Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Retail technology is rapidly evolving to create a more convenient, fun and immersive in-store and online experience. Here are ten trends to look out for in 2014.

Though there’s no doubt we’re still a nation that needs to be careful with its cash, the dark clouds of recent austerity are starting to float away to reveal a more optimistic, more promising future.

We’re not out of the woods yet, for sure, and the vast majority of people still feel we’re in a recession, but market confidence is starting to return and the masses are beginning, albeit cautiously, to dip into their wallets again.

This change in consumer attitude is also being complimented by the raft of new technology designed to make the shopping experience more accessible, convenient and fun. Peaks and troughs and trends are prevalent in practically every element of society – and retail is absolutely no different....

Retailers have discovered reverse showrooming is more common than showrooming, and they're using it to regain ground.In the past few years, as online shopping exploded and smartphones became the norm, the showrooming phenomenon — consumers using their phones to comparison shop in stores — seemed poised to gut the revenue of offline retailers.

But now a new report from BI Intelligence finds that retailers have discovered "reverse showrooming," or "webrooming," which is when consumers go online to research products, but then head to a bricks-and-mortar store to complete their purchase.  ...

Between the confluence of the Web and e-commerce and the rise in hours at work for U.S. workers, brick-and-mortar visits are becoming worryingly infrequent. Online shopping is rapidly overtaking high-street sales with the U.S. Department of Commerce spotting a 3.4% quarterly pickup in e-commerce sales compared to 0.6% for brick-and-mortar retailers during the fourth quarter of 2013.

However, thanks to modern technology, traditional retailers now have a chance to fight back. Strategy consulting firm Control Group put together a thorough report examining several emerging trends in retail technology. Especially, state-of-the-art technologies that make dynamic pricing for brick-and-mortar retailers could indeed enable them to turn the tide in the battle of clicks versus bricks....