By: Cathy Harms

I had the opportunity to attend the National Retail Federation's Annual Convention and Expo in New York at the beginning of January.  The NRF had a few key focuses – impact of mobile on retailing, impact of social media and all the new technology which is simplifying all aspects of retailing by integrating, analyzing and easily accessing all the information someone needs to manage multi-unit retail operations.  Over the next couple weeks, I will share some of my experiences and perspectives from the show.
One of the Expo Sessions was titled “Aligning the Agendas of the CMO and CIO” put on by Tom Kersten from Microsoft.  The presentation was informative and innovative.  The best part was a video they had developed that brought all the various technologies together to show what the customer experience will become in the future.  The video is about a mom who needs to go to the grocery store.  Here is her experience:

1. She enters her grocery list on her phone, of course the app already has many of her favorites that she simply clicks.  If the item is not on her list and she has the empty box, she can scan the code to add it to the list. 
2. Once her list is done, she transmits it to a coupon site to find coupons that work for her items.  She downloads those coupons onto her phone.
3. She goes to her favorite grocery store and when she walks in there is a large interactive screen that has the current specials of the day.  She downloads those specials into her coupon folder on her phone.
4. As she shops she scans the items and saves them on her phone.  If she is looking for an item, she can search on her phone and because of her GPS they can send her exactly where she needs to go.
5. There is no need to rescan items, she comes to the check out and sends the information from her phone and she is ready to pay.  This also lets her track how much money she is spending which can help her stay within her budget.
6. She can pay using her credit or debit card on her phone and she is out the door.

The process was quite amazing.  As a consumer I am not sure that I would want to be scanning every item that I buy as I buy it.  What happens for those vegetables that don’t have bar codes on them because their price is based on weight?  I am guessing there are a few of those details that would need to be worked out.  Also the fraud side of the process was not addressed. 

The part of the show that amazed me was the surprise by all the presenters about how fast the mobile and social marketing has grown in just one year.  Although loyalty marketing was not incorporated directly, utilizing the mobile phone would provide the authentication needed to award the loyalty points.

Check back next week for more insights from NRF.