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A New Era of Content Management and Strategic Collaboration

By Chris H. Petersen

One of the most misunderstood and missed dynamics of retail today is the renewed importance of “content.” Historically, brands focused on mass marketing of products that drove product content creation and distribution. Brands provided “air cover content” for launching products and educating customers. Brand content was also the “stuff” of retail ads, promotions and in-store merchandising. So, what changed?

 

What has changed is consumer behavior and expectations. Transformation from physical to digital retail created many new points of access for customers. More than 75% of today’s customers begin their journey online. Another layer of complexity is that consumers are increasingly using their smartphones to research and shop. Consumer-facing content is now dispersed across many channels, systems and the cloud. Consequently, a major challenge for both brands and retailers in today’s ecosystem is how to curate the “rich product content” that engages customers early, often, and even after the sale. 

Image Credit: OneSpace.com

Forget the 4Ps … 4Cs are not enough … The new 4Es of Retail

Traditional retail has transformed from product centric to people based

By Chris H. Petersen

There has been much discussion about the changing face of retail. Omnichannel has literally become the new normal. It is no longer a question of online versus stores. Consumers today quite literally shop anytime and everywhere. They no longer separate physical retail (stores) from digital. Shopping has become a seamless experience across time, place and devices. In this new era of retail anywhere and everywhere, traditional marketing is dead. Retailing has transformed from a product/place business to a people based business where today's customers are focused on experience across their customer journey spanning time and place.

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The 4Ps are dead. Successful retailers are now differentiating through the 4Es – Experience, Everywhere, Exchange, and Evangelism

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One of the greatest misses in omnichannel retailing today …

If retailers want to engage, they need more than products, pics & price

Image Credit: Twobee

By Chris H. Petersen

The operative word associated with customer experience in retail is "engagement". Briefly defined, engagement means to get someone to "feel excited or impressed to do something". Retailers' goals are to excite and impress us enough that we will purchase something. Yet, what do we typically experience on a retail website? Most retail sites consist of a search bar for a digital catalog filled with static photos of endless arrays of products. Ecommerce tests have shown that "rich content" engages and motivates consumers. But, what exactly is rich content? Would you recognize rich content if you experienced it? And, if it is so good, why aren't more retailers and marketers using it?

Why this is important: Rich content goes beyond the "product". It has the capacity to powerfully engage consumers at a personal level, showing us why products are useful, and how they fit our lifestyle. Best part, it can be tested and measured!

The simple solution for retailers - be channel agnostic

Consumer journeys are neither the same, nor consistent

By Chris H. Petersen

The term omnichannel is becoming ubiquitous. However, it may be one of the most misunderstood terms in retail today. Omnichannel is often equated with retailers using multiple channels to sell to customers. While multiple channels are now a reality for selling, what is driving the disruption is the change in customer behavior. Consumers literally are shopping everywhere, anywhere all the time. This new behavior is often described as the "customer journey". Today's customer's path to purchase is certainly not linear. But, what does this new trending phrase for retailers really mean? Is it a better way to go to market to reach customers? The potential pitfalls of trying to map the "journey" would indicate caution.

Why this is important: Marketers and retailers still struggling on how to reach omnichannel consumers, are turning to mapping the "customer journey". The irony is that the solution may really be much simpler – become channel agnostic.

Most missed CX opportunity and 5 ways to capitalize on it

Research shows that watching others has huge impact on conversion

By Chris H. Petersen

Image Credit: StockImages

Companies are spending increasing amounts of time and resources studying how consumers search for products, compare products, and shop across channels. Nothing wrong with understanding how consumers engage anytime and everywhere, including social media. Yet, most assume that the consumer journey is an individual event and decision process. But, it turns out that one of the most powerful influencers on our decision to buy is watching others! By making the experience of other consumers visible and relevant, retailers and stores can significantly increase conversion rates and customer satisfaction with their purchase.

Why this is important: Humans are social creatures. Shopping is and has always been a social experience. Yet, most retailers and brands overlook the power and importance of being able to watch what other consumers actually do.

