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  • Google analytics: how many visitors have visited n times?

    - by Riley
    I'm trying to guess how many loyal users I have by counting the number of people that have visited the site 10 times. How can I answer this question with Google Analytics? "Visitor Loyalty" is a tempting answer, but the label for loyalty is "Visits that were the visitor's nth visit," and I want something more like "Visitors that visited n times." For example, we have 40 visits in the "51-100" visit range, but I think that could be a single user who visited 91 times. Or two users who visited 71 times each. The whole chart makes a good logic puzzle (I wonder if there's a unique solution) but doesn't easily answer the question I have.

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  • Get Form Input via Ajax

    - by user3651491
    I have a jqgrid plugin which I call via Ajax. I have index.php and a getGridData.php. How will I pass form input in getGridData.php via ajax and use it in getGridData.php? I tried serialize but I can't pass or access it on getGridData.php. I need it as parameters for mysql. Here's my code. <script language="javascript" type="text/javascript"> function jgGrid() { $(document).ready(function () { $("#grid").jqGrid({ url: "inc/Controller/getGridData.php"+$("#thisForm").serialize(), data : formData, datatype: "json", mtype: "POST", colNames: ["SiteID", "TerminalID", "TransactionType", "Amount", "ServiceStatus"], colModel: [ { name: "SiteID"}, { name: "TerminalID"}, { name: "TransactionType"}, { name: "Amount"}, { name: "ServiceStatus"}, ], pager: "#pager", rowNum: 10, rowList: [10,20], sortname: "SiteID", sortorder: "asc", height: 'auto', viewrecords: true, gridview: true, caption: "" }); }); } </script> getGridData.php include('../Model/Queries.php'); $cardnumber = $_POST['cardnumber']; $transact_type = $_POST['transact_type']; $fromdate = $_POST['fromdate']; $todate = $_POST['todate']; $loyalty = new Queries(); $get_mid = $loyalty->loyaltyConn($cardnumber); $somedata = json_encode($loyalty->nposConn($get_mid, $transact_type, $fromdate, $todate)); echo $somedata;

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  • Pricing: Meet or Beat?

    - by charles.knapp
    My home dishwasher started making some really interesting noises. I heard radio advertisements from two retailers who promised to meet any competitor's price. Then, I heard another retailer promising that their everyday prices beat their competitors. That got me to thinking about the power of pricing and promotions in the marketing mix (product, price, placement, promotions, and people). What is more powerful to say in a competitive market: your company will meet a similar offer, or your company will beat the others? Will you sell more if you meet or if you beat? I found that the retailer who promised to beat the others really had the best everyday pricing. Even better for me, another retailer had an exclusive promotional sale for long-term customers. Their loyalty promotion beat the best everyday discounter. So, I got the quality and performance I wanted at a tremendous price. So, I have two challenges for marketers. First, where you really have to compete on price as a dominant factor, give people strong reasons to do business with you. If you try to meet other's prices, make the leap to actually beat and not merely meet. Second, upgrade your firm's capabilities where needed. Oracle offers a complete range of great CRM software for loyalty management, marketing promotions, and pricing management that will help you to grow your business.

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  • Pricing: Meet or Beat?

    - by charles.knapp
    My home dishwasher started making some really interesting noises. It was time to shop. I heard radio advertisements from two retailers who promised to meet any competitor's price. Then, another retailer promised that their everyday prices beat their competitors. That got me to thinking about the power of pricing and promotions in the marketing mix (product, price, placement, promotions, and people). What is more powerful to say in a competitive market: your company will meet a similar offer, or your company will beat the others? Will you sell more if you meet or if you beat? I found that the retailer who promised to beat the others really had the best everyday pricing. I was close to making a purchase. Then, another retailer had an exclusive promotional sale for long-term customers. Their loyalty promotion beat the best everyday discounter. So, I got the quality and performance I wanted at a tremendous price. So, I have two challenges for marketers. First, where you really have to compete on price as a dominant factor, give people strong reasons to do business with you. If you try to meet other's prices, make the leap to actually beat and not merely meet competitor prices. Second, upgrade your firm's capabilities where needed. Oracle offers a complete range of great CRM capabilities for loyalty management, marketing promotions, and pricing management that will help you to grow your business.

