What Digital Transformation Means to Retailers | @ThingsExpo #DX #IoT #M2M

A recent BusinessWeek article titled “America’s Retailers Are Closing Stores Faster Than Ever” summarizes the epidemic that retailers are facing today (see Figure 1). Retailers are closing stores at a record path and the driving force behind the acceleration in store closings is Amazon, who now accounts for over 50% of all on-line retail sales (see Figure 2). What are retailers to do when the tricks and techniques that worked in the past just don’t work in today’s real-time data and analytics driven business world? Business models that worked in a world that valued size and location quickly fall apart in a world where retailers are leveraging customer, product and operational data and analytics to provide a highly-personalization shopping experience and anticipate customers’ shopping desires to provide a wider range of highly-relevant, and easily accessible products (think Amazon 1-Click®).

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