Predictive Analytics

E-commerce has changed the way consumers purchase products, but until very recently, the basic structure of the transaction and sale itself hadn’t evolved much: People browse for products they want, compare prices across sites, maybe submit a code for a discount coupon if they have one and make a purchase. But a recent development points to a big change on the horizon for ecommerce, and the symptom is the massive sales growth achieved by major retailers who have embraced the new model.

On the heels of announcing a new partnership with Lowe's and HGTV, Sherwin-Williams Co. is predicting healthy sales growth for this year and next year. For the full year 2014, the company expects consolidated net sales to increase approximately 9% compared with full year 2013.

Ankenny, Iowa – Casey’s General Stores Inc. beat Wall Street expectations with net income of $49.89 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2015, up 21% from $39.43 million the same period the prior year. Growth of cost of goods sold did not keep pace with growth of sales, aiding the retailer’s profit.  

New York – Omnichannel specialty bath and beauty product brand Sabon boosted its online sales 35% during Black Friday and Cyber Monday by implementing Dynamic Yield’s personalization engine. Sabon saw lifts across key metrics including user engagement, total page views, time spent on site and sales.  

Menlo Park, Calif. – Facebook is improving its Facebook Search feature with emphasis on personalized results and mobile functionality. The social network has updated its internal search feature to provide uniquely targeted results designed to make it easy for users to find posts that have been shared with them.  

Petaluma, Calif. – During the second week of the holiday shopping season (Dec. 1-7), smartphone and tablet shoppers were especially generous spenders. According to data compiled by e-commerce software provider MarketLive, year-over-year online revenue generated by consumers using smartphones grew 107%, or slightly more than double.  

New York - The cost of healthcare, the ability to maintain margins
 and the ability to continue to grow revenue are the top business challenges in the retail sector. That’s according to GE Capital’s new national survey of c-suite executives at middle-market companies (ranging from $10 million - <$1 billion in sales).  

Chicago - Nearly half of CFOs expect the U.S. economy to improve during the next six months and only 9% expect it to worsen, according to the Grant Thornton LLP 2014 Fall CFO Survey. The biannual survey reflects the insights of more than 1,000 CFOs and other senior financial executives across the United States.  

Ann Arbor, Mich. – Rolling Stones fans will sympathize with the devilish problem facing American customers, who couldn’t get satisfaction in the third quarter of 2014. The national level of customer satisfaction fell 0.7% in the third quarter of 2014 to 75.6 on a 100-point scale, according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI), pointing to weak spending growth for the fourth quarter.   

SCOTTSDALE, Arizona - JDA Software announced the creation of JDA Labs – a research and development group assembled to drive game-changing innovation.   This global team, headquartered in Montreal, will innovate new and existing products and deliver patents, best practices and entirely new products to the market. JDA Labs currently  is driving research and innovation around three key areas: data science, user experience and product innovation.