3 Tips from a study of how a story can change everything

A story of how experience can change and even create a new reality

By Chris H. Petersen

Image Credit: David Castillo Dominici

Traditional product centric marketing has historically been focused on consumer segmentation, and then getting the right messages to the right consumers at the right time. In current omnichannel environment, we are increasingly hearing about the importance of engagement and customer experience. Omnichannel specialists are now advocating that marketers and retailers must start focusing on "their story". What exactly is the "story"? Why is story so important? Most importantly, what do businesses need to understand about storytelling to be effective? A recent case study with 6 photographers provides some interesting insights about the power of story and how perception can change and even create a new reality.

Why this is important: Stories are more than messaging. Stories don't just help sell products, they differentiate the products and retailers. In fact, stories can change the experience itself, and engage consumers in new ways beyond the event or product.

5 Questions CMOs must now ask when “they don’t show up”

Marketers need to engage like they are throwing a party for friends

Image Credit: Rawich

By Chris H. Petersen

What if you held a really important event, and spent a lot of time and money on decorations and catering … and no one came? Well, maybe a few people showed up out of curiosity or for the food, but not the really important guests you were expecting. A really successful personal party or event is based upon dynamics of relationships. When you plan an important party you don't just drop invitations in the mail or a text … you follow up personally. In many ways, businesses are "throwing a party" and just blasting out anonymous invitations, ala mass media, in the expectation and hope that "they will come". The ultimate irony for CMOs in an omnichannel world is that more channels does not necessarily mean more traffic or sales. To change results will require new questions and behaviors in the marketing arena.

Why this is important: With today's omnichannel consumers, mass marketing "ain't what it used to be". To earn the right to retain customers and repeat business requires asking different questions focused on building and sustaining relationships.

Reverse mentoring enables execs to tap millennial minds

How companies can use digital natives to build tomorrow's strategy

Image Credit: Ambro

The tradition of "seniority" still holds true in most companies. Most members of the C-Suite are "mature". Unless the company is a startup, it would be extremely rare to find a C-Suiter or board member that is a millennial. Yet, the biggest wave coming in terms of employees and purchase power is the millennial generation. Millennials are the first generation of "digital natives". So, how can company leaders and boards innovate and prepare strategies for this unique demographic? Some companies are experimenting with "reverse mentoring" of pairing a millennial with a C-Suite leader or board member.

Why this is important: The old saying that "you are what you were when" applies to Boomers and Gen Xers in the C-Suite today. In order to innovate beyond their traditional paradigms, leaders need a fresh perspective from the digital natives.

Two signs “Tahget” may be getting some of its mojo back

Retail innovation is an essential process, not an event

Retail in many ways has always been a battle for consumers. The earliest shops in open markets had to compete for customers by differentiating both products and prices. In the age of "Big Box" retail the battle for customers has reached an epic, and even more intense scale. The battle of mass merchants in the US has come down to Target and the Whale of Retail – Walmart. While Target use to "own" the female consumer segment, it has suffered some setbacks and lost some of its cache. Two recent Target initiatives are signs that Target may be on the road back to creating the mojo for "cool chic" that differentiates the Target Brand.

Why this is important: Nothing is constant or a given, especially in retail. Retail reinvention is not a fad, but an essential requirement for survival in today's competitive market. Innovation must also be an ongoing process, not an event.

3 Questions retailers must ask, and answer in order to survive

In times of disruption, old habits die hard, but can lead to demise

Image Credit: Xedos4; Freedigitalphotos.net

Change is hard. Really hard. We are creatures of habit, and we depend upon those patterns of behavior to get us to where we are today. Habits become safe and efficient, because we can fall back on the things that we know best … those things that usually work. Retailing is a business of habits built upon centuries of experience. From the very first shops in open air markets, retailing evolved into the science of how to sell things via the 4 Ps. So, what changed? The consumer and the marketplace. The last decade has been the greatest period of disruption in retail. A retailer's ability to survive depends upon their ability to both ask and answer 3 core questions … questions that disrupt the status quo of old habits built upon 4 Ps.

Why this is important: In the words of Charles Darwin, survival depends upon the ability to adapt to change. Future survival in an age of disruption depends upon the ability to ask different questions to find ways to adapt rapidly changing conditions.