Jill Puleri, Vice President, Global Retail Leader, IBM

By Jill Puleri

These are crucial times for brick-and-mortar retailers as they evolve to put the consumer at the center of all that they do. Those that make good decisions are going to prosper; those who don’t are going to slip to the back.

Central to retailers’ ability to remain relevant is their response to the mobile opportunity. Mobile commerce is expected grow 115 percent over the next 12 months. Though the opportunity is clear, capitalizing on it is full of complexity as retailers integrate web sites and supply chains together with the numerous mobile devices that consumers are using to shop.

Just a few years ago, many retailers were working feverishly to push out shopping applications for mobile devices. There was good reason for the rush: tens of millions of consumers are jumping on the smart-phone band wagon and using them to shop.

As it turns out, mobile apps haven’t proven to be silver bullet to the mobile commerce challenge. From an IBM survey of 26,000 consumers, we learned that they would rather access a retailer’s website than launch a shopping app.  Only 15 percent of consumers were aware that a retailer had a mobile application; just 5 percent downloaded the app and a mere 3 percent actually used it.

That’s not to say that mobile shopping isn’t gaining momentum, it’s just that consumers want to shop on their own terms and on their preferred platforms. With mobile technology enabling new and unconventional retail models at every turn, more traditional retailers are going back to basics. 

Usability and accessibility are key to closing the mobile sale. Terms like, “single click to buy” or “thumb enabled” are now top of mind when it comes to mobile strategies. Today’s consumers have more choice and little patience, so retailers now need to act and act quickly. 

I’ve spent my entire career in retail, focusing on solving my clients’ most important business challenges, and showing them the next big possibility at the intersection of their business and advanced technology. If retailers miss major shifts like mobile now, they’re at serious risk. It’s exciting, scary, complex, intense, motivating – all at the same time.

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Today, Puleri was recognized as one of Consulting Magazine’s Top 25 Consultants for excellence in retail.

Technorati Tags: Big Data, IBM Smarter Planet, innovation, Mobile Retail, mobile retailing, mobile shopping, Smarter Retailing

Michael Haydock, Chief Scientist, IBM Global Business Services, Retail Analytics Leader

By Michael Haydock

Jewelry sales are set to shine this year and expected to grow more than 11 percent in the second quarter and nine percent overall this year, according to a new Big Data-based retail forecast from IBM.

According to the analysis, improved consumer confidence, lower unemployment and enhanced stock dividends from the fourth quarter of 2012 have combined to leave people ready to start spending on luxury items again, like jewelry.

In addition, key retailers are buttressing the economic landscape and driving sales by leveraging Big Data analytics to better understand and respond to customers and trends. Sterling Jewelers, for example, which owns the popular Jared and Kay brands, overhauled its digital channels to better respond to changing consumer preferences. The move led to an increase in online sales of 49 percent this past holiday season.

Sterling commissioned IBM for research that included a customer segmentation analysis, voice of the customer surveys and in-store observations. With deeper insights into customer needs and distinct shopping scenarios – as well as the capabilities required to support them online – they were able to extend the Kay and Jared in-store shopping experience online and into the mobile channel.

IBM’s retail analytics forecast examines some 22 years of historical retail data from the U.S. Census Bureau, which captures sales observations from over 46,000 retailers monthly from 1992 to the present. It also examines consumer confidence, disposable income, and unemployment data, stock market information, and a long list of other factors. The company then applies patented algorithms to the data to model seasonal peaks and patterns, making IBM’s retail forecasts over 97 percent accurate – four times more accurate than retailers’ own forecasts.

Armed with these hyper-accurate forecasts, retailers can get ahead of trends to ensure that the right product mix in their stores, allocate the best use of advertisement dollars and make sure they have the right number of staff to ride the peaks and valleys ahead.

In addition to the projected spike in jewelry sales, the latest forecast also predicts a boost to in-store consumer electronics sales, which are projected to grow 2.33 percent in the second quarter and 1.58 percent overall for 2013, after five years of decline. Though a modest gain, the news is welcome to an industry that has been challenged by the rising impact of new social retailing phenomena, such as showrooming, in which consumers look at items in a store before ultimately buying them online – usually at lower prices.

IBM is betting that Big Data analytics can be used to help companies unlock new areas of business and better serve clients. Researchers at the new IBM Customer Experience Lab are developing the IBM Virtual Closet, a prototype technology that enables retailers to look at items consumers recently purchased or showed an interest in – whether online, in a physical store or on a social network – and tailor recommendations based on that consumer’s unique taste and style.

