Well well – this is a fun idea. Zappos, a US$ 1 billion etailer that’s done for shoes what Amazon did for books, has created a ‘club’ for the “Fortune One Million” group.
The club, c$40 a month membership, is a mix of video content, happy-clappy employee indoctrination videos and general bigging-up of the company culture. It’s all very ‘can do’ (and more importantly ‘have done’).
In addition there’re knowledge base articles, interviews with key staff and execs, and opportunities to post questions.
Although a little ‘American’ at times, it’s an interesting approach from a company that clearly believes in values of staff and customer engagement, delivering great service and in sharing insights. After all, it’s one thing to be given an insight, but an entirely more difficult thing to interpret and then implement the requirements of that insight.
Having worked for years in best practice publishing, training and indeed the structured, state-supported business development sector (with Business Link for London, formerly Europe’s largest enterprise support agency) this initiative is to be welcomed.
That they’re clearly going to monetise the One Million is simply an elegant example of that commercial spirit 😉
So, then, to 4 Millbank to be interviewed on the 7pm SkyNews bulletin about CyberMonday (or, being British, “Mega Monday”).
Appearing on SkyNews at 7pm
I was called this afternoon to ask if I’d be willing to appear and comment and of course the answer was ‘yes’. Then I started to feel nervous!
I don’t recall much about the interview itself – I was in a dark room, staring at a focus point and desperately listening to the question so that I didn’t burble. Intentionally, anyway.
Up earlier had been David Walmsley, Head of Direct at John Lewis, and as I’d arrived in the studio I’d thought how composed and fluid he was on TV. I decided to become more nervous immediately 😉
The studio was intriguing: not quite a ‘radio car’, but certainly a compact and lean operation, mainly focused on political happenings at nearby Parliament.
The Millbank studio for Sky News
I’ve not been able to track down a ‘recording’ of what I said, but my intention was to cover off how the predictions for Mega Monday were tending toward the blindingly obvious, and how even a scrooge-like consumer was now running out of shopping days to Christmas. Behind the headline figures of revenues (predicted, btw, by IMRG to be £320m today, with Retail Decisions predicting that Mega Minute will be 1.31pm today, with an expected near £1m in transactions that minute), the real issue is that revenues this year will have been bought by discounting. In order to have a higher cash value of transactions than last year, therefore, retailers will need to ship proportionally more boxes – creating an additional strain on their logistics operations as well as reducing their margins even further.
Pressed on the reason for the success of the web I recall mentioning that the web was now a mature component within multichannel retail. The web is used by some 90% of people questioned in an IMRG survey to help decide on purchases made in-store. Interestingly, only 68% of those questioned said the reverse – that they needed to see goods in-store to inform their internet purchasing.
I was asked whether there was anything fundamental to the web that would make it an inherently ‘cheap’ channel, but of course there’s a need to have a capable infrastructure as well, ideally, as a traditional retail channel in order to maximise sales. I challenged the draw of the web as being “cheapness” alone, noting that customers now required service as much as price. In the US on CyberMonday, for example, nearly 11% of all shopping traffic went to Amazon.com – a combination of breadth of product, excellent pricing and exemplary, proven service.
In what seemed like an age or a second it was over and, with a polite ‘thank you’ from the producer, I was back on the scooter heading home.
The kids were pleased to see me on telly (ahh) and I’ve already had abusive texts about being fat/nervous/bearded etc – to which I just say “thanks” 😉
This is a picture of me on the telly taken by Vicky with her iPhone - I'm just blinking, not falling into a trance. Honest.
It was an interesting experience and something out of the comfort zone. It was also a chance to get some key messages to a new audience and finally whet my appetite to enliven our plans for InternetRetailing TV. We did some experiments at our conference – see the embed below – but I think that it’s time to be a bit more active on this front.
Westfield London is one of my new clients and so it was a pleasure to get to visit and a guided wander with Sarah Lukins.
The first impression – other than the sheer scale of the place as I approached – was of friendly, helpful staff. The car park attendants were lovely – and it’s really pleasing to see a free motorbike parking policy in place. Very civilised.
The car park tickets are also fun, with rub-off panels so you can remember where you left your car! This is useful since there’s a vast amount of parking (as well as signposting to which park for which shops).
westfield-parking-ticket
The fit-out of the centre’s of a high quality – reminded me of the luxury malls in Hong Kong. Good flooring, variations in textures and colours of materials, as well as a good variety of shop frontages and eye-lines. The quantity of shopping is numbing – there’s so much that people will develop their own favourite ‘areas’ – much like people will shop certain streets in London. That gives you an idea of the size of the endeavour as well as a subtle success in creating zones of homogeneity and focus.
There were a number of new (to me, anyway) brands, as well as retailers clearly taking steps to broaden their reach. I was gutted that the MOST exciting new store – Beard Papa’s – was not yet open. Totally distraught, but I’ve made a mental note to go back as soon as it’s open. You can see the range of shops on the directory.