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  • Sales & Marketing Summit 2012. Lo avete perso? Rimediamo subito.

    - by Silvia Valgoi
    Lo scorso 28 marzo si è svolto l'appuntamento dedicato alle aziende che vogliono  ripensare i processi di Vendita, Marketing e Supporto alla Clientela, facendo leva sui nuovi paradigmi quali Social Networking , Web 2.0, e-commerce, mobilità e multinacanalità, Cloud computing. Dello straordinario intervento del Prof. Enrico Finzi sul valore dell'Innovazione e sui 10 fattori di Leadership indispensabili per mantenere la prioria competività sul mercato, soprattutto nei periodi storici negativi, non abbiamo documentazione (è stato fatto a braccio) ma a presto pubblicheremo una sua intervista. Nella documentazione potete ritrovare i temi trattati durante gli speech in plenaria e le sessioni di approfondimento  Oracle Fusion CRM, la soluzione di nuova generazione per migliorare e incrementare l'efficacia dei processi di Vendita e Marketing. Oracle Sales & Marketing Summit - Fusion CRM View more presentations from Oracle Apps - Italia . I processi più innovativi di Customer Experience. Oracle Sales & Marketign Summit - Customer Experience View more presentations from Oracle Apps - Italia . Ask the Expert: e-commerce, Ask the Expert: knowledge management, Oracle Sales & Marketing Summit - Knowledge Management View more presentations from Oracle Apps - Italia . Ask the Expert:marketing & loyalty, Oracle Sales & Marketing Summit - Marketing & Loyalty View more presentations from Oracle Apps - Italia . Ask the Expert: Policy Automation  Ask the Expert: Fusion CRM Oracle Sales & Marketing Summit: Fusion CRM Demo View more presentations from Oracle Apps - Italia .

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  • Personalized Pricing

    - by David Dorf
    In past postings I've spent a fair amount of time talking about targeted promotions.  Using a complete view of the customer that includes purchase history, location history, and psychographics gleaned from social media, we can select the offer with the greatest chance of redemption.  This is done to influence shopping behavior, which might be introducing the consumer to a new product line, increasing their basket size, increasing frequency of purchases, etc. Safeway seems to be taking a slightly different approach with their personalized pricing.  In additional to offering electronic coupons and club card offers, they are also providing a personalized price for certain items based on purchase history.  So when Sally want to shop at Safeway, she first checks the "Just for U" website for three types of deals.  She starts by selecting manufacturer coupons to load into her loyalty card, then she checks the Club Card for offers like "buy one get one free." The third step is the interesting one.  Safeway will set a particular lower price for Sally good for 90 days on items she buys often.  Clearly this isn't enforcing a new behavior but rather instilling loyalty.  I would love to know exactly how they are determining the personalized price.  Of course bargain hunters can still stack the three offers so they can, for example, get their $4.99 Oatmeal for $0.72. I like this particular question and answer from their website's FAQ: My offers are not that great. Can I tell you what offers I need? That's a good idea. That functionality is not currently available, but we appreciate your input and are constantly improving our just for U program. Stay tuned for exciting enhancements! I suppose if Safeway is tracking all the purchases, they can easily determine whether the customer if profitable.  As long as the customer stays profitable, why not let them determine a few offers themselves?  Food for thought.

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  • How can you Add Value to your Mobile Apps?

    - by Carlos Chang
    Author: Craig Mikus, Sr. Director, Enterprise Mobile Solutions Seems like every customer is either building or planning to build mobile apps, especially customer facing apps. Why? Inevitably, all companies want to improve the customer experience through more quality interactions that drive customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, new revenue streams, and even improve the way they service their customers. What better way than mobile apps? Right? But how can customers add more value to these mobile apps to drive more business benefit? Look closely, the answer just might be right in front of you. Still need another clue? What’s the first 4 letters of mobile – mo-bi? Or pronounced differently, More BI. That’s right – add more business intelligence to your overall mobile strategy. In today’s customer centric world where customer interactions and personalization are critical, it’s important to leverage a BI strategy that complements and feeds into your mobile strategy. For example, I was recently talking to a customer that was implementing a data warehouse project focused customer analytics. Their goal was to understand who are their best customers and why, develop customer profiles, identify customer trends & patterns, identify cross sell opportunities, and much more. The company then wanted to feed this information to marketing for targeted campaigns and programs. As we continued to talk, I asked my contact if they had plans to feed this information into their customer facing mobile apps to personalize the apps, target their interactions, and hopefully drive customer loyalty and new revenue streams? Two minutes later, my contact was calling his mobile development teams. So my advice to everyone, as you establish your enterprise mobile strategy and goals, remember that “mo-BI” is a critical component to add value to your mobile apps! So make sure you have “mo BI” in your mobile strategy. As I come to think of it, did you ever notice that Big Data also starts with BI?