The Virtual Closet is a great illustration of how retailers can use Big Data to better serve clients. By using information to provide exceptional customer experiences, whether online or in a store, companies will be able to attract more loyal customers and engage them in an ongoing relationship rather than a series of isolated transactions.

The challenge facing all retailers is how to successfully use Big Data to understand their customers and grow sales. The information is already out there. Now it needs to be optimized, analyzed and leveraged and that will require shifts in how retailers operate. But as the report shows, they’re starting to get it.

Technorati Tags: analysis, Analytics, Big Data, Big Data analytics, IBM Smarter Planet, innovation, mobile retailing, showrooming, smarter commerce, Smarter Retailing

Ade Shannon, CEO, LabelSneak

By Ade Shannon

Interest in Big Data has reached new heights for many small companies as they attempt to capture information to glean insights from the ongoing conversations on social channels such as Facebook, twitter and consumer blogs.

Businesses large and small face the challenge of vying for consumers who look around and research extensively for the right deal before they buy. And when they do make a buying decision, they express their views and talk about it to everyone – instantly. They blog about it, they post reviews, they want to be heard, they want dialog. They also will loudly change brands and loyalties if crossed. In short, consumers are increasingly influencers, informed, expressive and networked shoppers who have evolved into “networks of intelligence” and a key voice for a brand.

With consumer behavior so volatile, marketers need to know what consumers want, before the consumers do themselves. Besides analyzing their own data to learn how they have performed in the past, businesses need to be able to look forward and change before the market does.

It’s this data that allows small businesses to provide personalization and customization tailored to the specific needs and wants of individual consumers – just as local merchants used to do, only better. However, many small businesses still lack Big Data expertise.

Small businesses are starting to grasp the gold that is buried in the vast amounts of data generated by shoppers using social media and mobile devices. They are just looking for ways to mine this data to gain insight.

By 2020, Big Data will help increase the level of personalization, localization and other considerations that enable small businesses to enhance their presentation. Take, for example, social shopping: consumers involve friends and others, sharing and liking real-time text and photo streams during the shopping experience, and perhaps driving these participants to buy.  Big Data also is driving automation, creating a wealth of new smart apps and technologies able to anticipate our needs. Or its prompting issue-influenced decisions, where consumers consider sustainability or conservation as part of their purchase decision process. 

Applying Big Data analytics can help small retailers track and understand what’s being said out there. But the leap in value comes when they combine this intelligence with theirs and other data sources in a meaningful way, to mute the social data noise from the valuable insights and move their business forward.  

The technologies to achieve these goals for small businesses are available and more affordable than most small businesses expect, especially when factoring in the losses from a lack of investment in a world where competitors are. What’s required are the smarts: knowing which questions to ask of the data and how the organization can best use what it finds. Understanding the value of Big Data is generating increasing demand among small businesses for insight on how to better understand and connect with consumers.

As small businesses learn how to take advantage of customer data and evolving consumer marketing channels, their operations will continue to change significantly. Small businesses will take note if you can show them how to gain consumer insights from their own data. The collaboration with a local technology provider can help a small business take advantage of some of the most effective methods to gain this data insight, while simultaneously bringing a deep level of industry expertise.

Small businesses that understand this consumer value variation will be best positioned to stay ahead of the competition in this Big Data revolution. 

Over the next few years, emerging analytical technologies will covert even more daunting data streams into actionable business insight and provide consumers with a more satisfying shopping experience – one worth spreading the word about.

Technorati Tags: IBM Smarter Planet, innovation, small business, Smarter Retailing, SMB, social business, social media

George Murray, Senior Vice President of Marketing, Sterling Jewelers Inc.

By George Murray

Today’s retail environment is witnessing the convergence of competition and innovation evidenced by the growing trend in “show-rooming.”  Every company is looking for ways to make the consumer’s omni-channel shopping experience more convenient, and while the keys to achieving this are fairly universal the journey to integrating them in a relevant way is not.

At Sterling Jewelers, we launched ecommerce for our Kay® Jewelers and Jared® the Galleria of Jewelry brands as an additional means of meeting our customers’ evolving needs.  Since the introduction of our online platform, we have worked to develop a true digital eco-system, which is focused on how a shopper experiences, interacts with and ultimately purchases our products.