I was there from 2pm on a Friday and the place was packed. Circulation seemed good though with only Nando’s having a sizeable queue. Santa’s posh grotto had a busy gathering but seemed to be moving quickly. I couldn’t tell whether people were shopping actively (lots of bags) or just shuffling – no one’s offered to give me any facts I can publish 😉
Visiting the House of Fraserstore was wonderful and uplifting with a good dose of ‘retail theatre’. HOF is approach Selfridges-like level of display in some sections – Menswear, Women’s Accessories and bags in particular. Made me sad that Selfridges had not gone for an anchor store there.
I thought of this on Saturday as I shuffled through John Lewis (my mission: tights for the girls and a new steam iron). The crowds were shuffling and suffocating, the christmas decorations an annoying taunt that the crowds would only get worse and the queues at the checkouts (with the world’s nicest and most patient staff, it must be said) were mission-defeating.
In the space of two days I had reason to ponder both why I love ecommerce (no queues, ease, information, access) and why I love some shops (retail ‘theatre’, presentation, stimulus, service, knowledgeable advice). Westfield’s combination of good shops (not just rent-a-mall clones), personal and helpful service, retail theatre and a pretty painless parking/access experience bodes well. The aim must be to blend the best of retail and etail – with the additional benefits of a ‘programmable’ set of spaces (from cinema through to public event zones). In difficult trading times the hope for continued retail success has got to be a characterful blend of the best of all worlds.
I’m now officially allowed a week off from shopping to concentrate on selling!
I’ve been interested for a while in the tension between “retail” (encouraging customers to buy more) and sustainability or ‘green’ sentiments (encouraging people to buy less – “reduce, reuse and recycle” being the operating mantra).
There are many benefits and challenges for retailers in considering sustainability as a part of their strategy and this group on LinkedIn is a first step to exploring this topic.
Mired in conflicting claims, in questions of how far to trace and cost impacts and benefits, and struggling to reconcile customer expressed claims with their measured behaviour, we expect some lively debates!
How lovely. On a hot and humid summer’s day we have someone claiming to take on google at search. Enter Cuil (pronounced “Cool” – how convenient), produced by some ex-Google staffers (although, Google’s now so big that saying “ex-google” is about as meaningful as saying “ex-schoolchild”. Still, I digress. Heat, humidity, etc).
Well, I had a quick play, and it’s certainly pretty and I like the magazine layout (in the same way I like the look of Magnolia, but still use delicious).
Unfortunately, Cuil doesn’t as yet have the skinny on search. Concepts are a neat idea (although if I were in that sort of mood I’d just fire up TouchGraph and use that as a visualisation tool on top of the google index). However, these additional facets aren’t that useful when the 120bn web-pages they’ve indexed seem not to cover the web.
In a rather painful and blunt example, dear reader, I find that I no longer exist!
Leaving that dent to my ego aside (sob) there were a number of other areas that seemed to be peculiarly skewed or absent.
This shows on the one hand how heavy web users have become habituated to Google’s way of doing things. We amend our search strings for weight, or refine as we learn jargon in a given domain or based upon initial results. I haven’t got the energy to relearn this for a “solution” that’s at best simple ‘different’ and at worst has gaps.
The challenge issued to google also forgets that the big G is no longer ‘just’ a search engine: it’s a behavioural and intelligence linking monster. From the search and click-through activity, from my google documents, notes, custom search engines, google checkout and adword activity, Google is a closed loop system of information, behaviour and commerce.
The two ways to compete imho are to wait until google implodes (in the great history of global giants, or on a 20 year cycle) or be better at something. Clearly, the latter is preferable to the former, but if you’ve deep pockets and are under 40 years old then don’t totally disgregard the first option 😉
I’m no longer enamoured of Google, but in the age of the commercial web they are the benchmark. One way not to compete, I’d suggest, would be to issue a challenge and not deliver.
Thanks to an article in Indy (Clare Beale’s “On Advertising”) I’ve seen and now downloaded the most excellent iPhone guerilla/game/viral advert. It’s the first ad I’ve seen that “works” on mobile: the Carling iPint.
The app appears on the iPhone desktop and upon launch you are given the task of sliding a ping of – er – Carling from one end of the bar to the other.
This uses the iPhone’s motion sensors to good effect, and so is a great example of device-specific planning.
Tipping too far and the pint falls and smashes…
Once delivered to your iMate’s hands you’re “rewarded” with a virtual pint of Carling.
There’s a neat animation as the whole screen ‘fills’ with Carling, and…
… the liquid ‘tips’ as you move the iphone as if to drink it.
Once you’ve drained your pint you can then play again or mail the app to a friend.
So, this combines device-specific savvy, humour appropriate to the laddish demographic (toys + kit + beer + joke + game = bingo) and a viral aspect.
All we need now for ad-based perfection is:
location-awareness – “you’re next to a pub that’s pouring Carling now!”
integration with ecommerce (send receive vouchers, iBeerPoints [tm] and such like.
I’ve not seen such a well formed ad approach since the Lynx/Axe “feather” campaign.
It’s good to see this level of innovation and fun in mobile marketing – augurs so much better than blatting gifs to passers-by via bluetooth!
This was my Editorial from the July 2008 issue of Internet Retailing magazine.
The paradigm of the web channel being a vast shop with elastic walls has run its course. As Ian Jindal packs his bucket and spade for the summer holidays, he considers a new etailing paradigm: active selling in the network age. Retailers have managed the web for too long – our customers want it back!
