Closing the Brick and Mortar Technology Gap

An interesting article regarding the tech gap in retail recently in WWD. 

http://www.wwd.com/retail-news/trends-analysis/brick-and-mortar-stores-struggle-to-close-tech-gap-6504012

This article illustrates very well the lack of respect (and understanding) that many traditionally brick and mortar retailers STILL  have for their ecommerce initiatives. Pure players understand the need, but your more traditional fashion retailers simply don’t get it, or are having a difficult time understanding it. 

Look at the statistics;

94.8% of brick and mortar executives agree that “exciting store experiences will continue to drive shoppers into physical stores” and are looking for their traditional marketing devices to drive awareness…

                AND YET

                36% are insufficiently funding their digital initiatives

                27% are having difficulty identifying the right talent to drive their digital initiatives

                50.6% expect that their stores will shrink

When taken in scope these are huge numbers.  Here’s some ‘back of the napkin’ math for you;

The fashion industry is $250B annually in the US

If you assume the smallest subset of statistical basis for the survey numbers above (which is giving business WAY too much credit, but I’m being conservative here) about 9% of that industry is losing ground through inadequate funding and lack of talent. 

This represents $22.5 BILLION DOLLARS in avoidable losses. That’s like a Michael Bloomberg going broke every year and that’s a LOT of money.

So how do we drive traffic to the stores? The concept of an exciting store experience to drive traffic sounds fantastic, but the fact is that digital is fast becoming the only truly effective vehicle for customer communications.  Honestly, unless you’re in the industry, when is the last time that you seriously read someone’s mailer?  And frankly, most promo emails that I receive are deleted before they can even render in my email program.

Now we have another far more effective alternative. Promotion to the mobile device, easily achieved through incentivized app installation, could deliver many of these folks to the promised land… or at least the suburbs thereof, with a relatively small investment.

Application of push technology to mobile apps for notification of sales, store experiences, etc. is the most viable vehicle for delivery of the marketing and incentives to actually drive that store traffic. I this manner, the customer receives the notification right to their phone, the app is badged with the notification, and the likelihood of the customer actually seeing and reviewing the promotion increases exponentially. (Of course, this can and should be integrated into the Retailer’s CRM so that customers receive more targeted media, and better customers get better and more exclusive rewards. )

Without this, you’re either;

A. Hoping that the customer doesn’t toss your mailer in the trash

B. Hoping that the customer reads your email (if they’ve even provided you with an accurate email address)

C. Hoping that the customer visits your website

That’s a lot of hope and not a lot of guarantee. 

In my mind, this really is a no-brainer.  

If you’re a fashion retailer who is already writing copy, producing images, creating and updating sites, and spending on your marketing initiatives, then taking the one or two extra steps to drive your business into your customer base with the highest level of visibility, penetration, and ultimately customization is the brass ring that you hope to achieve.  

And as that retailer… If you can achieve this end by leveraging and building upon your existing assets and technology, then what you have truly achieved is the alchemy to turn that brass ring into gold.

And that’s what I call Profit Technology!