RIS News Trendagram: Customer Analytics Gains Traction in 2013 (January 2013 issue) – sponsored by PivotLink

For marketers who need more motivation to get inside the heads of omni-channel shoppers, a new infographic in the January 2013 issue of RIS News is chock-full of inspiration. (download RIS’ infographic here)

RIS’ “trendagram” illustrates the gold to be discovered in the customer data hills. Citing Empathica, Aberdeen Group, Forrester Research and others, RIS presents nine reasons why customer analytics is sizzling in 2013.

Several stand out:

• Social media’s impact on brand awareness: 50% of customers have tried a new brand due to a social media recommendation (point 1)
• Customers are sharing more data: 55% of retailers use real-time customer data capture at the point of sale. (point 4)
• Marketers have a serious customer intelligence gap: Less than half say existing data allows for effective customer segmentation, and only 36% describe customer information as “robust.” (point 7)

Marketing’s challenges courting their “besties” is no secret, so this list of nine could have easily rounded up to 10 (or more), including a stat I like from the RSR Research report, “Making the Case for the CMO”: Of the top five challenges retail marketers identified in implementing their strategies, four of them underscore the lack of advanced customer analytics tools to measure and drive marketing effectiveness. (download RSR’s report)

RIS sums-up their “Customer Analytics” infographic by saying:

“Retailers are realizing that knowing more about their shoppers can be the key to building relationships and boosting sales.”

Notice they said, “are realizing?” Just how many are discovering this “new news” about targeting their best customers? Quite a few based on a recap of NRF 2013, “Retail’s Big Show,” (#nrf13) by Steven P. Dennis. His post (a great read!) suggests you’re already late to the multi-channel party if you’re just now waking up to something the big guys in retail figured out years ago.

Ok, so let’s talk about those “big guys.” You know, the ones with gobs of money and marketing resources and IT people you wish you had to automate and integrate all your one-off marketing systems? Yeah, those guys.

This came up on a recent call I was on with Joe Dalton, Chief Product and Marketing Officer at PivotLink, and an industry analyst. Joe was describing how analytic applications have been right-sized for marketers at companies that don’t have unlimited resources or time. Instead of spending 10 times more on on-premise applications and playing the waiting-game, he said they can subscribe to analytic applications like those unveiled by PivotLink at NRF that are tailored for marketing users, integrate with leading marketing automation systems, and crank out customer insights quickly.

He also said something that really grabbed my attention – and RIS News’ editors as well – talking at NRF about the marketing’s technology imperative. Alongside quotes from the CEOs of Walmart and Container Store in the article “Epic Stuff Overheard at NRF 2013,” Joe said:

“Retailers are always wondering about what or even if they should be investing in technology. Let me put it this way, as you go through your budget process keep in mind that you are not going to out-invest Amazon.”

Big guys beware. Stories are emerging in segments like specialty apparel e-commerce that show marketers are mobilizing. With sophisticated (and affordable) Cloud solutions drawing actionable insights from big data, they’re about to woo your best customer.

Let us know how you’re using tips you gleaned from NRF 2013 and we’ll share them here.

In the article, Bruce explains the challenges marketers face in 2013, such as:

“the shift in purchasing power to millennials, evolving marketing channels and the explosion of customer data, all compounded by the surge in mobile adoption.”

He points out that given these dynamics,

“Robust customer analytics is no longer a luxury for retailers.”

Keeping up with massive volumes of data from operational systems (i.e. customer purchases and inventory) and combining that with customer data in marketing automation systems (i.e. email campaigns) is their first challenge. The next is layering in external data to get a more complete picture of customers. When asked about these new “big data” sources, Bruce said,

“There’s so much to discover and learn about customers when marketers look beyond operational data. Marketers can now explore new Cloud data sources – without mobilizing an army of IT folks or hiring “data scientists” – to understand how variables like weather affect purchasing patterns and how consumers respond to brands on social media.”

These new analytic capabilities are helping marketers rally around their customers. One example is the award-winning marketing story of Freshpair.com, a specialty ecommerce company in intimate apparel that powers marketing with PivotLink, Responsys and other Cloud solutions. Bruce explains in RIS News how Freshpair is using PivotLink’s SaaS marketing analytics to:

“provide deeper insights into customer behaviors and preferences, help frame relevant and engaging content and offers, and transform one-off touch points into ongoing, integrated conversations.”

For more of Bruce’s insights on the future of marketing analytics, read “Analytics Game-Changer” in the January 2013 issue.

