Tweetless in New York: A Look Back at NRF's BIG Show 2010

Now that everyone has had some time to decompress after the jam-packed NRF Big Show 2010, it’s time to look back at what can actually be taken from the event to help retailers move ahead and stay competitive in the increasingly changing retail world as we enter the second decade of the 21st century. This year, the main buzz was all about three major components of modern retail: social, mobile, and multi-channel. Ironically, technical difficulties preventing many attendees from accessing their mobile services from the show floor, and there were quite a few unnecessary headaches.

Of course, no one should be surprised that mobile, social, and multi-channel retail were the buzzwords this year; the signs are all around us! Social networking is ubiquitous, with everyone from your preteen daughter to your elderly grandmother “friending” you on Facebook or tweeting about their day's activities. This is important because, according to a recent report by Econsultancy, 90% of online shoppers trust online purchase recommendations from people they know. There really is nothing better than word-of-mouth advertising, and the ever-growing social networking medium has only made word-of-mouth (or word-of-keyboard?) more essential for retailers to harness.

These days, however, there’s always an easier way to share with your friends online. The most recent major addition to the universe of social networking is Blippy.com, which launched last week. Blippy is a website which, simply put, broadcasts every single purchase you make on your credit card, for everyone to see. Why bother to post a recommendation on Facebook for a good restaurant, when all your friends can simply log into Blippy and see that you just spent $250 there?

Personally, I can’t ever see myself joining Blippy (because I don’t want my parents or employers seeing me throw away $40 at the bars on a Wednesday night), but even the main page of the website is something to behold; I just watched a man in Delaware spend $184.47 at a Home Depot, and another man in Utah just spent $589.24 at the Powderwood Resort. And then, amazingly, I found myself looking at the Powderwood Resort’s website and thinking, “Huh. That seems like a really nice place to stay.” I now know that the Powderwood Resort exists, and if I’m ever planning a vacation to Utah, I’ll probably look there first. Behold the addicting magic of Blippy!

In addition to social networking, the mobile component is similarly changing the way people shop. Previously, the internet was a separate entity in a fixed location that you would “go to” when you needed to look something up. It was really not very different from another store, albeit a store parked on top of your own desk - and many retailers even manage "ecommerce" as a separate store. But things have changed, and retailers cannot afford to think of the internet as a separate destination -- it is everywhere, and a growing number of shoppers are connected to the internet 24/7 through their phones and mobile devices. When I recently stepped into Powell’s Books in downtown Portland, I picked up a book and headed to the checkout line. Halfway there, I stopped, snapped a picture of the cover of the book on my Motorola Droid, and the Amazon app told me I could buy it online for $5 less. I purchased the book using my phone, returned Powell’s copy to the shelf, and walked out of the store empty-handed. Put simply: If you’re not already in the mobile retailing game, you need to be.

The multi-channel approach has been around longer than social networking or mobile retailing, but that does not mean the art of multi-channel retail has been perfected. To shoppers, it is practically second nature to research a purchase online before buying it offline. To remain competitive, a store needs to use its website to make it simple and fast for a potential customer to find what they are looking for, and to make that purchase from you. If you don’t have the desired item in stock, then consumers expect you to get it for them -- after all, you sell it on your website, don’t you? -- and at no extra cost.

Despite the buzz and the importance of these topics at NRF, however, all three of these components failed miserably at the Javits Center. Many attendees discovered it was practically impossible to get a phone signal, so people like GREC staff were unable to live tweet and provide real-time updates on the sessions or from the show floor. People NOT attending the show were looking for real-time coverage via Twitter and blog posts, not waiting for days for a post-show wrapup. It's 2010, not 1999, and persistent and reliable network connectivity should be pretty much ubiquitous -- especially in New York City! This didn't just hit the press, it also diminished the messages and ideas of the presenters as they got far less exposure than they should have. I know I personally was looking forward to getting to hear about the presentations and events via Twitter, only to see the updates few and far between (and many of those updates simply being variations of, “Why are all my calls being dropped? ARRRGHHH!” or "No signal, no tweets").

So the real question is: How can retailers who attended the show believe the three hot buzzwords would impact their stores when they themselves could not even experience it during the event? While these concepts ARE very important, it seems kind of ironic to stress social and mobile retail while simultaneously venting your frustration about not being able to access Twitter on your phone!

The silver lining is that there is an important lesson in these unfortunate technological failures. For those retailers who experienced technical difficulties at the show, you should remember your frustration as an example of what customers feel when a retailer’s website is virtually useless in augmenting their purchasing decisions. That feeling you had, where you thought, “I really wish I could tweet this amazing quote to my followers!” is an example of what you want your customers to feel, to get them thinking, “Oh, I should tweet about this amazing product I just bought!”

So while there were some frustrations and headaches due to the technical setbacks, the overall message is the same: Social networking, mobile devices, and the internet are changing retail forever, and if you want to flourish, you need to make sure your customers don’t ever get the same type of headache attendees experienced from their phones failing on the show floor.

Comments

[Bob Phibbs, the Retail Doctor]

I think you are right on Danny, with all the technology partners like Verizon, AT&T and Motorola, Cisco and the like, you'd think NRF would have a way of making this a thing of the past for next year's big 100th. I wrote about this and a few other ways to enhance the experience at http://www.retaildoc.com/blog/national-retail-federation/nrf10

[Todd Michaud]

Remember in the late 90s when cell phone calls would drop all the time? (or was that last week with my iPhone in NYC???). There is always this rubber-band effect between great ideas and infrastructure capacity to deliver those great ideas. Just like the early days of cell phone usage, we are all getting accustomed to having little computers in our hands to help us do some really cool stuff. The problem is that the infrastructure just isn't ready.

I seem to be alone on this, but I think that Blippy is going to rock-people's world in ways they haven't considered. It is the first time that a retailers purchase information has been published publicly without their permission. I can easily go to Blippy and search my competitors and see how much people are spending with them, and there is nothing that they can do about it. WILD!