As part of this ongoing initiative, we recently focused on advancing our existing multi-channel retail strategy. This effort included a redesign of our Kay.com and Jared.com websites, the launch of new transactional mobile sites for both brands and the implementation of a social media strategy focused on engaging consumers in the spaces that are most relevant to them. We also launched a mobile app through the iTunes App Store and Google Play, and introduced our catalogs on the Google Catalogs app to offer mobile shoppers even more opportunities to interact with our brands.

Our goal was to deliver a more consistent, branded and personalized experience to Kay and Jared customers everywhere they shop – whether in a physical store, online or via mobile. To achieve this we leveraged our expertise in customer service and merchandising with the experience of strategic partners in terms of optimized navigation, functionality and mobile retailing.

To help define our roadmap, we commissioned research that included a customer segmentation analysis, voice of the customer surveys and in-store observations. With deeper insights into customer needs and distinct shopping scenarios, as well as the capabilities required to support them online, we were able to deploy an integrated omni-channel solution that extends the Kay and Jared in-store shopping experience online and into the mobile channel.

The initiative has already resulted in bottom line growth for our business, with consistent increases in year-over-year online sales for both brands. More importantly, it has also created new opportunities for us to continue to evaluate, improve and evolve our customers’ overall shopping experience.

Technorati Tags: Analytics, IBM Smarter Planet, mobile computing, retailing, Smarter Retailing, social business, social media

Jill Puleri, Global Retail Leader, IBM

Technorati Tags: Analytics, Big Data, IBM retail online index, IBM Smarter Planet, innovation, mobile computing, mobile retailing, online retail, Smarter Retailing

Dr. Trevor Davis, Consumer Products Expert, IBM Global Business Services

By Dr. Trevor Davis

Today, smart retailers are using sentiment analysis and social listening to keep one step ahead of trends as they develop – identifying which trends have staying power, when to act on them, and how to use them to their best advantage.

Some social media trends come and go in a day.  Some can remain unnoticed for years until they spring into public consciousness and everyone realises that the trend had been there all along – suddenly, like the exclusive model of automobile you just bought, ‘it’ is everywhere.

Some trends, like ‘steampunk,’ take decades to build momentum and make the break into the mainstream. Perhaps I am getting ahead of myself. What is steampunk and why should you care?

Steampunk is usually defined as a sub-genre of science fiction that concentrates on alterative world stories inspired by the technology, clothing and social mores of Victorian society. The stories of Jules Verne and H G Wells are often cited as inspirations. If you are a film fan you may have had a taste in the Will Smith movie “Wild, Wild, West” with steam-powered machines set in the Old West. Maybe you were in New York at Christmas 2011 and saw Macy’s holiday window dressed by designer Paul Olszewski in steampunk style.

Click the image to view an infographic of the Birth of a Trend.

The aesthetics of steampunk are broad and diverse – goggles, intricate jewelry based on clockwork, exquisite frock coats, corsets, top hats, brass and leather.  Steampunk isn’t just about fiction any more, and it isn’t just for fans. Interesting to note, 33 percent of the chatter about fashion can be found on gaming sites.

Gaining Momentum

The trajectory for steampunk as a popular social and cultural trend is on the rise. From 2009 to 2012 the amount of social media chatter about steampunk rose by an astonishing 11 times. Recently, the 2012 Paralympics closing ceremony put the global spotlight on steampunk when singer Rihanna made her entrance on a steam sailing-ship to a world television audience of 3.4 billion. In addition, Lady Gaga has been photographed in neo-Victorian garb. Now a US television network is writing a steampunk-inspired TV show for the fall 2013 season.

As this trend gains momentum, the business opportunity around steampunk is being capitalized on by forward-looking retailers.  Perhaps most notably is the current Prada Fall/Winter collection for men – elegant, stripped-back steampunk fashion modelled by Gary Oldman, Garrett Hedlund, Jamie Bell, and Willem Dafoe.  Where high fashion leads, everyday fashion follows quickly in a season or two.

The Science of Trend Spotting

Unlike my previous work on Cycle Chic (where the trend moved geographically over time) steampunk has become a style influence on mainstream clothing, accessories and home furnishings after several cultural leaps. In social media it is possible to analyse the move from fiction to fandom and music-making. Then to low-volume craft-makers to costuming. Next, promotion by cool-hunters and the attention of a few leading retailers. Now celebrities, high fashion and interior design.