“The hype has also too often made the path to success appear overly complicated and needlessly costly when a combination of new cloud innovations and higher end-user skills could provide a more economical remedy…”

Jeff’s point jives with what I hear from users who run business and marketing analytics on PivotLink. He notes that while data volumes are growing, it’s not really “new news.” What is new, he says, is the evolution of SaaS solutions to help business users get their arms around this data.

Coming from the business intelligence (BI) space like I do, it’s clear Jeff isn’t talking about your father’s BI:

“smart business executives are recognizing that capitalizing on Big Data doesn’t demand big investments in complex BI systems and high-priced data scientists. Instead, it means giving their employees access to cloud-based analytic tools that can satisfy their growing appetite for actionable information…”

It’s an encouraging direction for marketers who don’t think about “big data” problems, they think “I’m overwhelmed with data and want one view of my customer.” It’s definitely a hot topic in PivotLink’s booth #2659 at Retail’s Big Show (#nrf13) this week.

I recommend checking out Jeff’s article and weighing in on the board. It’s a good read for anyone following #analytics and #bigdata, including marketers – the “amateur data scientists” Jeff’s referring to – who need to cut through the noise.

A guy who spends a lot of time talking to business users about these challenges is PivotLink’s CEO Bruce Armstrong. I bounced Jeff’s article off of him for another perspective.

In a reply to Jeff on the article’s discussion board, Bruce said, “I’d add that general purpose BI – even in the cloud – doesn’t solve the problem any better than on-premise BI does.  The reason is that unless you come to the table with a BI *application*, tools are still just that – tools:  complex and expensive to buy, use, and maintain.  Self-service applications in the cloud are the opposite:  easy and affordable to buy, use, and maintain.  So, what is the difference between an application and a tool?  Apps do things.  Tools build things.  If you want to build something, buy a tool.  If you want to do something, buy an app – in the cloud.”

In addition, Bruce notes, “Big data analytic applications are best built by experts in a particular domain for the benefit of everyday users – and then delivered self-service via the cloud.  The way to build a big data analytic application is to pick a vertical market, like Retail, and organizational function, like Marketing, and offer a pre-built application complete with data model, data integration, data analysis, and application workflow.”

As an example of what PivotLink sees, he added, “building a new customer segment to quickly capitalize on the increasing chatter on social networks about a green North Face jacket that was worn by Macklemore at his last concert, but only sending it to existing customers who have purchased North Face products in the last year and have opened the last two emails sent to them, doesn’t require a team of data scientists to create custom scripts to extract data out of Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Responsys, Demandware, Omniture, and Epicor, load the data into a Teradata machine, run custom SAS Institute scripts and SQL queries, and deliver a PDF report via email – taking 4 weeks at a significant cost to deliver.”

“It’s just three clicks using PivotLink,” Bruce said.

Recent coverage speaks volumes about the weight on marketing’s shoulders this year. Buried by the data avalanche and recovering from holiday sales hangovers, retail marketers are clamoring to understand and reach omni-channel shoppers and develop lasting, personal relationships.

Building a holistic picture of customer preferences and behavior hasn’t been easy. Marketers struggled to make-do in 2012, cobbling together siloed marketing systems, customer data and home-grown analytics. The disconnect hit home in my holiday shopping experiences and fueled accounts like this post from IDC’s Leslie Hand. Thankfully, this year’s NRF will explain where we go from here.

I believe we’ve reached the “reset moment” RSR’s Brian Kilcourse described in his post a while back. If so, marketing and merchandising pros will be energized by NRF 2013. The program and EXPO are packed with tech innovations and best practices to improve consumer intelligence and relevance. Buckle-up for an exciting show!

Here are some marketing highlights we’re excited to check out this year:

