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In-Store Insights
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Tuesday, 16 March 2010 07:43 |
Sterling Commerce recently announced that specialty retailer New York & Company Inc. will deploy the Sterling Always in Stock solution as part of the retailer’s efforts to achieve seamless cross-channel operations. The new Sterling solution is designed to combine advanced cross-channel order management with seamless integration capabilities.
“At New York & Company, we are all about building the customer experience,” said William Voit, EVP & CIO at New York & Company. “Sterling Always in Stock will offer us innovative capabilities to save the sale that will not only minimize customer inconvenience and maximize customer loyalty, but also enable us to increase inventory optimization.”
The retailer’s proprietary branded New York & Company merchandise is sold exclusively through its national network of 592 retail stores in 44 states and an e-commerce store. The company will deploy Sterling Always in Stock in an initial 100-store pilot as part of an initiative to optimize the store experience, giving associates the power to help customers find and purchase desired items. By integrating Sterling Always in Stock with its point-of-sale systems, New York & Company is focused on supporting advanced cross-channel fulfillment by allowing ship to home for goods not available at the store.
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Cross-Channel Strategies
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Thursday, 11 March 2010 14:38 |
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By Tom Ryan, Managing Editor, RetailWire
Editor’s Note: This article is an excerpt from one of RetailWire’s recent online discussions. Each business morning on RetailWire.com, retail industry execs get plugged in to the latest news and issues with key insights from a "BrainTrust" panel of retail industry experts.
Blippy.com is a social networking site that encourages people to see and discuss what their friends and others are buying on services such as iTunes, Netflix, eBay, Amazon, and more. They can even set it up to show purchases from credit cards. While some view this as yet another internet-intrusion on personal space, converts say they discover new products and deals while reaching friends.
Speaking to the Los Angeles Times, Justine Ezarik, 25, said she bought an app that tracks sleep patterns after she saw a friend buy it on Blippy.
"A lot of people are skeptical. They feel like they are sharing so much online already," Ezarik said. "I just feel like this is the next thing to do."
The site's founders said millions are already readily sharing more opinions, whereabouts and photos on Facebook and Twitter that many initially felt overstepped boundaries.
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Solutions Spotlight
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Written by Mike Santos
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Thursday, 11 March 2010 13:43 |
 Concept:
RFID Enabled Solutions (RES) is a global provider of business solutions that are focused on optimizing operations, reducing expenses and improving business processes using radio frequency identification (RFID). RFID is a data collection technology which uses radio signals to transmit information about an item such as a serial number or name. RES provides end-to-end RFID solutions designed to increase data accuracy and product visibility, ultimately aimed at increased revenue generation and enhanced customer satisfaction.
Team:
RES leadership, with over 30 years of retail and over 20 years of RFID experience, has led some of the major retail RFID pilots in the U.S., including rollouts with Gap, Abercrombie & Fitch and Industry Standard. The company is owned and operated by Neco Can, Kurt Domini, Ryan Jones, and Brad Chuminatto. RFID Enabled Solutions is headquartered in Dublin, OH with offices in Dayton, OH, London U.K. and Turkey.
Market Relevance:
There’s been a great deal of chatter in the industry, as RFID is poised to become ubiquitous. The technology matures into a low-cost, general technology supported by the world’s rapidly developing wireless infrastructure and Web-based software application base.
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In-Store Insights
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Thursday, 11 March 2010 14:23 |
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By Laura Davis-Taylor, VP of Global Retail Strategy, Creative Realities, LLC
Laura Davis-Taylor will be a featured speaker at the Retail 3.0™ Virtual Conference on April 21, 2010.
 As more retailers embrace the concept of marketing at retail, an interesting phenomenon I’ve recently witnessed is that of old school media planners struggling to include the store as a media. Invariably, the one place they get truly hung up is defining “reach” within the store.
Lets start with some media definitions. Wikipedia defines the word reach when associated with advertising as “a measure of the size of an audience”. GRP (short for Gross Rating Point) is how the industry measures reach by a specific media vehicle or schedule. And, the CPM is how they represent the cost to reach 1,000 people within that specific media vehicle.
Almost all traditional media is defined and measured this way, so it’s no surprise that people new to playing within stores inquire about a retailer’s in-store GRP and CPM. There are, however, some big issues with this approach.
Many factors have wreaked havoc on the traditional marketing world, causing brands to look at new outlets, new vehicles and new methods for connecting with busy, distracted people on the go. Lucky for us, the store was reevaluated as a consumer connection point and folks like P&G helped the industry see that it’s actually the richest place to create a relevant dialogue with that consumer. Given that a message received in-store is an active one, meaning that shoppers can respond with a buy immediately, it’s actually shocking that this was such big news. Regardless, it has legitimized the store as a healthy piece of the yearly marketing plan.
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