Retail Means Perpetual Reinvention
With CES 2020 behind us, we have a clear slogan: Only the tech-forward survive!
Shopping has become a modern-day sport. Whether you’re the consumer on the hunt for the perfect product or the retailer/brand gathering loyal customers with the right message at the right time and place. Both hunters and gatherers have new toolsets to meet ever-changing shopping expectations.
The High Retailing Summit coalesces — on emerging technologies to help the hunters and gatherers increase efficiencies, sales, and customer
Retail Takeaways:
IoT, 5g And AI Embed themselves at Retail
Intel’s Joe Jensen, Adobe’s Chris Duffy, Verizon’s Arvin Singh, and new upstarts like Anagog were all on hand to dissect big data and retail. 5G is laying the groundwork for numerous edge computing experiences and retail will be one its first proving grounds.
Have Your Toothbrush Buy Some Toothpaste
Euromonitor’s Michelle Grant’s panel showcased a future of smart bathrooms, smart kitchens and smart boats where ecommerce is frictionless and your appliances are shopping capable.
Frictionless Shopping
Amazon Go stores captured the imagination about cashierless checkout systems, but Standard Cognition showcased it’s easy to install system that does the same thing without having to build a new store.
Retail Means Perpetual Reinvention
AWS Vice President Sandy Carter kicked off the day with an impassioned talk about innovation and knowing your brand. Working backwards from the customer’s needs is an art that Sandy’s mastered.
Voice and Visual Search
The lowly search bar is finding new competition. Whether it’s voice-activated or a visual search, a clickable showroom or an AI -based delivery system that knows what you want before you do, the holy grail is to read a shopper’s mind without creeping them out.
The Mo and Jo Show
Who said analysts couldn’t be entertaining? Manny Amalgro and Joe Scartz recorded a number of classic podcasts live at CES High Tech Retailing Show. You can find them all here.
The 800 Pound Gorilla
Ascential Edge gave a good graphical depiction of how ginormous Amazon is and made the case for ecommerce driving future growth for retailers.
In A Mixed Reality World
AR and VR continue to make strides to help provide the narrative behind the product. AR and Retail turn out to be besties, whether you’re previewing how that plant might look in your garden or finding out about the painter behind the next masterpiece on your mantle. VR is still best used in public places to make an experience take on a life in multiple dimensions
Stores Get Physical
Yet it’s been an exceptional year for physical stores. Online native brands from mattress companies to fashion and makeup vendors are zealously staking out a physical presence. New experiences in malls, arenas and other venues use technology to gather data about real-time customer interactions and create appealing experiences melding online and offline presence. Saatva Mattress, Neutrogena and Meijer Department Stores, Sally Beauty and Ulta were just a few examples.
