights technology.

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