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The New Face of Retail
In many retailers today you'll have a hard time finding staff that can tell you where things are. But recently I've been visiting stores in our SoHo neighborhood where the employees can not only tell you where things are, but they can also tell you where they came from, how they were made, and anything else you could think to ask. Is this the new face of retail?
For years retail pundits have discussed the impact of online shopping on the physical retail space. And while many have debated the "will we shop online or in-store" issue, what they've often missed is how the online shopping experience impacts the offline shopping experience, not how it eliminates it. One thing that it really changes is the information available to us as consumers.
The result: there's nothing worse then going into a store and knowing more about the products than the people working there. The online shopping experience impacts the retail experience by tipping the balance of what we know as shoppers vs. the sophistication of the retail sales staff.
Link: The New Face of Retail.
The Brand as Experience
When you look at the profound changes occurring in both the retail and media spaces it's only logical to explore how they are going to impact each other. The first place to look is the technology that it is driving much of the change on both fronts. And the key to success in harnessing technology for marketing or sales is to realize that technology has to be focused on creating a better experience for the consumer, not for the retailer.
Audiences have come to expect dynamic environments in everything that they do. They watch content when they want to. They receive information when they want it. The have bought into just-in-time marketing. When they are bored with our content, they make their own. So as you look at the technologies on the retail horizon, think about how you could use them to create something more unique for the consumer. Dan Pink, writing for Yahoo Finance, recently had this to say:
"Today, utility is abundant. We have more products and services than we can handle, and most function just fine. To stand out in a crowded marketplace, sellers must make a dramatic leap in utility-or stand out in some other way. They can try to compete on price, but that usually ends in a downward death spiral. So the alternative is to compete not on left-brain attributes like price and functionality, but on right-brain qualities such as emotion, meaning, and look and feel. Case in point: Target sells toilet brushes and vegetable scrubbers designed by superstar architect Michael Graves. Even the most mundane, utilitarian objects in our lives have been turned into objects of desire."
Link: The Brand as Experience.
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