Be invisible
One of the ten “be” is Be invisible.
The rule underlying this principle says: “technology is like a joke, if you have to explain it
than it’s not good”
Users end up utilizing platforms, websites, new devices and technologies, that they are not
familiar with because of the exponential growth of technology.
Assuming that this is going to stay, to accelerate even more, the only way to be successful as
a company, is to ensure that the devise, the technology, the platform that you ask
customers to use, is invisible. The impact that technology has on the lives of people, must
be minimal. The more complex it is, the less it’s going to be used. The learning curve must
be (flat) simple. Minimize complexity, eliminate frictions between the different parts and
uses of devices. Experiential benchmark, once the bar of expectation is defined, the
businesses must deal with that standard. The experience must be intuitive, clear, simple,
without steep learning curve.
Ex: Amazon go. When you enter the store, you check in with the app, take whatever you
want and leave. Not cash, no checkout line, just take and leave. Perfect example of invisible
technology. Carrefour developed “carrefour flash” where you enter a carrefour shop and
you can take all the products and then directly pay by card without having to scan products
because the shop tracks you and knows what you have in your cart.
Be seamless
One of the ten “be” is Be seamless.
The rule underlying this principle says “No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a whole a
whole orchestra to play it”.
Seamless means no friction between touchpoint, experiences, channels, meaning that the
customer lives a continuous experience. Customers are human being that tends to be smart,
that uses multiple devices, that interacts with companies. There is the need to have
different tools, channels and professionals involved, and ensure that there is a director that
decides who must play and when. If you don’t ensure that the experience is seamless, is a
problem, because people don’t see anything other than the brand.
People have benchmarks, and they don’t care about the complexity, the channels, they just
want to experience the brand, the idea they have of the brand is the sum of interactions.
The sum of interactions determines customer experience/perception. Customer experience
is the sum of all interactions a customer has with your brand. Multichannel vs Omnichannel.
What we talk about is omnichannel, where the customer is in the middle and all available
channels are connected and coordinated. Omnichannel aligns all touchpoints to obtain a
seamless experience. However, in most cases there is a multichannel company, where the
channels are not integrated. People don’t want different channels to deal with, people want
the brand as one.
Ex: Ralph Loren. The company must remember that customers use different devices and
encounter different touchpoints so they must be orchestrated by the director (the
company) to perform as a harmonious orchestra.
Ex 2: Sephora. In-stores features, check if a product is available, virtually try products,
receive recommendations, use app inside the store to find a product or to let assistants
know your customer journey in order to personalize that.
Be a destination
One of the ten “be” is Be a destination.
The rule underlying this principle says “People don’t buy goods and services. They buy
relations, stories, and magic”. Stores should be destinations. Is not enough to defend
yourself from competition. If the only reason people go to a store because is convenient or
because it is close by, is not enough. Someone else will create a digital store and kill you. If
the relationship is not based on functional benefit, but functional benefit and experience
instead, is going to be successful. The company should create emotional benefits because
consumers choose a brand for intangible reasons.
Ex: Apple. Devices are not actually superior; however, people keep choosing that brand for
intangible reasons, including emotional involvement. Emotionally attached to you. Cannot
base completion on functional benefit, but overall experience.
Become A “want to go” place → you love to go; you’re excited to go. Stores should be
destinations.
Ex 2: North Face: pop-up store reachable only by foot in the middle of the Dolomites, in San
Martino di Castrozza. For the few, limited edition for sale. It was a place where passionate
people/advocates wanted to be.
Be loyal
One of the ten “be” is Be loyal.
The rule underlying this principle says, “Do what you do so well, that they will want to see it
again and bring their friends”.
Loyalty is a powerful world and tool in the hands of retailers. All principles are
interconnected. Functional benefits are important and should be part of the reason
customers stick with a brand but can’t be the only reason. It’s important to create a
combination of factors, functional and emotional benefits. The client becomes a mix
between producer and consumer (prosumer) strengthening loyalty. Loyalty is connected to
rationality and functional benefits, but it is even more connected to emotions. If you’re
loyal, you’re satisfied. Make people come back again and bring their friends. The more you
manage to create an engaging experience the more you increase chances to come back.
