Forrester Research, Inc.

San Francisco -- Gensler announced that Jim Crawford has joined its lifestyle team as director of strategy and experience design. Crawford most recently served as chief experience officer at Chute Gerdeman, where he was responsible for integrating technology into award-winning store and experience design projects.

At Gensler, Crawford will utilize skills to enhance the firm’s practice and work with clients in multiple industries connecting digital and physical design with business and consumer objectives.
 

It’s the question on every brand’s mind — how do I reach the millennial consumer?

Is it all about social? Should I focus on mobile? Should I allocate more of my advertising budget toward this trendy website?

Washington, D.C. - While paid search and email marketing still top retailers’ list of effective customer acquisition channels, social media has moved up the ranks to become an important tool for engaging with and attracting new customers. According to the State of Retailing Online 2015 report, conducted by Shop.org, Forrester Research Inc. and Bizrate Insights, 25% of retailers surveyed cite Facebook as a top acquisition platform.

While paid search and email marketing still top retailers’ lists of effective customer acquisition channels, social media has moved up the ranks to become an important tool for engaging with and attracting new customers.

New York – While most observers agree there will not be widespread adoption of technology to accept payments from EMV-compliant payment cards in the U.S. by the October 2015 fraud liability shift deadline, Forrester Research is less optimistic than most. In a research note, Forrester said retailer concerns about the ROI of spending on chip and PIN technology, as well the development of new secure payment methods, will delay widespread adoption of hardware and software needed to accept chip and PIN payment in the U.S., until 2020.

New York – Retailers Amazon.com, HSN, Newegg, QVC and Zappos.com were among the 15 companies receiving the highest ratings in the 2015 Forrester Research Customer Experience Index. Forrester data indicates that improving the customer experience is a strategic priority for 73% of businesses, yet only 1% of companies deliver an excellent customer experience.

In announcing its Costco-like membership model, Jet.com (yet to launch as of this writing) has positioned itself as the latest type of online retail marketplace. Considering that online marketplaces really go back to the days of CompuServe, Prodigy and Earthlink (extra points if you know what “dial up” means), I’ve been struck by how much marketplaces have been in the news lately. Think about Alibaba’s jaw-dropping $9.3 billion sales on Singles Day (Nov.

In the 1990s, when the Internet and eCommerce created a tangible link between modes of shopping that had previously been isolated (stores and catalogs), retailers struggled with how to understand, measure, and connect with shoppers in multiple ways.

It was out of this confusion that the concept of “multichannel” was heralded as retail’s saving grace, and soon, retailers were all abuzz with cross-channel shoppers.

Fast-forward a few years and retailers began scratching their heads wondering why their “multichannel” initiatives hadn’t delivered the stunning ROI they were pro

Digital payment gains slow, steady traction

Washington, D.C. - Retail CIOs agree that security and digital innovation are top priorities for 2015, according to a new report by the NRF and Forrester Research.

The study, the Retail CIO Agenda 2015: Secure and Innovate, finds that managing data security is the most urgent focus area for retail CIOs, with 97% of respondents placing it at the top of their 2015 priority lists.