1. Customer Analytics Jump Start: We hit the ground running this week with an NRF preview of sorts. Catch a replay of Susan Reda’s webinar from STORES Magazine: “Smart Marketers + Customer Analytics = Smarter Marketing Decisions.” Specialty e-commerce company Freshpair shared great tips and lessons for revitalizing your retail marketing strategy. Register at bit.ly/YYzdk8.
2. Cruise the EXPO: From Sunday Jan. 13th on, meet PivotLinkers at booth #2659. Here’s how to find us. We’ll share analytics success stories from retailers like Party City, Kelly-Moore Paints and Freshpair (read their story in STORES). Plus, stay tuned for new PivotLink marketing solutions we’ll launch and demo at the booth. Prefer to schedule an appointment at NRF? Contact Caroline Waterson.
3. Gear-Up and Give Back: Check out hot trends at the RetailROI Super Saturday Analyst Day Sat. Jan. 12 with Paula Rosenblum from RSR, Joe Skorupa from RIS and others. Retailer registration is free. Proceeds go to the Retail Orphan Initiative.
4. Get the 2013 Digital Retail Outlook: On Sun. Jan. 13 at 9:25am, Forrester’s retail expert Sucharita Mulpuru will share insights on where to (and not to) focus and what’s on the drawing board for retailers. Details.
5. NRF’s 9^th Annual Sunrise Breakfast (Mon. Jan. 14 6:45am): Hosted by top Gartner retail analysts like Jeff Roster, retail professionals will discover the latest trends in business processes and technologies. Pre-registration required.
6. Prosper! The opening keynote Mon. Jan. 14th at 8:30am made our list because we always learn a great deal listening to Macy’s Chief Terry Lundgren, and pairing him with the distinguished Kofi Annan means non-stop pearls of wisdom about how we can all build a more prosperous world. Details.
7. 2013 IT Forecast with RIS News’ Dave Weinand (Mon. Jan. 14 3:15pm): We’ll tune in as Dave and other experts preview hot tech investment areas for the year. Details.
8. Retail Safari™: Experience the Best-in-Class Retail Concepts from Around the Globe (Tues. Jan. 15 1:15): We’re grabbing a front-row seat for Forbes contributor Wendy Liebmann (@chiefshopper at WSL Strategic Research) to explain how retailers are engaging shoppers around the globe. Details.
9. Party! Marketers never miss a party, so seeing this on RIS’ “must-attend” event list launched it to the top of ours too: Rock & Roll Retail 8:30pm Mon. Jan. 14, 2013 at B.B. Kings Blues Club in Times Square.
10. Go Virtual: Can’t make it to NRF? Schedule a personal demo of PivotLink’s new marketing solutions and discover best practices we’ve gleaned working with top retailers. Or, download the NRF app, follow on Twitter at #NRF13 and @pivotlink, and access sessions live via NRF.com.

How are you tackling analytics in 2013? What are you excited to see at NRF? We’d love to hear and share your tips. Cheers to a great NRF 2013!

Photo courtesy Flickr user dentarg (via Creative Commons License).

I spend a lot of time studying what is happening in the world of business software technology, and a much of what I’ve been coming across recently is related to marketing automation.  There are many promises of being able deliver the right content to each user by tracking interaction behavior and using various programmatic or algorithmic approaches to determine the best response – and now device makers are saying they can embed this type of technology directly into smart phones, tablets, next-gen televisions, etc.

OK, let’s just say that this kind of marketing automation technology can do much of what is being promised.  Where does that leave the role of the Marketer?  Well, to begin with, we haven’t reached the point where computers can interpret a marketing strategy and then determine the specific tactics and programs that meet an organization’s business objectives.  For now at least, this is still the domain of people, and the marketing professional is responsible for figuring out how to best acquire, retain and develop a loyal set of customers (as well as how to counteract competitive threats because, let’s face it, there’s always someone trying to take away your customers).  Implementing marketing automation technology without a strong team of Marketers to define and manage its usage is not going to provide any real benefit.

The role of automation technology does allow the Marketer to scale more personalized interactions with customers, but going back to the need for intelligent decisions to be made before jumping into automation, there is another important role that technology can play: assisting the Marketer to understand and interpret customer data.  Marketing analytics can bring insight into large amounts of information coming from multiple channels (including automation systems) and looking across many time periods, allowing the Marketer to apply his/her expertise based on empirical knowledge instead of intuition or relying on what worked previously.

If you are interested in learning more about how analytics technology and Marketers can work together to make better decisions, PivotLink is hosting the next STORES Knowledge Series webinar on Weds, January 9.  Register here to join us and hear from e-Commerce retailer Freshpair to learn how marketing analytics is assisting their Marketers to make better decisions.

PivotLink CEO Bruce Armstrong hosts the Customer Excellence Awards honoring retailers for their outstanding analytics vision. (c) PivotLink

As the journey to implement customer-centric strategies continues for many retailers, they can now draw inspiration from three best-in-class examples.