Earn and burn. Earn points and then “turn” them into benefits.
Ex: Nike Melrose wanted more than a shop. it’s a local community platform. Product display
based on customer data in the area. Exclusive events and training sessions. Creating Value.
Ex 2: LEGO. Lego ideas: Submit creations and ideas of new products. The idea could be
green-lighted. From people to platform. Catalyzing relationship.
Be personal
One of the ten “be” is Be personal.
The rule underlying this principle says “Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that
you tell them what they need well before they realise it themselves”. Human beings love to
be treated as individuals. When things are personalized, people like them more. They want
to feel special. People like to be treated as individuals, different from the others, so
companies must leverage the information and data they have and use them to propose
personalized suggestions to their customers. Algorithms are at the basis of this.
Customization vs personalization. Important to know: Personalization: it’s offline. Ex
remembering someone’s name. it’s completely personal. Customization: connected with
databases, AI. Can do it with or without tech. Building a cluster to decide a behavior. You
can be personal without technology.
The best is amazon, that based on data, they would start sending unsolicited samples to
you, based on what you purchase.
Ex 2: Feltrinelli: Book an appointment with bookseller. Via chat and in store. Personalization
of experience that delights the customer.
Be a curator
One of the ten “be” is Be a curator.
The rule underlying this principle says, “In a world of nearly infinite content, consumers are
looking for one-stop shops”.
We live in a world of abundance; people can buy whatever they want and whenever they
want. Paradox of choice: when you have too many choices you can’t choose. You end up
choosing wrong. Last generation was in love with abundance because they lived the World
War II era, but for us, the complexity is too much. Today’s customers don’t want complexity.
It is better to go to one-step shops where the options are fewer, and customers can find the
top products for every category. Influencers are curators because they choose to sponsor
some products and people trust them in buying these products thinking that they are the
best options they can find and not having to make research themselves making the process
easier. Websites recommending products can also be curators. Ex: website Deepop.
Ex 2: Nike Melrose simplifies the purchase decision avoiding the paradox of choice thanks to
the product display based on customer data in the area
Be human
One of the ten “be” is Be human.
The rule underlying this principle says, “Humans are still the killer app”.
It’s about High-tech VS high touch, meaning delivering personal experience but making it
warm thanks to humans. The more we will experience in high tech iper-connecting world,
the more we will need humans to warm up technology. “Digital is everything but not
everything is digital”. The human touch is always appreciated to warm up the interaction
between the brand and the customers. You can have a killer app but then what makes the
difference is how humans use it. It is important to emotionally connect with customers and
this is something that technology is not able to do. Be human means also that you need to
pay attention to sustainability, that you have priorities in this world, that you must be
respectful with your clients. Nowadays being sustainable is fundamental for companies
because it is what clients want. Humans are still the killer app. Emotionality. Blending hightech with high touch. Building a relationship. Whatever you want to do, bear in mind the
role of human being to warm up clients.
Ex: Nike Melrose Direct chat with store manager. Emotional bonding and trusted
relationship.
Ex 2: Feltrinelli: Video review. Digital screens in-store with video reviews. Customer benefit
is simplify purchase choice and enrich it. Human touch in the decision journey.
Ex 3: North Face: Close the loop with be human. Brand for the nature, in nature of a brand
that loves nature and the profits from the products went to a charity program to preserve
environment of the area
Be boundless
One of the ten “be” is Be boundless.
The rule underlying this principle says, “Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them”.
Every brand has its limits being it physical, digital, small, or big. Digital store’s limit is that
they are not close with the clients. Physical store’s limit is that they don’t have space to
stock a large inventory. Being boundless means to overcome the limits of the company.
