Data & Analytics

New York – Disney and Ralph Lauren, vertical brands with a strong retail presence, are the highest-ranked retailers in a new Brand Keys survey of what brands U.S. consumers consider the most patriotic. To determine the rankings, Brand Keys drilled down into consumer response to 230 brands to see which were most associated with the value of patriotism.

Following is a list of the retailers who made the list of top 50 most patriotic brands, with their emotional engagement strength for patriotism:

No. 3: Disney (96%)

Dufftown, Scotland - Providing customers with their own unique experience with the brand is of the upmost importance to Scotch whisky provider Glenfiddich. The company is using interactive technology to let customers located in Thailand virtually tour the Glenfiddich Distillery located in Dufftown, Scotland.

Retailers face a tough battle to generate growth in the face of unprecedented competition from global rivals and digital rivals, but many are overlooking what could be their best opportunity. Improving the way employees interact with customers – whether in stores, online or even via call centers – is a proven route to enhanced sales performance, but too few retailers are focused on doing so.

Armonk, N.Y. – When consumers look for Father’s Day gifts, they increasingly are doing so on the go. According to new IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark data, mobile accounted for more than 48% of all online Father’s Day traffic in 2015.

This figure was just shy of desktop, which claimed 51.7%, a far slimmer gap than 2014. For sales however, desktop remains supreme, accounting for 74.3% of sales (compared to 25.7% for mobile) and driving average order values of $115.12, compared to mobile devices at $93.14.

Seattle – Amazon.com is reportedly using a proprietary machine learning solution to analyze online customer reviews and present newer and more relevant reviews first. According to CNet, the system takes into account factors such as newness, whether the review was written by a verified Amazon purchaser and how many customers found the review helpful.

CVS Health has selected a DigitasLBi executive to be its next marketing chief.

Hangzhou, China – Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Holding Group Inc. will reportedly pull the plug on its 11Main U.S. specialty e-commerce site. According to TechCrunch, Alibaba plans to fold 11Main into New York-based social shopping platform OpenSky.

All good things must come to end — including, after nearly four years, my contributions to this column. “Retail Rap” will soon be forging on without me. This is the first of two final columns I’ll be contributing, and I’ll beg your indulgence if I wax nostalgic at times in this, column number 99, and in my last submission two weeks from now, Retail Rap number 100.