How do you ensure your shopping malls meet your customers’ expectations? Just ask them! It sounds simple, but it’s definitely easier said than done. That’s why we decided to examine “The Big C Vote“; the campaign by Majid Al Futtaim’s City Centre shopping malls that incentivizes their customers to co-create their shopping mall experience!
To grasp the campaign’s inner workings, we even interviewed Rasha Azab, Managing Director of West Region Shopping Malls at Majid Al Futtaim – Properties.
First, What’s the Big C Vote?
All City Centre visitors are invited to take a seat at “The Boardroom Table” in person or vote online to help create their shopping mall experience to their delight. Launched on October 4, the regional campaign inquires about their customers’ thoughts, aspirations, and ideas for City Centre’s future. The following video marked the campaign’s inauguration …
It asked customers to share their wishes and aspirations in six categories, namely: “Eat“, “Shop“, “Occasions“, “Events“, “Lifestyle“, and “Services“. And it’s all prefaced by the apt statement: “We want to build the best malls in the world. But we can’t do that without you …”
But helping create the shopping experience they like isn’t the only incentive to participate in the “The Big C Vote”. Upon completing the vote, customers with purchases worth at least EGP 500 enter a raffle for a chance to win precious gifts, an iPhone 14, a PS5 or a trip for two.
But what insight gave birth to this campaign at this moment? And how does it fit into Majid Al Futtaim’s Strategy?
Qs & As With Rasha Azab, Managing Director of West Region Shopping Malls at Majid Al Futtaim – Properties
We tried “The Big C Vote” ourselves and were lucky enough to meet Rasha Azab, Managing Director of West Region Shopping Malls at Majid Al Futtaim – Properties. We talked about strategy, insights, mechanisms, and more …
Q: What is Majid Al Futtaim’s general strategy when it comes to customer engagement?
A: Customer experience is at the core of what Majid Al Futtaim does, and it has constantly been a huge part of both its short-term and long-term strategy.
Across our four properties in Egypt – namely Mall of Egypt, City Centre Almaza, City Centre Maadi and City Centre Alexandria – we have continuously been identifying and rolling out on-ground customer engagements, from shop-and-win activations to strategic partnerships, such as City Centre Almaza’s latest collaboration with ESMOD Beirut that provided 30 of our customers with a fashion design scholarship led by the leading fashion institute.
What we have also been working on is identifying the key personas that visit our malls, and building a more tailored, customised journey for each, ensuring that the available offerings, services and experiences appeal to our various demographics. This is part of our aim to ensure that our properties are more than just shopping malls – more so destinations that provide digitalised, personalised and community-first experiences.
Q: What’s the insight that gave birth to this campaign?
A: Recently, and over the last few years in specific, we have been witnessing an evident change in consumer behavior – and it is no secret that the pandemic played a major role in that change. This resulted in a rise in the public’s need for personalised offerings and experiences, which was the main instigator for this campaign.
In addition to that, Majid Al Futtaim—on a regional level—is working towards creating “malls of the future”, with consumers’ needs, wants and aspirations at the heart of our operations and business model.
With that in mind, “The Big C Vote” campaign was launched at the City Centre properties across the region, looking to encourage mall visitors to share their thoughts, aspirations, and ideas on what they want their future City Centre experiences to look like.
Q: What happens when customers do not see a change after they vote?
A: “The Big C Vote’s” main purpose and objective are to gain insights into what the public wants to see, in order to continue to expand on the available offerings and experiences to ensure our City Centres are an inclusive and welcoming space for anyone and everyone. With that said, of course, priority will go to the suggestions with the most votes.
We would like to assure our consumers that we will be taking their suggestions to heart – and we will be working as a team to ensure that we provide the public with what they wish to experience, to the best of our abilities. Only then will visitors want to come back time and time again – which is evidently what we want as well.
Q: What are the campaign’s accomplishments so far and what are its expected outcomes?
A: The campaign, which will end on October 22 at City Centre Almaza before moving to City Centre Alexandria, is expected to help the Majid Al Futtaim team identify the food and beverage outlets, shopping experiences and offerings, and entertainment options they would like to see come to light, helping us to further elevate the consumer journey.
Seeing as the campaign is still ongoing, we do not have specific results to share as of this moment. However, from the engagement of customers at the booth and the feedback we’ve received so far, we are positive that we will be celebrating successful achievements by the end of it. We will surely be announcing the results once the campaign ends.
We can’t wait to see what the campaign yields! For now, you could try out “The Big C Vote” yourself by clicking here …