Mixing digital and physical. These are some of the ways to mix digital and physical: CLICKAND-SUBSCRIBE: ask clients to subscribe to your website so that the company will
constantly be able to reach them even. CLICK-AND-COLLECT: buy online and pick up the
product in a store. CLICK-AND-COMMUTE: buying in a place and then collecting the product
in another place. The difference between click-and-collect and click-and-commute is that
the second one happens when you are travelling from a city/country to the other while in
the first case you collect the item in the same place where you are when buying it. CLICKAND-TRY: interact with a personal stylist online and then go to the store to try the product
and decide whether to buy it. CLICK-AND-RESERVE: reserve a product online and then go
into the store, where clients can also buy something else. Companies must decide which
method to adopt based on your clients.
Ex: North Face: The brand is for nature lovers, people that love to be outside it was for the
few. Very restricted target in mind
Be exponential
One of the ten “be” is Be exponential.
The rule underlying this principle says, "Most of the bright people don’t work for you, no
matter who you are".
When markets become disrupted by new technologies and competitors, many legacy
companies struggle to keep up. Some companies reach out to partners with an eye toward
building a broader ecosystem that will boost their competitive strength.
ECOSYSTEM: alliances, joint ventures, or short-term collaborations designed to create a set
of capabilities and services that integrate value chain participants (customers, suppliers,
platforms, service providers, competitors) through a common commercial model and virtual
data backbone. The aim is to enable seamless integration, to create enriched and efficient
consumer and stakeholder experiences, and to solve significant pain points or inefficiencies
in the customer journey. Outsourcing. Leverage third party assets and stretch our
proposition. Grow exponentially. What can I do to grow exponentially. Building an
ecosystem where you’re in the center and the others around are complementing your
proposition. Leverage the assets of others.
Ex. Using Glovo, Deliveroo, etc. for your Building an ecosystem where you’re in the center
and the others around are complementing your proposition. Leverage the assets of others.
Be Brave
One of the ten “be” is Be brave.
The rule underlying this principle says, "Ironically, in a changing world, playing it safe is one
of the riskiest things you can do". Get busy living. Experimenting. Specially as startups. If
you’re not brave, you’ll extinguish. Nowadays trends disappear so fast. Don’t risk too much
on your own. Think big and act small. Test to learn, learn by doing. Always in beta mode:
permanent beta is essentially a lifelong commitment to continuous personal growth. Still
figuring out what we should do. Try and learn. Maintaining this mentality, no matter what.
Coffee shop test: buy coffees to people in exchange of their feedback about your start-up
idea. Stay in beta mode: you keep testing and checking your brand because the world keeps
changing and so should do your company.
INTRODUCTION:
To market means every step from the moment you have to sell something to someone to
the actual moment you sell it. Kotler said that marketing’s job was to make sales useless.
Marketing is everything you do before sales. Marketing’s objective is to make the product
sellable. Friedman said that the reason for a company to exist was to make profit, nowadays
this concept is not acceptable; businesses focus on stakeholders and shareholders. In fact,
the first activity a company does, is to target the audience, segmentation, meaning choosing
who the company will be selling to.
In developed countries supply exceeds demand. When it’s vice versa, there is scarcity. Ex:
pandemic, situation of scarcity.
Marketing mix: 4 Ps  product, place, promotion, price.
RETAIL:
When it’s B2C, it’s retail.
Marketing is about anticipating a need, creating a need; is about making things people want.
Data in this era is crucial for everything, first of all to understand customers.
How to promote a product? Find something unique about that product, value proposition.
ROPO means research online, purchase offline OR research offline and purchase online
Showrooming research offline and purchase online
Webrooming is research online, purchase offline
Sopexa: they work with the best excellences around the world in the field of food and
beverage. It is an international communication agency, made up of food and beverage
enthusiasts. It is art of the hopscotch group which is an international communication group
that is based on: Digital, events, public relations, shopper experience = global PR.