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  • Customer retention - why most companies have it wrong

    - by Michel Adar
    At least in the US market it is quite common for service companies to offer an initially discounted price to new customers. While this may attract new customers and robe customers from competitors, it is my argument that it is a bad strategy for the company. This strategy gives an incentive to change companies and a disincentive to stay with the company. From the point of view of the customer, after 6 months of being a customer the company rewards the loyalty by raising the price. A better strategy would be to reward customers for staying with the company. For example, by lowering the cost by 5% every year (compound discount so it does never get to zero). This is a very rational thing to do for the company. Acquiring new customers and setting up their service is expensive, new customers also tend to use more of the common resources like customer service channels. It is probably true for most companies that the cost of providing service to a customer of 10 years is lower than providing the same service in the first year of a customer's tenure. It is only logical to pass these savings to the customer. From the customer point of view, the competition would have to offer something very attractive, whether in terms of price or service, in order for the customer to switch. Such a policy would give an advantage to the first mover, but would probably force the competitors to follow suit. Overall, I would expect that this would reduce the mobility in the market, increase loyalty, increase the investment of companies in loyal customers and ultimately, increase competition for providing a better service. Competitors may even try to break the scheme by offering customers the porting of their tenure, but that would not work that well because it would disenchant existing customers and would be costly, assuming that it is costlier to serve a customer through installation and first year. What do you think? Is this better than using "save offers" to retain flip-floppers?

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  • Upon Reflection

    - by foxjazz
    During my tenure at the last company, I didn't let my career stagnate as others have and as time moved along.When at work or home, spend 10% of your time learning something new about some aspect or segway of your job so that your skills are marketable in case you lose it. From experience let me reinforce that it pays off. It pays off in your current job because of the education received and the competence increase of your skills which applied will bring recognition.In these days and times, loyalty to a company is truly at an end. However many companies do care about cultivating their employees which creates a brand of loyalty that can't be replaced. Old companies with the Corp. mentality (or because of the corp. mentality) ever decrease their budgets on organizational sections and thereby do a RIF as a matter of business.The mistakes they make during this process can be risky. But who am I, but a lowly ole programmer, to judge risk. If you are laid off, be friendly with your past manager, and based on simple questions and help, give whatever help you can over the phone even though you are under no obligation to do so.It is also quite possible that there are opportunities to make at home with a new company in the future. Just remember that when inquiring about a position, take advantage of the training that is offered, and keep yourself emotionally and educationally fit.Talk soon,foxjazz

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  • Siebel 8.1.1 for Communication

    The latest release of Siebel CRM 8.1.1 includes many new features and enhancements for the Communications industry. In this webcast, you’ll hear from Brenda Harris, Principal Product Strategy Manager for Communications here at Oracle. She’ll explain how Siebel Communications 8.1.1 will help your communications company provide the most differentiated and personalized customer experience proven to increase customer loyalty and profitability levels.

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  • Why It Is So Important to Know Your Customer