Winners of the 2012 Retail Customer Excellence Awards were honored in a ceremony at the Marketing Analytics Summit presented by PivotLink. The awards recognize retailers with innovative Cloud analytics strategies that are delighting customers, reinventing marketing and driving business agility.

Winners include Freshpair.com, Kelly-Moore Paints and a leading fitness products retailer.

Ceremony host Bruce Armstrong, president & CEO of PivotLink, added, “These awards are inspired by the success we’re seeing across the PivotLink user community as companies implement best-in-class analytics strategies to drive actionable customer insights. We salute this year’s winners for their vision and outstanding success using PivotLink to accelerate customer-centricity.”

Freshpair.com: 2012 Excellence Award – Marketing Optimization (c) PivotLink

2012 Excellence Award – Marketing Optimization
Winner: Freshpair (www.freshpair.com)
Awarded to a company that has set the standard for excellence in marketing optimization. New York City-based apparel ecommerce leader Freshpair uses PivotLink Customer PerformanceMETRIX with leading marketing automation and campaign management solutions to drive high-impact, marketing programs that yield an outstanding return on investment (ROI). Read Freshpair’s success story in STORES Media.

Kelly-Moore Paints: Winner, 2012 Excellence Award – Retail Innovation (c) PivotLink

2012 Excellence Award – Retail Innovation
Winner: Kelly-Moore Paints (www.kellymoore.com)
This award recognizes an outstanding example of an analytics-driven company. San Carlos, Calif.-based Kelly-Moore is driving actionable business insights through its innovative PivotLink AnalyticsCLOUD environment.

2012 Excellence Award – Customer Centricity
Winner: Fitness products retailer
The winner of this award puts customers at the center of everything they do by using analytics solutions to better understand and serve them in-store and online. This fitness retailer’s successful SaaS analytics environment automates customer and sales performance reporting using PivotLink RetailMETRIX.

See more photos from the 2012 Customer & Marketing Analytics Summit.

Sometimes, big news events seem like a great opportunity to leverage for opportunistic marketing.  Of course, it probably isn’t the best idea to use a natural disaster as the focal point of a sales promotion.  Comments by American Apparel defended the promotion as a way to mitigate the loss of sales in their stores that were shut down by the storm; but even factoring out the question of the appropriateness of this tactic, they are missing the larger issue regarding the effectiveness of these types of broad-brush marketing promotions – they just don’t perform well!

Looking at the email from this story, they segmented their customers based on whether the recipient lived in a nine state geographic area.  Basically, this is a generic email blast, which does not use any meaningful differentiation to determine who would be most likely to purchase at this time.   I recently heard a good description of this method – “spray and pray” (which has even more relevance given this particular promotion).   While it’s easy to create a promotion code and send it out to everyone, this approach does nothing to communicate an understanding of the customer, encourage engagement/retention, or build brand loyalty.

Marketers need to think less about hastily conceived one-off tactics and more about building long-term relationships with their customers.  We recently put together a set of content that looks at the issues of customer loyalty, and describes how marketers can improve their campaigns through the use of customer analytics, including benchmark data on the types of returns that have been documented.  I encourage you to look at the Improving Customer Loyalty e-Kit.

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“Big Data” is the latest technology term to reach the height of over-use.  Besides being promoted by a multitude of vendors and tech publications, it’s even being covered in mainstream publications such as Forbes and the Wall Street Journal.  Heck, even National Public Radio’s Morning Edition had a recent segment on big data!  All of this attention and the associated claims for how it will change the world have brought some justified scrutiny – Gartner’s most recent Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies has it entering the “peak of inflated expectations”.

So, is it all just hype?  From a business-to-consumer perspective, should marketers be concerned with big data? And what even is “big data?”

Let’s answer that last question first. Big data, according to wikipedia, is simply defined as “a collection of data sets so large and complex that it becomes difficult to process using on-hand database management tools.”  Basically, it means that, as a marketer, your collection of customer, transaction, revenue, web, email, and other data becomes too big and diverse for your current tools to handle.

TODAY’S DATA IS INHERENTLY “BIG”

In this era of digital everything, nearly every marketer has access to more data than they can reasonably handle. A single web visit by a single customer can result in thousands of data points across items viewed, locations, durations, browser, referral, clickstream, frequency, etc.  Couple that with device, payment methods, demographic data, product attributes, not to mention data across your other channels, and any retailer is quickly drowning in data.

