For retailers, including online retailers, having a physical presence is a unique opportunity to forge closer customer relations and boost traffic and sales. In order to succeed, retailers need to create dynamic, context-driven shopping experiences.

Beacons and more broadly IoT devices are the enablers of these experiences. Beacons are small and typically hidden devices that use Bluetooth low-energy (BLE) wireless and geo-fencing technology. The customer’s mobile device proactively

In my last blog post, Four Ways Amazon is Beating Retailers, I wrote about how Amazon has changed the retail game with broader product assortments, higher customer centricity, lower prices and a superior technology stack. But retailers have something that Amazon doesn’t – physical stores, which act as an unlikely competitive advantage. Despite Amazon’s convenience, consumers have proven with brands like Apple, that they still enjoy a fully immersive shopping experience – when done right. Even

This year is starting to be an exceptionally disruptive one for traditional multi-channel retailers. Even stalwarts like Wal-Mart, Macy’s, and Sears have announced store closures in the face of renewed online competition and threats to their traditional store-based business models.

While the online channel has been a bright spot with sales growing by 14.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2015 over 2014, Amazon accounted for the majority of that growth. Industry analyst Macquarie estimates that

Few industries have access to more data regarding consumers, products, and channels than the retail and consumer industries. Data-derived insights should be at the heart of what drives this business. Yet beyond the hype, most attempts at using big data to build a competitive advantage have been dismal failures.

Despite a decade of advice from pundits that retailers need to improve the overall consumer experience — both in the physical and digital stores, the same problems persist. It drives me

Poor customer service is killing so many retail businesses. Relying on old tools is the culprit – and what they should do about it.

I love my town. I have lived there almost 20 years and I love the small-town feel in the middle of a large Metroplex. I have shopped at the same grocery store, same dry cleaners and until about a month ago, the same pharmacy for the entire time I have lived there.

My daughter is a type 1 diabetic and that means frequent trips to the pharmacy. For much of