Customer journey is a map of all touchpoints the customer goes through from the moment
they have a need to the moment they satisfy that need. Touchpoints are the point of
possible interaction between companies and potential customers.
5 As of customer journey are awareness, appeal, ask, act, advocacy.
CUSTOMER JOURNEY TOUCHPOINTS They used to be:
- Awareness: when a customer first becomes aware of your product, or when a
customer first becomes aware of a need that they want to fulfil.
- Familiarity/appeal : at this point the potential customer has decided they might want
or need a product similar to yours, so they start reading reviews, learning the
features, making comparisons, asking for opinions, and using the internet to
research the options in detail.
- Consideration/ask: deciding among the most likely purchases, taking test-drives,
going to a product demonstration, asking the opinion of people who have already
purchased.
- Purchase: final decision on the brand and product then taking the plunge, online or
physically.
-
Loyalty/advocacy: having your customers so happy that they not only purchase (and
repurchase) from you but refer more business to you from friends and family and
becomes and advocate of your product. This is the most important thing to obtain,
and it is the biggest indicator of success. In the first months everybody likes what
they buy, the important thing is that they keep liking it and they will decide to
repurchase from your product.
This journey has a FUNNEL STRUCTURE, meaning that as customers go through it, they
become fewer and fewer, advocates are very few. The shape of the journey actually changes
depending on the product, it is not always a perfect funnel. This is a journey from one step
to the other; it can be performed both online and offline. We can go into the shop and then
look for information online, etc. so we can also have a hybrid customer journey. It can also
be virtual (in the metaverse). This journey sometimes is online, sometimes is offline,
sometimes is physical, digital, virtual. Costumer experience is the result of all the
interactions that people have with your brand. Sometimes you might skip some steps.
With the online development, it has also brought some changes in the customer journey. It
is not a linear path anymore. It’s full of interruptions and deviations.
ROPO, customers search for relevant product information to quality their purchasing
decision before they actually decide to buy products in the store.
Click and collect happens when customers order online and collects at the store.
Compromise between online and in-store shopping.
Try and buy happens when customers try products in a store
Showrooming when the customer search for a product in a store and buy it online
afterwards.
Multichannel VS Omnichannel
Multichannel  is the independent management of every single channel. They are
organised in BU or teams, low integration and communication between them, and low
coordination between different strategies. Multichannel strategy is made of different silos,
one close to another but all separate. The behaviour of the customer is not analysed
through different channels. KPIs and metrics are dedicated exclusively to single channels. Ex:
sales volume, sqm, client in B2B and conversion rate in e-commerce.
Omnichannel  is a unified management of distribution, a process based on interaction,
communication and interdependence among teams dedicated to a single channel.
Omnichannel is a dynamic approach to the customer, real time monitoring of the evolution
of the purchase behaviours and feedback to initiatives. For omnichannel approach there is
the creation of appropriate IT devices and marketing which take advantage of cross-channel
purchase process. IT, digital marketing, KPIs and date monitoring system are all part of
omnichannel approach. They give a trend of people’s behaviours, making the managers able
to predict what they can sell in the future.
For the development of an effective omnichannel model companies are called to:
- Digital thinking: to trigger a cultural evolution and upgrade the skills of evolution
process involving the entire organization
-
-
-
-
-
-
Readjust the organizational structure: no more divisions in independent silos, but
rather a single function that orchestrate and coordinate teams dedicated to
individual channels.
Draw a single customer experience is essential to integrate e-commerce and the
services offered in the online sale points and vice versa by creating multiple
touchpoints
Pick-up in-store, online visibility of available stock in the store, customer care
integrated, dedicated App, RFID / QR and augmented reality to access in-store digital
content are just some examples
Develop a proper online presence: only those who are able to respond adequately to
these expectations can play a leading role in the digital market. That is why
investment in creating highly usable websites and cloud technologies that ensure a
single customer experience regardless of the device used assumes a strategic role
Patrol the community and social media: keep your users connected to you; listen and
monitor social networks, share quality contents that can excite, inform and instruct
followers. To do this we need to develop the dedicated teams that operate as actual
editorial newsrooms, or, if it is not sustainable, relying on external partners who can
coordinate and support these activities.