    - by Christie Flanagan
    Over the years, I endured enough delayed flights, air turbulence and misadventures in airport security clearance to watch my expectations for the air travel experience fall to abysmally low levels. The extent of my loyalty to any one carrier had more to do with the proximity of the airport parking garage to their particular gate than to any effort on the airline’s part to actually earn and retain my business. That all changed one day when I found myself at the airport hoping to catch a return flight home a few hours earlier than expected, using an airline I had flown with for the first time just that week.  When you travel regularly for business, being able to catch a return flight home that’s even an hour or two earlier than originally scheduled is a big deal. It can mean the difference between having a normal evening with your family and having to sneak in like a cat burglar after everyone is fast asleep. And so I found myself on this particular day hoping to catch an earlier flight home. I approached the gate agent and was told that I could go on standby for their next flight out. Then I asked how much it was going to cost to change the flight, knowing full well that I wouldn’t get reimbursed by my company for any change fees. “Oh, there’s no charge to fly on standby,” the gate agent told me. I made a funny look. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. This airline was going to let my fly on standby, at no additional charge, even though I was a new customer with no status or points. It had been years since I’d seen an airline pass up a short term revenue generating opportunity in favor of a long term loyalty generating one.  At that moment, this particular airline gained my loyal business. Since then, this airline has had the opportunity to learn a lot about me. They know where I live, where I fly from, where I usually fly to, and where I like to sit on the plane. In general, I’ve found their customer service to be quite good whether at the airport, via call center and even through social channels. They email me occasionally, and when they do, they demonstrate that they know me by promoting deals for flights from where I live to places that I’d be interested in visiting. And that’s part of why I’m always so puzzled when I visit their website.Does this company with the great service, customer friendly policies, and clean planes demonstrate that they know me at all when I visit their website? The answer is no. Even when I log in using my loyalty program credentials, it’s pretty obvious that they’re presenting the same old home page and same old offers to every single one of their site visitors. I mean, those promotional offers that they’re featuring so prominently  -- they’re for flights that originate thousands of miles from where I live! There’s no way I’d ever book one of those flights and I’m sure I’m not the only one of their customers to feel that way.My reason for recounting this story is not to pick on the one customer experience flaw I've noticed with this particular airline, in fact, they do so many things right that I’ll continue to fly with them. But I did want to illustrate just how glaringly obvious it is to customers today when a touch point they have with a brand is impersonal, unconnected and out of sync. As someone who’s spent a number of years in the web experience management and online marketing space, it particularly peeves me when that out of sync touch point is a brand’s website, perhaps because I know how important it is to make a customer’s online experience relevant and how many powerful tools are available for making a relevant experience a reality. The fact is, delivering a one-size-fits-all online customer experience is no longer acceptable or particularly effective in today’s world. Today’s savvy customers expect you to know who they are and to understand their preferences, behavior and relationship with your brand. Not only do they expect you to know about them, but they also expect you to demonstrate this knowledge across all of their touch points with your brand in a consistent and compelling fashion, whether it be on your traditional website, your mobile web presence or through various social channels.Delivering the kind of personalized online experiences that customers want can have tremendous business benefits. This is not just about generating feelings of goodwill and higher customer satisfaction ratings either. More relevant and personalized online experiences boost the effectiveness of online marketing initiatives and the statistics prove this out. Personalized web experiences can help increase online conversion rates by 70% -- that’s a huge number.1  And more than three quarters of consumers indicate that they’ve made additional online purchases based on personalized product recommendations.2Now if only this airline would get on board with delivering a more personalized online customer experience. I’d certainly be happier and more likely to spring for one of their promotional offers. And by targeting relevant offers on their home page to appropriate segments of their site visitors, I bet they’d be happier and generating additional revenue too. Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}  ***** If you're interested in hearing more perspectives on the benefits of demonstrating that you know your customers by delivering a more personalized experience, check out this white paper on creating a successful and meaningful customer experience on the web.  Also catch the video below on the business value of CX in attracting new customers featuring Oracle's VP of Customer Experience Strategy, Brian Curran. 1 Search Engine Watch 2 Marketing Charts

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  • Customer Experience Online Forum

