WHY IT MATTERS: Digital Transformation

WHY IT MATTERS: 2 of 2 interesting visualizations in this short post - unfortunately the full report is for members only ;-(

WHY IT MATTERS: 1 of 2 interesting visualizations in this short post - unfortunately the full report is for members only ;-(

WHY IT MATTERS: acquisition of magento by Adobe has taken a few years to integrate but it seems that the process is over. This comparison is quite high level but provides good insights to get started. The net-net: magento ain't your open source project anymore and has moved into the corporate grade solution, with the good (support, features, integration to Adobe portfolio, ...) and the bad (pricing, inflexibility, ...) that comes with it.

WHY IT MATTERS: je mets mon commentaire en français parce qu'il s'adresse spécifiquement aux amis du panier bleu. L'article de Ben Evans soulève une question importante et fait la démonstration que non, Amazon ne sait pas. Et que pour Amazon, pour l'instant, peu importe. Mais pour le panier bleu et sa place de marché, le marchandisage et la curation de contenu sera importante. Essentielle même. Et qu'elle sera peut-être le différentiateur et la clé du succès. Le panier bleu ne gagnera pas en créant une place de marché mais en réglant les enjeux des commerçants (coûts élevé des cartes de crédit, logistique, livraison, retours et publicité) et en offrant aux consommateurs une destination pour trouver des commerces et des produits québécois. 

En gros, il faut régler les problèmes du commerce de détail, et la technologie ne résoudra pas tous les problèmes à court terme...

WHY IT MATTERS: customer data platforms are starting to become more integrated into the web platforms. This book is a good summary of what's possible with a CDP. Just beware that there is an obvious bias towards the bloomreach solution - so do not discard the standalone version as they suggest!

WHY IT MATTERS: bear in mind that this list is pre-covid. But with so many retailers looking for solutions I felt this list to be useful. As with all WAVEs, have a big grain of salt and use the reviews , market positioning, etc. to prepare your own evaluations. And don'T discard solutions because they are not on the list. This is for B2C.

WHY IT MATTERS: this guide is specific about Google and Shopify but the principles apply to all eCommerce solutions and the various discovery channels out there (facebook, Amazon, etc.). It highlights the relative complexity and expertise required to let your eCommerce website standout in a sea of solutions. Retailers thus must learn new ways to market and merchandize their store and their products to standout online. In the illustration from the guide, just crafting the right title for your product names requires time and effort in order to make it easy for users to *find* your products on Google. Not easy, not simple. This is where Le Panier Bleu can help by reducing the clutter and making local retailers standout when buying local is a concern for shoppers...

WHY IT MATTERS: sharing content across different websites, eCommerce, in-store displays and new devices (ie. Alexa, siri) is difficult. This survey provides insights into the reasons why sharing is difficult. Be aware this is biased towards headless CMS, but the conclusions appear valid IMHO.

WHY IT MATTERS: to make stores relevant in a world that moves to eCommerce, this report is full of useful insights to improve in-store marketing via technology and analytics.

WHY IT MATTERS: a recent survey provides numerous insights into email marketing tools and techniques. A great reference with numerous examples, tools and technologies. One highlight of the report is the role that AI plays in the creation and delivery of email campaigns in the coming years.

WHY IT MATTERS: always good to use when you need to know where the market is going on eCommerce. Love the analysis. Always take the vendors and their position with a grain of salt.

A review on real-life beacon deployments in retail store tends to demonstrate a resurgence of proximity geographic location tracking.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

Digital transformation strategies require that customers are tracked in the real world as much as they are in the web-world. This often means that the mobile devices we carry enable a seamless digital communication - tools to push promotions and notifications while we walk the street or store aisles. To do so, retailers must know where you are and geofencing is not enough anymore. Beacons come to the rescue and mobile OSes - both Apple and Google - now build into their APIs very good location services which allow mobile app developers ways to connect with users in a very personal way. Using GPS location is not sufficient, especially indoors, so beacons are a must and reports such as this one show that our physical world has become a forest of digital beacons to track our every moves. We all thought this technology was dead after the initial failure of the 2013 Apple announcement. However, all retailers should now include geolocation and proximity tracking in their digital strategies and mid-term roadmaps, as it has apparently moved from the lab to the real world.

More on location services in the OSes, see the following links:

https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/LocationAwarenessPG/Introduction/Introduction.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40009497-CH1-SW1

https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/location/index.html