If you’re a typical marketer and you use Excel as your day-to-day data analytics tool, you’re either already overwhelmed or you have to summarize data to a level which eliminates any ability to act upon the details that are contained in it.  If you have marketing automation and CRM tools, you can do some analysis, but it’s a struggle to connect your different data sources and there’s limited ability to dig out insights and then act on them with targeted campaigns aimed at specific customers.

This is where the big data hype meets the big data reality:  While big data is a real challenge for marketers, your ability to act on your data is what really matters. Your big data might be a few million data points across a few databases, while a mega-retailer’s big data might be a few hundred billion data points across dozens of systems and data sources. Either way, it’s a roadblock to your effectiveness.

FROM ANALYSIS TO EXECUTION

Your first step with handling big data is addressing the challenge of deeply understanding your customers.  Marketers need solutions that can bring together multiple data sources and answers questions such as:

• How can you logically group and assess your overall customer base?
• What makes different customers valuable or expensive, loyal or not?
• Which customers do you need to focus on to improve retention, increase purchase frequency or maximize order value?
• Which customers provide the blueprint for the type of new customers you want to acquire?

Furthermore, you need the ability to take those insights and turn them into action.  Having a great insight is worth little if you can’t turn it into a marketing campaign or you can’t specifically target those customers who exhibit those behaviors.

TAKING THE NEXT STEP

Big data may be an over-used and hyped-up term, but that doesn’t make the concept any less relevant.  It just forces marketers to be more careful when choosing how to leverage the wealth of data that exists.  Taking that initial step of pulling data together, assessing  your customers at several levels of detail, and acting upon your first set of insights is where marketers should begin.  From there, you can collect results and begin to use these to refine campaigns and determine the best follow-up customer interactions.

Those complex, IT-focused, big data technologies that talk about their benefits in “feeds and speeds” as opposed to business value are ones to avoid. Unless, of course, you’re ready to hire a few PhDs, get IT involved, and wait months  for your first insight to be available.

Instead, look for a solution that’s focused on rapidly providing business-level insights, can be used directly by marketers, and can feed those insights to your marketing automation system.

References:

• Gartner Hype Cycle definition
• “Gartner: Big Data, Smart Devices, Cloud Computing, Maturing As Technologies, BOYD Rises” (CMS Wire, Aug 17, 2012)
• “5 Ways ‘Big Data’ Is Changing the World” (Entrepreneur.com, Oct 7, 2012)
• “Stay Close to Clients With ‘Big Data‘” (Wall Street Journal online, Oct 19, 2012)
• “Predicting The Future: Fantasy Or A Good Algorithm?” (NPR.org, Oct 8, 2012)
• “Marketers Continue To Struggle With Big Data” (Forbes.com, Oct 5, 2012)
• Definition of Big Data (wikipedia.com)

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Jason Rushin is an independent consultant with over 15 years of software technology marketing, product management and business development experience.  Jason has his own blog at www.13plymouth.com and tweets using the handle @jrushin.

If you attended last year, you already know about the great speakers and well-stocked bar at the customer party. You know all about that sleep-deprived feeling like you just did the Escape from Alcatraz triathlon. We’re dialing it up even more this year! But fear not. Here’s your 5 hour energy drink with everything you need to know to get revved-up and in the zone for the 2012 Summit.

Where do I need to be? What’s on the agenda?

1. It’s all happening October 24 – 26, 2012 at the W San Francisco (181 Third Street San Francisco, CA 94103)
2. Our Summit begins with a Welcome Reception on Wednesday, October 24th at 6:00 p.m.
3. Our core Summit day is Thursday, October 25th 8:30 – 5:00 with non-stop industry keynotes, customer success spotlights and a panel on winning analytics strategies of the leading brands hosted by Susan Reda, Editor, STORES Media.
4. Our last training session will end on Friday, October 26th at 12:00 p.m.

Browse the agenda with all the details, including Thursday’s party.

What should I pack?

