This is where Circuit City has a chance to shine. For years (well, for a decade, really), the consumer electronics chain has been beaten by larger rival Best Buy, Inc. (NYSE: BBY), and the pressure has only become more intense in recent years.
Circuit City no doubt sells quite a few television sets, although the profit misses and generally bad quarters in the last six months or so has been largely attributed to the declining profit margins on flat-panel televisions. This is the very product Circuit City now wants to trumpet as it reaches out to consumers to offer education well ahead of the actual analog-to-digital hand-off.
Circuit City CEO Phil Schoonover said that "TV is our most important business," which appears to be code for "please buy a digital TV from us as the transition gets underway and we'll go the extra mile to ensure you know how it works with the newer digital technology."
Circuit City has the opportunity to win back some customers and become relevant again in the consumer electronics category by getting something like this right. It could lead to better sales, more extended warranties, more foot traffic and cross-sales and enhanced awareness and renewed interest in the retailer. In fact, I'm pretty sure that is what Schoonover wants with this new campaign.
Here are the key pieces of the Circuit City plan:
- Provide additional educational pamphlets related to the DTV Transition in its stores nationwide
- Include DTV Transition advisory information in its advertising supplements
- Incorporate DTV Transition reminders and messages into the closed circuit videos that run on TVs in Circuit City stores nationwide
- Provide store signage devoted to the DTV Transition
- Educate our customers via the Circuit City Web site, www.circuitcity.com, on the DTV Transition. The site already offers industry-leading HDTV information by posting unbiased and unedited reports from leading consumer publications, and through more than 130,000 customer ratings and reviews.
- Conduct additional training for store personnel related to the DTV Transition, and also related to the government program that will provide discount coupons to help consumers purchase set-top tuner boxes to convert digital broadcast signals for analog-only TV sets.
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