Invest in CRM, Analytics and social media monitoring: the adoption of these systems
is essential to effectively connect with users / customers. Profiling and monitor their
behaviors in the physical and digital places of activity before, during and after
purchase to quickly intercept opportunities and to respond accurately to their
expectations.
Re-imagining physical stores. Customers expect speed, convenience, flexibility. They want a
seamless experience. 90% of retail purchases are still made in stores and 95% of all retail
sales are the result of online, mobile, and in-store interaction. Unifying all these, creating an
omnichannel experience, will provide business with more opportunities. Omnichannel
method and technology must be used to enhance in-store experiences as well as physical
and digital shopping. Ex: mobile alerts, providing data to stores, virtual dressing rooms
interactive displays, after-hours pickups.
Examples of omnichannel:
Rebecca Minkoff ("connected store" provides the "best of the online world" in a physical
location. Shoppers can browse as usual or these can shop via the "connected wall" - a giant
touchscreen/mirror that allows customers to swipe through available products, among
other things. If something catches your eye on the connected wall, you can simply tap "Add
items to my room." Then, when those clothes have been added to a dressing room, you get
a text message. And to check out, just tap the changing room mirrors).
Lowe’s (Retail home improvement. Lowe's partnered with Google to create "Vision" - an app
that leverages Google's Tango to allow consumers to measure their homes and virtually
envision how furniture will fit and look in those spaces. Then, when it's time to make a
purchase decision, customers will head into stores, and their smartphones will identify
where those products are physically located as well as provide customer reviews for those
items. Talk about next-generation seamless digital to physical shopping experiences).
Alibaba’s Hema grocery stores (merge online and offline retail. Customers use an app to
scan products, get information and pay for their groceries. Alibaba is also opening robotusing restaurants, where food is ordered entirely through an app and delivered by
machines. )
SHOPPER MARKETING is way customers are influenced in the last mile to buy something.
Last mile is last moments/steps before we make a purchase. Companies try to be very
present in these last few moments in order to convince clients to buy their products.
Shopper marketing is understanding how consumers behave as shoppers, in different
channels and formats, and leveraging this knowledge to benefit of all stakeholders defined
as brands, consumers, retailers and shoppers.
The evolution of retail
Retail 0, when there was a physical market, intermediation and negotiation between seller
and costumers.
Retail 1, during the years when everyone needed to save money because of the crisis. Piggly
Wiggly, self-service was created, fixed prices that could not be negotiated and
disintermediation.
Retail 2, after World War 2, everything under the same roof (EUTSR). The born of shopping
centres and malls. People went to one place and found everything they needed. They had
cars and refrigerators to store food, so they bought everything they needed for more days
instead of buying things day by day.
Retail 3, the born of e-commerce. The moment when presence and localisation stopped
being the same thing. Some physical stores disappeared. Being present without being
localised. If they wanted to sell something, there wasn’t the need to be physical to do so.
Retail 4, with the digital transformation. With the explosion of digital technology, we can
buy everything we want everywhere we want. Social commerce, ubiquitous commerce and
mobile commerce are all part of that.
Retail 5, post-digital commerce. In this era, we have the metaverse, augmented reality,
NFTs. Due to the pandemic all these technologies accelerated.
The iceberg metaphor is about retail 4 and building with the past, not on it. If the new
paradigm brings happiness and easiness, it means people are going to accept it, to use it. If
it brings value to people’s lives, it’s going to be used. Depending on how much value it
brings, we see a big or small change. Value is perceived value.
Retail apocalypse. “The perfect storm” encloses disruptive technologies (customer
expectations, economic slowdown, online explosion, and manufacturer expectations). For
the past two decades, the retail industry has undergone a metamorphosis. The algorithm is
changing fast, and the majority of top managers have not been trained for this kind of
reality. They struggle to understand what to do, and the future is not what it used to be.
