Bluetooth beacons burst onto the retail scene in 2013, with Apple’s release of the iBeacon standard and the built in support in iOS 7. Promising revolutionary changes to micro location services (identifying location to with a meter or so) and providing location context to targeted promotions, the technology was widely discussed and predicted to be game […]
Despite the Innovation agenda of Australia’s Federal Government, the digital services provided by the Government actually teach organizations more about how NOT to do digital rather than serving as a shining example.. Last Sunday, the Australian Tax Office’s website was down for the entire day. Apparently this was for scheduled maintenance. No backup site was […]
The IT leaders of many Retailers are reviewing their team’s capabilities, and are re-investing in the skills associated with Software Development. A maxim of 1990’s and 2000’s IT departments was “Buy not Build”. As the cost of developing software increased, and the availability of resources became scarce, buying a software package made more sense than building […]
A typical retailer spends between 1 – 2% of their revenue on IT. This makes IT one of the largest above-store costs for a retailer. In an industry that is still more about process work than knowledge work, retail executives always feel they are spending too much on technology. So it is very important for […]
It seems these days that every retailer has a Loyalty Program. Whether it’s the coffee card at the local café, the discount card at the apparel store in the Mall, or the large multi tenanted scheme anchored by your favourite Supermarket chain, loyalty programs are ubiquitous. Yet many retailers question the value they get from […]
Almost since the advent of Smartphones, the concept of digitizing the wallet has grasped the imagination of many. From those of us with a pocket book the size of George Costanza’s exploding wallet through to those of us who simply don’t want to have to carry around another item, the Smartphone offers a potential solution to one […]
The key to gathering useful data about retail customers is to be able to identify the same customer across multiple transactions. Retailers primarily use two techniques: Loyalty programs, and Credit Card usage. One of these techniques is about to get much more difficult. The use of a customer’s credit card number as a means of […]
Australian retailers are facing ever-increasing threats from the global market. For the first time, significant numbers of overseas retailers are either entering the Australian market or are well progressed in their plans to do so. At the same time, the “global village” nature of online retail means Australian consumers can access overseas markets simply and […]
What do you think will be the big trends in Retail Technology as we exit 2014 and head in to the New Year? I have listed below 7 areas of technology that Australian Retailers need to be following closely; 3 areas to forget; and 1 to speculate upon. Let me know your picks.
Digital technologies are transforming retail, whether through on-line shopping websites, smartphone apps, augmented reality, new payments systems or location detection. However, the way the Digital Age will convert into real dollars for retailers is through the data this technology is producing in such vast quantities. It is estimated that 90% of all the data gathered […]