    - by Christie Flanagan
    Missed Oracle’s Customer Experience Online Forum?  Don’t worry. You can still catch the sessions at your convenience. Watch the Customer Experience Online Forum on demand to hear from Bruce Tempkin, a leading expert in customer experience, as well as other thought leaders and they delve into topics such as the ROI of customer experience and strategies for winning over customers.  Simply register to gain access to these sessions and more: The Customer Experience RevolutionCustomer experience has become the most important and defensible differentiator for your business. The customer experience is a journey that transcends all customer touchpoints and stages of the customer lifecycle. Discover where you are in the journey, identify how to begin optimizing the experience you deliver your customers, and join the Revolution.The ROI of Customer ExperienceBruce Temkin, Customer Experience Transformist & Managing Partner, Temkin GroupResearch of US and UK customers demonstrates a high correlation between a positive customer experience and loyalty. A successful customer interaction increases the willingness to buy more and to recommend your company. US companies can gain $380 million over three years by providing an optimized customer experience. This session will help companies determine the business impact that customer experience has on their specific business. Integrating Marketing and Loyalty to Deliver Great Customer ExperiencesNew devices and channels, such as mobile, social and web, are creating radical shifts in the customer buying process and the ways your company can reach and communicate with existing and potential customers. Learn how leading brands are using Oracle's marketing solutions to harness big data and better understand their customers, extend their marketing reach into social channels, and retain their high value customers through more rewarding customer experience.Where to Start Your Organization's RevolutionThe process of crafting a great customer experience starts with understanding customers and their goals. This session helps you to begin mapping a sound customer experience strategy, describing the intended experience and kinds of processes that create differentiation. The ROI of Customer Experience: A Tempkin Group Insight Report Did you know that customer experience leaders have more than a 16 percentage point advantage over customer experience laggards in consumers’ willingness to buy more, their reluctance to switch business away, and their likelihood to recommend? Did you know that even a modest increase in customer experience can translate into millions of dollars gained? Learn more about the ROI of customer experience in this free report.

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  • Walmart's Mobile Self-Checkout

    - by David Dorf
    Reuters recently reported that Walmart was testing an iPhone-based self-checkout at a store near its headquarters.  Consumers scan items as they're placed in the physical basket, then the virtual basket is transferred to an existing self-checkout station where payment is tendered.  A very solid solution, but not exactly original. Before we go further, let's look at the possible cost savings for Walmart.  According to the article: Pushing more shoppers to scan their own items and make payments without the help of a cashier could save Wal-Mart millions of dollars, Chief Financial Officer Charles Holley said on March 7. The company spends about $12 million in cashier wages every second at its Walmart U.S. stores. Um, yeah. Using back-of-the-napkin math, I calculated Walmart's cashiers are making $157k per hour.  A more accurate statement would be saving $12M per year for each second saved on the average transaction time.  So if this self-checkout approach saves 2 seconds per transaction on average, Walmart would save $24M per year on labor.  Maybe.  Sometimes that savings will be used to do other tasks in the store, so it may not directly translate to less employees. When I saw this approach demonstrated in Sweden, there were a few differences, which may or may not be in Walmart's plans.  First, the consumers were identified based on their loyalty card.  In order to offset the inevitable shrink, retailers need to save on labor but also increase basket size, typically via in-aisle promotions.  As they scan items, retailers should target promos, and that's easier to do if you know some shopping history.  Last I checked, Walmart had no loyalty program. Second, at the self-checkout station consumers were randomly selected for an audit in which they must re-scan all the items just like you do at a typical self-checkout.  If you were found to be stealing, your ability to use the system can be revoked.  That's a tough one in the US, especially when the system goes wrong, either by mistake or by lying.  At least in my view, the Swedes are bit more trustworthy than the people of Walmart. So while I think the idea of mobile self-checkout has merit, perhaps its not right for Walmart.

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  • Siebel CRM 8.1.1 Solutions

    Listen to George Jacob, Group Vice President, CRM Applications, discuss the new release of Siebel CRM 8.1.1. By empowering end customers and creating a consistent, engaging service experience, businesses are leveraging Siebel CRM 8.1.1 to garner high customer loyalty levels and improve business profitability in this tough economic environment. Tune in today!

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  • The Truth About Flash - Apple Vs Adobe

    Every emerging technology generation seems to result in a battle of platforms and ideologies - a war between companies for the hearts, minds, dollars and loyalty of consumers for their system of choice. Memories of Microsoft's Internet Explorer finally landing the fatal blow to Netscape, or Google's meteoric rise to power over Yahoo (and the world), are now but footnotes in the history of humanities technological revolution. But no sooner are they forgotten are we plunked into the middle of another war - perhaps the most vicious yet, and the one that may just have the most impact on our...

