The secret weapon every retailer needs this holiday season

We live in the age of the empowered consumer – with little patience and sky-high demands for personalized shopping experiences. Today’s consumers are used to having everything they want available to them at the swipe of a finger or within a physical store. When there’s an app for nearly everything along with ultra-accurate search technologies, brands need to make sure they’re delivering on their promises and providing seamless and relevant customer experiences across all channels –mobile, web, social, call center, physical stores and more. This means understanding customers on an emotional level and engaging them in real-time in a personalized way to deliver the most significant value tailored to their unique needs.



This might sound like a no-brainer, but a vast majority of brands are falling short. According to a recent study from IBM and Econsultancy, there is a significant gap between what consumers expect and what brands are able to deliver. A shocking four out of five consumers believe that the brands they interact with do not understand them as individuals – which can have huge implications on a brand’s success and bottom line.



As retailers gear up for the busy holiday shopping season, they must present themselves to their customers in the most relevant way possible regardless of channel. Brands must shift their focus and recognize that delivering great customer experiences is the responsibility of the entire organization – not just marketing or customer service. Merchandising plays a significant role in how customers interact with a brand and has the opportunity (and responsibility) to take a leadership role in delivering exceptional customer experiences that will make the difference between retail winners and losers this holiday season.



Gone are the days when merchandising managers operated in “set it and forget it” mode, planning their holiday store fronts in July with little flexibility to make changes during the critical fourth quarter. Merchants have realized that they need more control over how they present products and content to their customers. They must develop a deep understanding of how customers are living their lives to make the biggest impact – and more importantly, make the sale. Optimizing a brand’s merchandising strategy results in their customers receiving an iconic brand experience which will drive increased sales, improved inventory turnover and customer loyalty.



So how can merchants make their mark on the customer’s overall brand experience? The answer lies in analytics.



The golden ticket in this customer centric world is connecting data to insights and insights to action. Analytics are changing the retail game by providing visibility across all engagement channels to better understand customer buying patterns. Predictive and cognitive analytics allow merchants to be fully in tune with what’s happening in the market in real-time, including what products are performing better or worse than expected among various demographics and regions. For example, retailers can strategically mark down slow-selling products by knowing the optimal percentage and duration for markdowns based on competitive pricing data, customer demand forecasts, real-time inventory data, coupled with knowledge of regional or individual buying behaviors. This helps retailers drive sales while reclaiming valuable selling space, a clear win-win.



With the power of these insights, merchant are able to remove the guesswork from their day-to-day and react immediately to what’s working or not working by adjusting and personalizing what products they present to shoppers online and in store. An intelligent merchandising strategy should be closely tied to inventory management and fulfillment to ensure that featured products not only reach the right eye balls at the right time, but that the infrastructure is in place to deliver those products to the customer’s doorstep as promised.



With the upcoming holiday shopping season expected to be bigger than ever before – according to the IBM Holiday Readiness Report, growth in e-commerce sales on U.S. retail websites has exceeded 10% each quarter over the past year – it’s clear brands need to leverage all of the tools at their disposal in order to provide engaging experiences across all channels. Through analytics, retailers are able to better understand and design a relevant experience for each and every customer.



Today’s brands need to look beyond the forecasting data that has historically driven merchandising decisions. Instead, they must evolve as fast as their customers do by adapting to current market conditions and use real-time data as their secret weapon. By leveraging analytics solutions, retailers can more intelligently determine the most desirable and profitable experience – including products, content, prices, promotions and markdowns – to put forward at any given time. That is what customers demand, and the time to deliver is now.

Adam Orentlicher is Director of e-commerce Offerings & Strategy for IBM Commerce. He is responsible for leading IBM's cross-unit, cross-discipline team responsible for IBM WebSphere Commerce, IBM Commerce on Cloud, IBM's SaaS-based integrated marketing, selling and fulfillment platform leveraging IBM WebSphere Commerce, IBM Sterling Order Management, and IBM Sterling Configure, Price, Quote.