Moore’s law: Technology or any device in order to work needs a microchip. The stronger the
microchip, the stronger the device. If we could constantly add more transistors into a
microchip, the progression of technology could be enormous. This leads to the
democratization of technology because the availability of powerful technologies (such as
smartphones) is affordable by a great part of the population. Moore’s law makes retail
smart, meaning that Natural computing, powered by computers that can see, hear, and
understand the world around them, will enable brands and retailers to hold new types of
interactions with shoppers, and tell stories in new ways. Smart products will be sold in smart
stores bristling with smart infrastructure. A plethora of sensors will gather data on shoppers.
This will enable retailers and manufacturers to delight shoppers with fully customized
shopping experiences. Don’t mix the means to the act.
Digital is a dimension of everything. A dimension that enables you to do things in a different
way. Digital is a mean to an end. It is important to understand at which specific point of the
customer journey the client decided to buy the product. Which is the most important step
influencing the decision? Once we find the most important step, we invest the majority of
our company’s money into that step, for this reason it is important to understand where to
invest. It is impossible to invest a lot of money in every step of the journey and it would be a
waste of money. Brand experience/customer experience is the result of all the interactions
that a customer has with a brand. It is crucial to build a strong and compelling customer
journey.
The customer journey is fragmented and also different for every single person.
Thus, it is very complex to understand the customer journey in depth and companies
struggle a lot to do it.
We have to specify that internet and technological devices are not the solution to our
problems nor something we should fight. The dimension of everything is the dimension that
allows us to do new different things. We develop new benchmarks, new standards, and we
adapt to them, making it difficult to adapt to other adoptions. Ex: amazon and having
everything always available within 24h. If this is the new benchmark, and we want
something that we cannot find on amazon and it takes more than 24h to be available to us,
we are dissatisfied. We can say that customer expectations are evolving faster than retailers
are innovating. Customers have the power, if retailers don’t satisfy them, they are no longer
going to be customers of that retailer. Either you satisfy the customer, or you don’t have
one. Us as customers, we are doing many different things at once, and this is why is
important for companies to understand how to target customer. Deciding which platforms
to use and which ones have the biggest impact on them. How can companies have all of this
information about customers? DATA.
Customer persona is a segment of potential/actual buyer with similar customer journeys
and similar characteristics such as demographics, psychographics, habits….
Data is the new oil, companies need to find it, extract it, distribute it, and monetize it. Data
is fundamental to decide customer journey, to know how many people are interested in the
product, and how can people relate to it. To understand data, there are needed some skills.
Collect data, add value to the process, software, skills. Refine data, some data are files,
some are images, we need to transform it in useful information that’s going to be used by
different departments inside the company. If the data is not refined, you cannot monetize it.
Where to find it? Many sources, online, social media, shops.
How to extract it? Aggregate it in a way that adds value to what is being collected, then
refine it and transform it into something that is actionable and useful. Then distribute it.
LUXURY
Luxury is not fashion or vice versa. Luxury, for many different reasons, has not approached
the digital world until recent times. This is because luxury cannot be owned by everybody,
and it represents a status to other people. Luxury is synonymous with prestige and rarity.
Whereas digital, can be owned by everybody. So, the luxury world wanted to keep distance
from that, but not for long. Entering the world of digital, even if it means being attached to
the image of sector “mass market”, would help the luxury world expand to a new target
audience ready to consume luxury. Luxury companies need to enhance the customer
experience and transform their businesses for the digital era, also involving customer
journey, digital touchpoints, earned touchpoints and connected stores.
When we talk about luxury 4.0, we mean a model that uses data to build customer intimacy,
capture emerging customer preferences, streamline the process of turning ideas into new
products. Also is about enhancing the customer relationship and restore the authentic
personal experience that defined luxury when it was confined for a small elite. This
trajectory of digital will bring more disruption.
The impact of digital in luxury
3 areas: customer experience, changes to the enterprise, future disruption
Customer experience  digital is having a great impact on how luxury shoppers choose
brands and goods. 80% of luxury sales are digitally influenced. It means that consumers hit
one or more digital touchpoints. The typical luxury shoppers follows a mixed journey
between online and offline. They seek advice on social media, trusted bloggers and then
they post about their purchase later. The biggest luxury categories for online sales are
beauty products, apparel, and accessories. Overall, consumers are younger and willing to
experiment. They also all have embraced a digital lifestyle, meaning they have smartphones,
which have replaced the desktop. They spend four times as many hours on mobiles as they
do on computers. This poses different questions, like how can a brand convey all their ideas
through a phone screen? How to show the breadth of the collection and all the details?
Today the average customer, engages with a brand on different and multiple touchpoints, in
a highly personalized journey. Half of these touchpoints are digital. Today is expected a
seamless and flowy experience. We can also say that luxury customers are highly engaged
on social media, and they are moving from being observers to actors on stage. They are
becoming another marketing channel at all effects. So how brands can turn customers into
their ambassadors? How to keep the chatter positive? How to create a coherent brand
message when it’s been created by the customer itself? Some brands are adapting to this
digital era and this ongoing transformation, others are not.
Changes to the enterprise  luxury brands need to become digital enterprises. Digital is
penetrating the value chain and is also creating opportunities to be effective and
responsive. The brands that are evolving, focus on digitalizing their business, they are
building a luxury 4.0 model and they increase speed and agility, using data to take customer
knowledge and relationships to the next level. They are also forming partnerships across the
luxury ecosystem to achieve what they could not achieve on their own. Luxury 4.0 is also a
fully digitalized model for manufacturing. Creating a seamless system that ties together
everything, from machines in factories, to smart logistics, customer data, and design. This
also gives a rapid response when shifts in demand happen, also reducing costs. Big data and
machine learning are bringing authenticity and relevance back into customer relationships.
Now we have intimacy for many. This happens thanks to data, which finds opportunities to
provide services that are uniquely tailored to each and every customer and occasion,
making the brands authentic. This brings us to contextual marketing, which recognizes that
different customers are different people, also on depending on the occasion. Contextual
marketing is about intimacy and anticipating customer desires, which are powerful ways to
retain core customers and drive growth with new ones.
Future disruption  we need to expect some changes, such as that store space will be
experiential and lifestyle oriented, consumer renting will be the new owning, amazon will
crack fashion and luxury, “insta-brands” will take more space in the market and
sustainability will matter more and more. Customer will be hungry for experience, rather
than buying. Customer will start purchasing experiences and emotions that the brand can
offer. Digital has trained customers to be and expect continuous excitement. The most
exciting experience will set the bar for the next one. This is the time for reverse
omnichannel, meaning when it’s the store that must match the quality of the online
experience. Digital is source of inspiration for reinventing the role of store and customer
experience. Ex. “rent the runway”: access to fashion clothes and accessories on a
subscription basis.
5 actions:
1. Think and act broadly. Digital is no longer only a sale or a communication channel.
Digital has become a key element of the value equation that brands need to master.
It spans a range of disciplines, including retail, supply chain, brand management, and
customer engagement.
2. Prepare for continuous transformation. Digital needs to be a stress test that brands
need to apply to every single element of their offer in order to better understand
opportunities and threats/risks.
3. Evolve the organization. Digital requires organizational changes. No longer marketing
and digital marketing, but just marketing. Digital and IT officers are the same. The
digital officer sits on the executive committee and participates in key decisions over
the life of a brand.
4. Fully leverage the power of big data and machine learning. Advanced analytics is a
reality and CEOs should ensure their teams are using it properly to bring back
authenticity and intimacy in the customer relationship
5. Develop ecosystems. Winning brands source competencies from the outside, from
their ecosystems, in order to ensure access to cutting-edge skills.