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  • Partner Webcast – Oracle WebCenter: Digital Transformation with Sites - 14 Nov 2013

    - by Roxana Babiciu
    In order to succeed in today's economy, organizations need to engage with information across all channels to ensure customers, partners and employees have access to the right information in the context of the business process in which they are engaged. The latest release of Oracle WebCenter addresses this challenge with updates across its complete portfolio. Oracle WebCenter Sites enables marketers and business users to easily create and manage contextually relevant social and interactive online experiences across multiple channels on a global scale to drive sales and loyalty. Read more

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  • Welcome to the Oracle Retail International Blog

    - by sarah.taylor(at)oracle.com
    Welcome to the first post of the new Oracle Retail International Blog. Retail is an international business and today's successful retailers view themselves in the context of a global market. A niche fashion business in Tokyo will learn marketing strategies from the luxury brands of Milan, an independent grocer in Oslo will source the same global brands as a supermarket in Oklahoma, and every retailer in the world will measure their multi-channel operation against the international e-commerce giant Amazon.  Why? Because today's customer is a global customer with unparalleled expectations on choice, price and service. Today's consumers have access to more information on retail than ever before. Technology allows people to shop from their home, their office or from the phone in their pocket, wherever they are and at whatever time suits them. Customers are using the web to search for products and promotions. They are also using the web to develop their voice in commenting on products and services that have delighted or disappointed. In an information rich industry, this customer element creates a new world of data. The best retailers are developing eagle eyes for reading customer activity and turning it into profitable decisions. Ultimately, whether you choose to compete or shop on price, service, product innovation, excellent operations or all of the above - the international world of retail has become an inspiration for all - retailer and consumer alike.  Retail as an industry is growing and diversifying at a faster rate than ever before. Yet it is still the customer who picks the winners and the losers on the retail field. Economic circumstances transform the rules, but it is still the customer who dictates the game, the pace, the price, and the perception of the brand. Wise retailers never rest on their laurels. They are always shopping for ideas on how to improve and differentiate the offer at every touch point to meet the customer's needs better than anyone else and to gain each customer's loyalty at a time when loyalty can be cheap. With this blog, I hope that we might provide a hub for discussion around what unifies retail and how technology supports both the retailer and customer experience. Despite the competitive nature of this market, we hope that this will provide an opportunity to share experiences and lessons learnt with a view that knowledge can only help this industry to grow and develop. At Oracle we've been supporting retailers for many years. Many of us have worked within retail organisations all over the world, myself included. With this in mind, I don't feel it is too bold a statement to say that Oracle understands retail. We wouldn't be so heavily integrated in some of the biggest and most well-known names in retail if we didn't. With this blog, we intend to create a community of international retailers that can exchange ideas and experiences, debate collective challenges and drive a better understanding of this continually evolving industry. Events such as the World Retail Congress and NRF's Big Show bring enormous value to the retail industry providing platforms for discussion and learning but they happen once a year. We wanted to create a platform for discussion on a different level and that like retail, is always on. We hope not only to bring commitment to being not only the infrastructure that brings all of their systems together within a retail business, but an infrastructure that supports the industry internationally to grow and flourish through creating a platform for networking, discussion, creativity, vision and strategy. Please feel free to ask questions or comment using the comments functionality.  You might also want to visit our other Oracle Retail social media sites: Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/oracleretail YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/user/oracleretail Twitter - http://twitter.com/#!/oracleretailInsight-Driven Retailing Blog - http://blogs.oracle.com/retail/

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  • Analytics in an Omni-Channel World