• Orange – Not only is it PivotLink’s official color, you can show props to the world’s greatest baseball team in the chase for the National League Championship Series – go SF Giants!
• A bike helmet – In case you want to join stump jumper Bruce Armstrong’s 5am single track ride on Mount Tam.
• Your camera – If you don’t bump into local celebs Robin Williams and Santana, you can hook TMZ up with pics of you and our A-list speakers such as IDC’s Greg Girard; Kellogg Innovation Network’s Robert Wolcott, Ph.D.; STORES Editor Susan Reda; Freshpair’s Matthew Butlein; Responsys starlet Heather Blank; Allrecipes.com VP of Business Intelligence (BI) Steven Smith; Retail TouchPoints’ Andrew Gaffney, and Shelley Nandkeolyar, Shop.org Board Member Emeritus and Senior Partner at GVG Capital.
• Your guitar – So you can jam at the party after hearing cool up-and-coming bands from San Francisco and Boston, like the Hub Dub & Adios Amigo.
• An appetite – You’ve probably heard, our guests eat well.
• A credit card – Because SF shopping rocks.
• Your best Canadian accent, eh? To welcome PivotLink north of the border.
• Your phone – For your Facebook check-in at the Welcome Reception on Wed. Oct. 24^th at the W in San Francisco.
• A notepad – For all the great ideas you can’t wait to implement when you get back to the office.
• A neck pillow – To catch some zzzz’s on your flight back.

So now you’re ready!

If we forgot something for the packing list, tweet it to us at @pivotlink using #PLSummit12. And if you know someone who forgot to register, there’s still time at http://landing.pivotlink.com/summit2012.html

The full report can be downloaded here:
http://www.pwc.com/us/en/retail-consumer/publications/retailing-2020.jhtml

Weaved throughout the report are the implications of “perpetual connectivity” of mobile, connected consumers and there are some interesting take-aways for marketers:

1. “Consumer-driven supply chains” take hold – The report looks beyond “wall-less” stores to highlight what PwC describes as an era of “increasing transparency for shoppers into all aspects of the retail supply chain.” Tech fanatics like me will enjoy reading about some of the concepts to boost convenience and personalization, like restaurants with touch screen salad-building apps and a host of other ways technology can bridge the gap between consumers and sellers. It turns out that’s just the beginning, according to the report:

“Savvy shoppers by 2020, we believe, will be equipped with ever expanding abilities to ―see into the inner workings of retailers, manufacturers and distributors across the entire supply chain.”

This presents infinite possibilities for marketers to reinvent touch points and drive more meaningful conversations with customers.

2. Analytics are evolving – The report validates some of the new analytics strategies retailers are using to understand and serve online customers and differentiate from much larger competitors. It notes:

“Key to end-to-end visibility of the value chain is understanding how consumers buy, what they buy, and when and where they buy―and adjusting retail strategies accordingly.”

The latest issue of NRF’s STORES Magazine highlights a real-world example at Freshpair (www.freshpair.com), an intimate apparel etailer that is going beyond conventional transaction-based customer segmentation by taking brand affinity and lifestyle into account. Sandy Smith’s article describes how Freshpair is creating a boutique-level experience using advanced customer analytics (from PivotLink), leveraging the insights to enhance marketing campaign effectiveness (via Responsys) and delivering relevant product recommendations while customers shop.

3. Less art, more science – As a marketer, the idea of enriching customer information with infinite data from the cloud is exciting. The only problem is, reading about big data can be intimidating when the discussion dives into areas like data science and architecture. Important topics, yes, but I like how this report puts the benefits of big data in simple terms:

“As retail evolves to 2020, retailers must guard against becoming overwhelmed by the transactional data available for analysis. As that potential data set spreads in a mobile world, retailers will have almost limitless potential to maximize their business by marketing to shoppers at a specific time, in a specific place…”

Marketers who react to flashing lights, however, have a lot on the line. It cautions:

“without a central proposition to anchor this wealth of data, a retailer‘s brand will end up an outcome of this aggregated transactional information, not a driver of shopper behavior as intended.”

We’ll talk more about how marketers can harness big data in upcoming posts. I also suggest checking out PivotLink’s 2012 Customer and Marketing Analytics Summit Oct. 24 – 26, where you’ll hear success tips from retail practitioners and experts from Freshpair, IDC Retail Insights, Kellogg Innovation Network, STORES Media, Retail Touchpoints, Responsys and more.

The report highlights the number one success factor distinguishing “retail winners of tomorrow,” and that is understanding behavior and making predictions. This brings us full-circle to point one:

“…retailers will have the opportunity to store and manage massive data sets derived from point of sale, supply chain, and consumer input via loyalty cards or social media interactions. The ability to provide this level of analytical insight and to use it to manage all other parts of the business, including the shopper, will, we anticipate, determine which retailers will thrive and succeed through 2020.”

Download the report for details on where things are headed. In the meantime, before you execute your next campaign based on a hunch, see if your analytics back up who you’re targeting and what you’re saying to them.

[Image: Flickr user afagen]