For steampunk, the tipping point came in October 2010, when NYC ComicCon and a NYC Haunted House Halloween event both featured steampunk themes. Two months after that exposure, the level of social chatter more than doubled. Shortly thereafter, US department stores and specialty retail shops began to feature steampunk-inspired window displays and steampunk-inspired clothing and accessories as ways to increase footfall.

We’re used to seeing trends develop geographically and chronologically. But thanks to advanced IBM analytics we can now measure trends in a third dimension: across cultural domains. For retailers and manufacturers, the beauty of seeing trends in “three dimensions” is being able to identify enduring trends before they’re big on Facebook and Twitter (and note that Twitter has six times the steampunk chatter as Facebook). This enables the smart money to get in front of the trend before it saturates the mainstream.

For steampunk, the next two years will witness the shift from low production, high cost “craft” manufacturing to mass production. Mainstream fashion labels, accessories and jewelry will all begin adopting a steampunk aesthetic. For retailers, this is the moment to start laying the groundwork to capitalize on this emerging trend.

Follow the conversation at #IBMPopData or #NRF13.

Technorati Tags: Analytics, fad, IBM, social media, social sentiment, steampunk, trend, Trevor Davis

Karen Lowe, General Manager, Global Retail Industry, IBM

By Karen Lowe

The beginning of every new year is a fresh opportunity to define strategies for success in the year ahead. Once again, I look forward to discussing the state of the retail industry with clients and influencers at the National Retail Federation’s (NRF’s) BIG Show when it kicks off this weekend.

This year, IBM continues its focus on making retail smarter, enabling retailers to put their customers first. One of the most profound challenges facing retailers today is the need to allow customers to connect and shop anywhere, anyhow and anytime.

We all know that technology has driven major changes in how we browse, compare and purchase products. Shopping from mobile devices is increasing exponentially. In fact, 70 percent more consumers used a mobile device to visit a retailer’s site on Cyber Monday in 2012 than 2011, according to the IBM Digital Analytics benchmark.

To help retailers respond, IBM researchers have been working in our labs to innovate the shopping experience – both in-store and out.

Yesterday, IBM announced that it was the leading recipient ofU.S. patents in 2012, marking the company’s 20th consecutive year as the world’s most inventive company. IBM’s 2012 patents include innovations that will enable fundamental advancements in retail, including:

• A patent for product identification that would enable a user to find out more details about a product using a photo and whatever information they can provide. For example, if a consumer sees a photo of a couch they like in an online article on decorating ideas, they could use the technology found in this patent to learn what retailer it’s from and if it’s available for purchase.
• A patent for 3D image streaming would enable a retailer to create a more personalized shopping experience for its customers in the store by capturing 3D movement of the consumer as they navigate through the establishment and identifying behavior in response to stimulus.
• A patent to enable two people to simultaneously browse and shop the same web pages. For example, let’s say a user finds an article or description of a product or service they like and copies it. A server detects the copy operation and displays an invitation to co-browse the page with a friend of the user. The user copies the invitation and pastes it in an e-mail to the friend. The friend opens the mail and joins the browsing session. After that, they can go through the web page sharing the same views.

IBM has a long history of innovating how retailers work. For example, a patent awarded IBM in 1994 formed a cornerstone of e-commerce as we know it, helping automate the online ordering process. IBM researchers also broke new ground by developing the first point-of-sale system, the barcode and the first magnetic stripe technology used for credit cards.

Continued innovation is essential as retailers evolve to meet the needs of the empowered consumer. The path-to-purchase has become disconnected and complex due to a variety of factors including social media and device explosion. In response, smarter retailers must adopt a customer-centric approach across the organization, look beyond traditional markets for growth and drive down costs while increasing operational efficiency.

I can’t wait to discuss this further at NRF. You can join the discussion on twitter with #IBMNRF and #smarterretail.

Technorati Tags: IBM Patents, IBM Smarter Planet, IBM Smarter Retailing, innovation, National Retail Federation, Smarter Retailing

Katrina Read, Business Analytics Solution Architect, IBM

By Katrina Read

For retailers, the busy holiday season brings the opportunity for significant revenue, but also the added stress of making sure shelves are stocked to provide maximize returns. Which begs the question: how do you know what products should be stocked in which stores?

The use of predictive analytics in the retail industry is not new – in fact it was one of the first commercial industries to really adopt the use of mathematical algorithms to predict future sales. And yet, I often find myself standing in front of empty shelves wondering how they could get it so wrong.

