Turning Customers into Advocates

Posted on March 7, 2016 by bermanevansretail
All companies are after loyal customers — those who keep coming back to the firms and regularly repurchase from them. It’s a tough competitive battle to capture and retain such customers.
But, even more valuable than loyal customers are loyal customers who also serve as brand advocates or evangelists. THESE people not only keep on buying from a specific firm; they also recommend their favorites to others — sometimes, as with social media, to many others.
Take a look at this infographic from Spendsetter (published by Retail TouchPoints).


 

Posted in Part 1: Overview/Planning, Part 2: Ownership, Strategy Mix, Online, Nontraditional, Part 3: Targeting Customers and Gathering Information, Part 6: Merchandise Management and Pricing, Part 7: Communicating with the Customer | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

What Happens to Our Privacy If a Company Is Sold?

Posted on March 5, 2016 by bermanevansretail
Most of us are not fully aware of the privacy policies and rules that go into effect if a company sold is sold or goes into bankruptcy. Suppose we signed up for a Web site that had specific restrictions on how our personal information could be used, such as not providing it to a third party. Do these restrictions remain if the company is bought by another firm?
Not surprisingly, our privacy rights are not as strong as they should be in these situations. Therefore, we need to give out personal information very carefully — and monitor its use.
As Natasha Singer and Jeremy B. Merrill reported for the New York Times:
“The privacy policy for Hulu, a video-streaming service with about nine million subscribers, opens with a declaration that the company ‘respects your privacy.’ That respect could lapse, however, if the company is ever sold or goes bankrupt. At that point, according to a clause several screens deep in the policy, the host of details that Hulu can gather about subscribers — names, birth dates, email addresses, videos watched, device locations, and more — could be transferred to ‘one or more third parties as part of the transaction.’ The policy does not promise to contact users if their data changes hands.”
“Provisions like that act as a sort of data fire sale clause. They are becoming standard among the most popular sites, according to a recent analysis by the New York Times of the top 100 Web sites in the United States as ranked by Alexa, an Internet analytics firm. Of the 99 sites with English-language terms of service or privacy policies, 85 said they might transfer users’ information if a merger, acquisition, bankruptcy, asset sale, or other transaction occurred, the Times’ analysis found. The sites with these provisions include prominent consumer technology companies like Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and LinkedIn, in addition to Hulu.”
Click the image to read more from the NY Times.

 

 

Posted in Part 1: Overview/Planning, Part 2: Ownership, Strategy Mix, Online, Nontraditional, Part 3: Targeting Customers and Gathering Information, Part 5: Managing a Retail Business, Privacy and Identity Theft Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Do YOU Know When It Is OK to Raise Prices?

Posted on March 4, 2016 by bermanevansretail
Having a superior pricing strategy and implementing that strategy properly are often the keys to profitability (see, for example, 1, 2, 3).
With this in mind, take a look at the new E-report “2016 Pricing Regroup: To Hike Or Not To Hike” by Retail TouchPoints:
“Retailers know that competitive price intelligence and price optimization are ‘business basics’ in today’s retail environment. Consumers can compare products and prices virtually anywhere via their mobile devices, and because Amazon can shift prices multiple times per day, advanced pricing tools are a must-have for all other retailers. Yet when it comes to implementing the recommendations provided by price optimization tools, many retailers are still skittish. They fear that even a small price hike will send customers scurrying to their competitors. In fact, price is the reason more than 90% of shoppers leave a store to buy from a different retailer.”

 

To access the FREE report, click the image below and fill out the short registration form.

Posted in Part 1: Overview/Planning, Part 2: Ownership, Strategy Mix, Online, Nontraditional, Part 6: Merchandise Management and Pricing | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments