While it may feel like the holiday season is still a little while off, it’s a given truth of retail life that the season tends to creep up earlier and earlier each year. While for some, this might be enough to make you want to exclaim ‘Bah Hambug!’, the fact of the matter is holiday…
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Has an experience-focused HMV found its mojo again?
For those with an interest in the retail landscape, the opening of HMV’s flagship store the Vault presents yet another interesting example of a well-established retailer taking an ‘experience-first’ approach. Considering how things were looking for the brand at the beginning of the year, the fanfare which the opening of the Vault is a receiving, is…
Finding the Right Retail Metrics for Your Business
In his recent article “The Way We Measure Retail Store Performance Needs to Change” M&A banker Richard Kestenbaum puts forward a strong case for retail to re-consider which metrics they are using to measure success. Retailers tend to rely on two key metrics for store performance: sales per square foot and store income statements. Sales…
How Did I Do?
Top retail influencer and friend of TruRating Andrew Busby, recently celebrated the publication of his first book: Harry Was Right All Along is a collection of short stories from the high street, tracing the ups and downs of the ‘profoundly human’ business of retail. Writing with an experts eye for detail, the collection offers “a refreshing…
Is Nordstrom putting customer convenience above the competition?
In ‘shock of the week’ news Nordstrom, announced that it will be accepting returns from two major department store rivals – Macy’s and Kohl’s – at its recently opened NYC concept stores, Nordstrom Local. With returns a pain point for customers and retailers alike, the strategy marks a bold leap into the prioritisation of convenience…
3 CX Improvements To Drive Revenue Growth
We recently submitted a guest blog post for our fantastic partners Retail Pro about three simple customer experience tactics you can implement to drive revenue growth for your business. Because we’re generous, we’ve decided to share the intro of the article here, enjoy this taster and be sure to click through for the full read…
The Influencers: Andrew Busby
Second up to bat in our new series The Influencers, we were lucky enough to speak to the fantastic Andrew Busby. Having worked in the retail industry for over 20 years, Andrew’s time is now primarily spent working as a retail analyst, writer and keynote speaker. As the principal and founder of Retail Reflections, Andrew regularly…
What lies in store for the future of retail metrics?
Typical – you wait an hour for one article about the inadequacies of our current methods for measuring retail performance, and two turn up at once. Recently at TruRating Towers we came across two interesting articles both questioning the validity of today’s most commonly used retail metrics. Writing in Forbes, Richard Kestenbaum’s “The Way We…
Leaving a Lasting Impression: Traditional vs. Digital Marketing
Modern Marketing: A Digital Love Affair Good data is the foundation upon which strong marketing decisions are made. The more data at our fingertips, the more targeted we can get. Which goes some way to explaining the contemporary marketer’s infatuation with all things digital. Digital is steeped in data. The ability to A/B test every…
What is social proof and why is it important in marketing?
The history of social proof Social proof as a concept has been around for quite some time. Psychologists were describing it decades ago (perhaps most notably Robert Cialdini in his 1984 book Influence: The psychology of persuasion). However, it’s only recently that we’ve seen it become the focus of intense interest from marketers – particularly…
TruRating at Retail Expo 2019
We are delighted to be speaking at the Retail Expo 2019 in London on May 1-2. As one of Europe’s leading events for retail technology and design, it’s an honour to share the stage with so many fantastic retailers and industry names. Georgina will be taking to the Marketing & Branding stage with JD Sports…
How to put Customer Experience Theory into Practice
A recent report by Bain & Company contained the somewhat shocking statistic that while 80% of businesses believe they provide a ‘superior proposition’ only 8% of their customers agree. For those in the retail business, this highlights one of the key challenges facing the industry today – how to close the gap between the service…
CX Icon: Brian Dennis
This week, we were fortunate enough to speak to Brian Dennis, known throughout the country as the “the customer service guy”. An internationally renowned CX innovator and forecaster, Brian has served as a Fortune 150 executive – most recently as VP Customer Experience at Kohl’s – alongside being the best-selling author of his newest book…
Unlocking the Value of Customer Experience (CX) Initiatives
Putting a Value to Customer Experience While it’s easy to pay lip service to the importance of customer experience, for those in charge of CX initiatives or Voice of the Customer programs, proving the value of investing in Customer Experience to the wider business can be a challenge. While a commitment to exceptional service values…
CX Icon: Nate Brown
This week we are delighted to speak to the fantastic Nate Brown. Alongside his role as Director of Customer Experience for UL EHS Sustainability, Nate is an ICMI Top 50 CX Thought Leader, and as co-founder of the CX Accelerator (a virtual forum for CX professionals) is something of a catalyst for communication amongst the customer…