While this is the giving season, my gift to you, fellow retailers, is this advice: WWW. No, I’m not talking about the World Wide Web. WWW is short for, Who, What and When – the three W’s that every retailer must focus on in this new world of smarter commerce.

WHO

First and foremost it’s important to understand who your customers are. Simple demographics such as age, gender, location, etc. are easy to come by. The most valuable information about customers is not where they shopped and what they bought, but where they are most likely to shop, what they are most likely to buy, and what offers they are most likely to accept to help increase wallet share. This kind of information is not readily available, and requires predictive technology to uncover the hidden trends and patterns in historical data to predict what is likely to happen in the future. With this predictive insight, we can make more informed decisions about what catalogues and offers to send to which customers, for which stores.

With the recent IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark reporting an increase in online sales of 20.7 percent compared with Black Friday last year, and a staggering 24 percent of consumers using mobile devices to visit a retailer’s store (up from 9.8 percent in 2011), now it’s even more important to understand intimate details about your customers’ buying patterns and habits. Knowing your customers’ preference for buying online could dramatically change the way you market your products and offers – whether it be to increase your share of wallet spend online, or find innovative and unique ways to encourage them into a store for face-to-face customer service. 

WHAT

Understanding what customers are likely to purchase is important for both the existing and potential customers. While reward programs and loyalty cards allow us to identify and understand an individual customer, the holiday season brings with it crowds of unknown and potential customers all looking for that something special. Analytics can help identify current trends and topics in social media that are related to a particular brand. This insight can then be used to identify products that are on trend and therefore need to be stocked to maximum levels before the shopping frenzy begins. For example, a store can decide which shoes to stock more or less of – positive trends in relation to “Ruby Red” shoes could identify an item that is going to be on many wish lists and should therefore dominate the shelves.

Furthermore, highlights from Black Friday 2012 showed us the pervasiveness of social media in real time, being able to tap into consumer sentiment while the promotions are unfolding to understand how they are being received and take subsequent action.

WHEN

Understanding when customers are going to purchase holiday gifts is especially important as it impacts not only stock levels and marketing campaigns, but at this particular time of the year, it also impacts store operating hours. Having greater insight into when people are likely to do their holiday shopping can help plan store opening hours, and avoid the costly “open all night” events that see more employees than actual customers. Are the customers that shop at 2:00 a.m. profitable? If not, then why open the store? 

Similarly, if your customers happen to fall within the 24 percent of consumers shopping mobile this year, they may be more interested in knowing you have round-the-clock packing and shipping to ensure their order is on the first mail run the next morning.

This post is as much about me as it is about retailers. Selfishly, I want my favorite store to be open at a time that is convenient to me and to stock the items on my holiday gift list. Is that too much to ask? Analytics say, no.

For more insight on how analytics can add value to retail organizations visit my blog.

Technorati Tags: IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark, IBM Smarter Planet, predictive anal, smarter analytics, Smarter Retailing

Kathleen Ryan, Writer, IBM Communications

By Kathleen Ryan

Universal Product Codes (UPCs) are part of our everyday lives. Whether we’re checking out groceries at the supermarket, getting medicine from the pharmacy, or shipping a package, the bar code and scanner are standard technologies for capturing and registering pricing and other retail information.

But it wasn’t always this way. Before bar codes, the process of pricing was laborious, time consuming and a drain on resources. Prices were placed on individual products by hand, usually with the thump of a price “stamper,” and then read by a cashier who then tapped the price into the cash register, by hand. Weekly price changes started the process all over again.

That all changed in June of 1974 when a clerk scanned a pack of Wrigley’s gum at a supermarket in Troy, Ohio. The technology rapidly took hold and today it shows up on virtually every retail product. Today the non-profit governing body for bar codes says that uniform standards for UPC codes are used by more than one million companies around the world.

One of the pioneers of bar code technology, retired IBM employee N. Joseph Woodland, died this week. He was 91.

N. Joseph Woodland, National Medal of Technology, National Inventors Hall of Fame, IBM

I had the privilege of interviewing Joe Woodland back in 2004. The U.S. was adopting the European standard of UPC codes. Joe was a little hard of hearing, but he could remember events from 50 years earlier as if they took place the day before.

Woodland talked about how he and a colleague began thinking about codes for supermarket products in the late 1940s after hearing grocery store operators complain about high labor costs associated with manual price changes.

His inspiration? Morse code.

“Morse code had been used in flashes of light and in flashes of sound,”Woodland said. “I got the bright idea of putting it on paper so that it could be scanned by a computer.”

