Data & Analytics

More momentum for Pinterest and the emergence of social shopping are among the top social media trends that research and analytics firm Blueocean Market Intelligence predicts will impact the retail industry this year.

The firm analyzed the online sales data of the nation’s top 100 retailers from September through December 2013 as part of an ongoing global study assessing the business impact of top retailers social media efforts in a report called, “Social Media Effectiveness Index for Retailers”

New York – 1-800-Flowers.com Inc. reportedly had a difficult time meeting customer demand for Valentine’s Day. According to CNN, the retailer has sent apologies via Twitter and Facebook to roughly 1,000 customers for deliveries that were late, missing or damaged.

New York -- nGage Labs and Web Decisions have entered into an arrangement that combines nGage’s personalized mobile customer engagement capabilities with Web Decision’s omnichannel marketing database solutions to create a fully integrated database-drive mobile customer engagement solution.

Delia’s is still in the early stages of its turnaround efforts, but losses in the fourth quarter prompted the multichannel retailer that caters to teenage girls to offer preliminary results.

The company said that headwinds which continue to pressure the retail industry hampered its progress in the quarter.

Research Triangle Park, N.C. -- CrossView, a provider of cross-channel commerce and retail solutions, announced that it is using technology from IBM's Smarter Commerce portfolio to help premier confectioner, Lindt Chocolate, deliver personalized shopping experiences, increase online conversion rates and grow mobile sales.  

Cal-Maine Foods’ VP of operations-production Jack B. Self has died at the age of 84. Self had been an employee of Cal-Maine Foods since 1968.

Redmond, Wash. -- Microsoft Corp. has enhanced Microsoft Dynamics CRM by adding a comprehensive set of new marketing, customer care and social listening capabilities to the suite. The new release is expected in the second quarter of 2014.

MasterCard has teamed up with Points International so it can offer cardholders enhanced rewards that give them more ways to redeem, exchange and trade their rewards points.

The flexible rewards management and monetization options are expected to drive engagement and value to rewards programs offered by issuing banks participating in the MasterCard Rewards Platform.