BrainTrust Query: 2011 Predictions for Retail Technology
Through a special arrangement, presented here for discussion is an excerpt from a current article from Insight-Driven Retailing Blog.
I don't have any bold predictions for 2011 as I believe the new year will be marked by the maturation of several technologies instead of brand new things we've not seen before.
Here are six areas to watch in 2011:
1. Alternate Payments: We've seen several alternate payment schemes emerge over the last two years and 2011 may be the year one of them takes hold. Any competition that can drive down fees will be good for everyone. I'm betting that Apple will add NFC chips to their next version of the iPhone, then enable payments in stores using iTunes accounts on the backend. PayPal will continue to make inroads, and Isis will announce a pilot.
2. Engineered Systems: The industry is moving toward purpose-built appliances that are optimized across the entire stack. Oracle calls these "engineered systems" and the first two examples are Exadata and Exalogic, but there are other examples from other vendors. These are particularly important to the retail industry because of the volume of data that must be processed. There should be continued adoption in 2011.
3. Social Analytics: There are lots of tools that provide insight into how a brand is perceived across popular internet sites, but as far as I know, these tools are not industry specific. The next step needs to mine the data and determine how it should influence retail operations. The data needs to help retailers determine how they create promotions, which products to stock, and how to keep consumers engaged. Social data alone does not provide the answers, but it's one more data point that will help retailers make better decisions. Look for some vendor consolidation to help make this happen.
4. 2-D Barcodes: Look for more QRCodes on shelf-tags, in newspaper circulars, and on billboards. It's a great portal from the physical world into the digital one that buys us time until augmented reality matures further. Nobody wants to type "www", backslash, and ".com" on their phones.
5. In the words of Microsoft, "To the Cloud!": My favorite "cloud application" is Evernote. If you take notes on your work laptop, you will inevitably need those notes on your home PC. And if you manage to solve that problem, you'll need to access them from your mobile phone. Evernote stores your notes in the cloud and provides easy ways to access them. Being able to access a service from anywhere and not having to worry about backups, upgrades, etc. is great. Retailers will start to rely on cloud services, both public and private, in the coming year.
6. F-Commerce: Move over "E" and "M" so we can introduce "F-Commerce," which should go mainstream in 2011. Already several retailers have created small stores on Facebook, and it won't be long before Facebook becomes a full-fledged channel in the omni-channel world of retail. The battle between Facebook and Google will heat up over retail, where both stand to make lots of money.
Discussion Questions: Which of the retail technology predictions mentioned in the article will gain momentum in 2011? Which seem to be a few years off? Are there others you would add?