    - by David Dorf
    Retail has been around ever since mankind started bartering.  The earliest transactions were very specific to the individuals buying and selling, then someone had the bright idea to open a store.  Those transactions were a little more generic, but the store owner still knew his customers and what they wanted.  As the chains rolled out, customer intimacy was sacrificed for scale, and retailers began to rely on segments and clusters.  But thanks to the widespread availability of data and the technology to convert said data into information, retailers are getting back to details. The retail industry is following a maturity model for analytics that is has progressed through five stages, each delivering more value than the previous. Store Analytics Brick-and-mortar retailers (and pure-play catalogers as well) that collect anonymous basket-level data are able to get some sense of demand to help with allocation decisions.  Promotions and foot-traffic can be measured to understand marketing effectiveness and perhaps focus groups can help test ideas.  But decisions are influenced by the majority, using faceless customer segments and aggregated industry data points.  Loyalty programs help a little, but in many cases the cost outweighs the benefits. Web Analytics The Web made it much easier to collect data on specific, yet still anonymous consumers using cookies to track visits. Clickstreams and product searches are analyzed to understand the purchase journey, gauge demand, and better understand up-selling opportunities.  Personalization begins to allow retailers target market consumers with recommendations. Cross-Channel Analytics This phase is a minor one, but where most retailers probably sit today.  They are able to use information from one channel to bolster activities in another. However, there are technical challenges combining data silos so its not an easy task.  But for those retailers that are able to perform analytics on both sources of data, the pay-off is pretty nice.  Revenue per customer begins to go up as customers have a better brand experience. Mobile & Social Analytics Big data technologies are enabling a 360-degree view of the customer by incorporating psychographic data from social sites alongside traditional demographic data.  Retailers can track individual preferences, opinions, hobbies, etc. in order to understand a consumer's motivations.  Using mobile devices, consumers can interact with brands anywhere, anytime, accessing deep product information and reviews.  Mobile, combined with a loyalty program, presents an opportunity to put shopping into geographic context, understanding paths to the store, patterns within the store, and be an always-on advertising conduit. Omni-Channel Analytics All this data along with the proper technology represents a new paradigm in which the clock is turned back and retail becomes very personal once again.  Rich, individualized data better illuminates demand, allows for highly localized assortments, and helps tailor up-selling.  Interactions with all channels help build an accurate profile of each consumer, and allows retailers to tailor the retail experience to meet the heightened expectations of today's sophisticated shopper.  And of course this culminates in greater customer satisfaction and business profitability.

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  • How to Waste Your Marketing Budget

    - by Mike Stiles
    Philosophers have long said if you find out where a man’s money is, you’ll know where his heart is. Find out where money in a marketing budget is allocated, and you’ll know how adaptive and ready that company is for the near future. Marketing spends are an investment. Not unlike buying stock, the money is placed in areas the marketer feels will yield the highest return. Good stock pickers know the lay of the land, the sectors, the companies, and trends. Likewise, good marketers should know the media available to them, their audience, what they like & want, what they want their marketing to achieve…and trends. So what are they doing? And how are they doing? A recent eTail report shows nearly half of retailers planned on focusing on SEO, SEM, and site research technologies in the coming months. On the surface, that’s smart. You want people to find you. And you’re willing to let the SEO tail wag the dog and dictate the quality (or lack thereof) of your content such as blogs to make that happen. So search is prioritized well ahead of social, multi-channel initiatives, email, even mobile - despite the undisputed explosive growth and adoption of it by the public. 13% of retailers plan to focus on online video in the next 3 months. 29% said they’d look at it in 6 months. Buying SEO trickery is easy. Attracting and holding an audience with wanted, relevant content…that’s the hard part. So marketers continue to kick the content can down the road. Pretty risky since content can draw and bind customers to you. Asked to look a year ahead, retailers started thinking about CRM systems, customer segmentation, and loyalty, (again well ahead of online video, social and site personalization). What these investors are missing is social is spreading across every function of the enterprise and will be a part of CRM, personalization, loyalty programs, etc. They’re using social for engagement but not for PR, customer service, and sales. Mistake. Allocations are being made seemingly blind to the trends. Even more peculiar are the results of an analysis Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins made. She looked at how much time people spend with media types and how marketers are investing in those media. 26% of media consumption is online, marketers spend 22% of their ad budgets there. 10% of media time is spent with mobile, but marketers are spending 1% of their ad budgets there. 7% of media time is spent with print, but (get this) marketers spend 25% of their ad budgets there. It’s like being on Superman’s Bizarro World. Mary adds that of the online spending, most goes to search while spends on content, even ad content, stayed flat. Stock pickers know to buy low and sell high. It means peering with info in hand into the likely future of a stock and making the investment in it before it peaks. Either marketers aren’t believing the data and trends they’re seeing, or they can’t convince higher-ups to acknowledge change and adjust their portfolios accordingly. Follow @mikestilesImage via stock.xchng

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