Industry Experts Predict The Future Of Retail

Aditya Vijay Athanki – IBM Retail

   

There will be a fusion of physical and digital worlds where at some point in future consumers will intuitively shop without perceiving the difference in a world of superposed channels.

Data devices, people processes become intertwined and winners will differentiate with their ability to collect, manage, secure, analyze and act on the widest set of information to proactively provide engagement, assortment and services that meet individual consumer needs, wants and aspirations at any point in time.

While this may be a scene from a rather distant future, one can be assured that imminent. To remain relevant, retailers need to anticipate buying patterns and respond with ‘contextual engagement’. What is the next step in your journey to adapt, grow and continue to be profitable? Learn more from:www.ibm.com/retail

Rick Moss – Retail Wire

Consumers will regain control of the decisions, this time for real

When the internet and social media (somewhat inadvertently) began to undermine mass marketing efforts, it was assumed that consumers took control into their own hands. And yet that wasn’t yet true. Shoppers at that time lacked the necessary tools to find the exact products they wanted, at the prices they wanted and delivered in the particular ways they wanted. Marketers, seeking to regain control they perhaps hadn’t yet lost, responded by learning to analyze browsing and purchase history and ostensibly creating personalized offers.

Retailers want to demonstrate, it seems, that they know best what consumers want. That movement is still in the developing stages, and yet we see a good deal of pushback from consumers who find personalized offers unsatisfactory and get creeped out when retailers let on how much they know about them.

The future will belong to retailers that empower consumers to make their own decisions. It’s quite a simple concept, and yet it requires a different mindset than trying to second guess consumers’ desires. To give them what they want, retailers might try asking.