Global Study Highlights Huge Disconnect Between Retailers and Consumers and the Role of New Technologies in the Shopping Experience
NEW YORK, NRF 2019—January 15, 2019—People do not want to speak with robots while shopping in-store or online according to a new study conducted by Oracle NetSuite in partnership with Wakefield Research and The Retail Doctor, a retail consulting firm created by expert consultant and business mentor Bob Phibbs. The global study of 1,200 consumers and 400 retail executives across the U.S., U.K. and Australia found a huge disconnect between shopper demands and what retailers deliver in areas spanning the overall retail environment, social media, personalisation and the use of advanced technologies such as chatbots, artificial intelligence (AI), and virtual reality (VR).
“These findings point to a clear and urgent need for better customer service,” said Bob Phibbs, CEO, The Retail Doctor. “No retailer wants their customers to be confused or anxious, yet more than half of respondents have felt that way while shopping. Customers will feel confident when they develop an emotional connection to the brand. This happens when retailers foster positive, helpful in-store interactions; contrary to popular belief, millennials want store employees to help them. With nearly every respondent reporting that they value brick-and-mortar stores, now is the time to craft every in-store interaction to keep shoppers coming back.”
Mind the Gap: Retailers and Consumer Are on Very Different Pages
Despite significant investments in enhancing the customer experience online and in-store, retailers are not able to keep up with rapidly changing customer expectations and this is creating a huge disconnect.
Personalisation is Proving a Problem
Despite almost half of consumers (42 percent) – and almost two-thirds of millennials (63 percent) noting that they would pay more for improved personalisation, only 11 percent of retail executives fully believe that their staff has the tools and information needed to give consumers a personalised experience. The gap between consumer demand for improved personalisation and retailers’ ability to deliver is damaging the customer experience.
Shiny New Technologies Are Not the Silver Bullet
While retailers are aware that they don’t have the tools and information needed to meet rapidly changing customer expectations, the study found that hyped technologies such as AI and VR are not yet the answer.
A Simple and Streamlined Future
Despite the popularity of online shopping, physical stores aren’t going anywhere. As long as retailers keep the experience easy and seamless, consumers will keep shopping in-store.
“Consumer expectations are not only rapidly changing, but exactly what expectations look like vary from person to person and moment to moment. This makes it incredibly hard for retailers to keep up,” said Matthew Rhodus, director of retail, Oracle NetSuite. “The results of this survey show that while the retail industry is often considered to be at the forefront of consumer experience innovation, there’s still a long way to go to meet shopper expectations. What this means is the opportunity for retailers to improve the relationship with consumers is tremendous.”
To read more about NetSuite’s insights into the report’s findings visit the NetSuite blog.
Methodology
For this survey, 1,200 consumers and 400 retail executives were surveyed around the overall retail environment, in-store and online shopping experiences and advanced technologies. Both retailers and consumers were surveyed from three global markets including the U.S., U.K. and Australia with retail executives representing organisations between $10-100 million in annual sales.
About Wakefield Research
Wakefield is a full-service market research firm that uncovers insights for brands to help them solve problems and grow their business. Wakefield Research is a partner to the world’s leading consumer and B2B brands, including 50 of the Fortune 100. Wakefield Research conducts qualitative and quantitative research in 70 countries. For more information, please visit https://www.wakefieldresearch.com
About The Retail Doctor
The Retail Doctor is a New York-based retail consulting firm created by expert retail consultant and leading business mentor Bob Phibbs. With over 30 years of experience in retail, Bob has worked as a consultant, speaker, and entrepreneur, helping businesses revolutionise their brand and grow their success. Bob is also the author of three highly-praised books, including The Retail Doctor's Guide to Growing Your Business (WILEY). His clients include some of the largest retail brands in the world including Bernina, Brother, Caesars Palace, Hunter Douglas, Lego, Omega and Yamaha. For more information, please visit www.retaildoc.com
About Oracle NetSuite
For more than 20 years, Oracle NetSuite has helped organisations grow, scale and adapt to change. NetSuite provides
a suite of cloud-based applications, which includes financials / Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), HR,
professional services automation and omnichannel commerce, used by by more than
customers in countries and dependent territories.
For more information, please visit http://www.netsuite.com.au.
Follow NetSuite’s Cloud blog, Facebook page and @NetSuiteJAPAC Twitter handle for real-time updates.
About Oracle
The Oracle Cloud offers complete SaaS application suites for ERP, HCM and CX, plus best-in-class database Platform
as a Service (PaaS) and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) from data centres throughout the Americas, Europe and
Asia. For more information about Oracle (NYSE:ORCL), please visit us at oracle.com.
Trademarks
Oracle and Java are registered trademarks of Oracle and/or its affiliates.
Safe Harbor
The preceding is intended to outline our general product direction. It is intended for information purposes only,
and may not be incorporated into any contract. It is not a commitment to deliver any material, code, or
functionality, and should not be relied upon in making purchasing decisions. The development, release and timing of
any features or functionality described for Oracle's products remains at the sole discretion of Oracle.