He joined IBM in 1951. “I went to IBM to see if they would be interested in using the technology that I had come up with,” Woodland said. “I really started to work on it while I was on the faculty at Drexel (University).”

Woodland and Bernard Silver, his co-inventor, received patent No. 2,612,994 in 1952 for their idea, though the patent was for a circular “bull’s eye” image, rather than the familiar rectangular shape that was developed a couple of decades later as the technology caught up to the invention.

“I was sitting in my office at IBM in White Plains, N.Y., and I received a phone call from someone who later became one of my best friends,”Woodland said. They talked about bar code technology and within a few hours,Woodland was told to transfer to Raleigh, N.C., to work on the team that IBM had assembled to help retailers adopt the bar code technology in advance of the 1974 launch at Marsh’s Grocery Stores in Ohio.

From 1971 through 1982, Woodland was responsible for developing IBM’s UPC technology and selling it to the grocery industry. He worked with George J. Lauer, another IBM employee, now retired, who developed the engineering behind the rectangular appearance of the modern-day bar code.

During the 1992 presidential election race, then-President George H.W. Bush made news headlines when he seemed surprised by products being scanned in a store though the technology had been in use for almost two decades. Later that year, President Bush awarded a National Medal of Technology to Woodland for his “invention and contribution to the commercialization of bar code technology, which improved productivity in every industrial sector.”

During the White House Rose Garden ceremony, Woodland said, “When President Bush gave me the medal, he said, ‘There are people that felt I didn’t know what a bar code was when I saw it. But I really know what it is now.’”

Woodland was inducted in the National Inventors Hall of Fame last year. As noted in his obituary in the New York Times, Woodland worked on the Manhattan Project during World War II, and is survived by his wife and other family members.

During IBM’s Centennial Year in 2011, the bar code’s success was named one of the company’s Icons of Progress because of the tremendous role that UPC codes played in the transformation of the retail industry worldwide over the past five decades.

Technorati Tags: IBM Smarter Commerce, N. Joseph Woodland, Smarter Retailing

Craig Hayman, General Manager, IBM Industry Solutions

By Craig Hayman

We’ve seen some interesting holiday shopping trends again this year. Consumers took serious advantage of early promotions, driving a 17.4 percent increase in online sales on Thanksgiving Day. This set the stage for 20.7 percent growth on Black Friday. And the biggest surge came from mobile consumers, with sales hitting 16.3 percent.

Impressive stats – which made for some happy retailers – to lead into the holidays. But where do these numbers come from? What are they based on? And who do they represent?

These and other shopping trends such as sales by category, by device and from social channels are analyzed by the IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark. It’s a cloud-based digital analytics platform that uses, collects and analyzes digital information on how consumers are responding to the products and services being offered to them online 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. The benchmark tracks more than a million ecommerce transactions a day, analyzing terabytes of raw data from more than 500 retailers nationwide. 

Analysis of how shoppers feel about the retail environment and what they’re buying comes from the IBM Social Sentiment Index, an advanced analytics and natural language processing tool that analyzes large volumes of social media data to assess public opinions.

IBM’s goal with initiatives like the IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark is to give retailers, CMO’s, the media, industry analysts and influencers, insights about consumer shopping trends across a wide variety of channels, including social media, mobile devices, and other online sources where consumers interact with their brands.

With this information in hand, for example, retailers can make more accurate, fact-based decisions on marketing expenditures and have the ability to meet the individual needs of customers. This can lead to improvements in sourcing, inventory management, marketing and sales along with more satisfied customers.

Today, the IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark is considered by many to be the de facto source for online shopping trends. In fact, the benchmark results announced last week have been cited in more than 10,000 media articles to date, which is a pretty good indicator of its influence.

IBM is committed to helping retailers deliver highly personalized experiences for shopping customers that are consistent across all channels. This season, it makes for happier holidays and smarter commerce for all.

Additional coverage of the holiday shopping season

• Mobile Helps Savvy Shoppers Cash In Over Thanksgiving and Black Friday
• Cyber Monday to be a Record Setter
• Multi-Channel Shoppers are the Real Winners this Black Friday
• The Digital Consumer Fuels Cyber Monday’s Record-Breaking Sales
• IBM Smarter Commerce Blog

Technorati Tags: Analytics, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, holiday shopping, IBM retail online index, IBM Smarter Planet, IBM Smarter Retailing, smarter analytics, Smarter Retailing