Business Reporter: In Today's World of Stripped-down Shopping, Retailers Need to Start Focusing on the Essentials

LONDON, July 10, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Ever since high-street shopping fell victim to the onslaught of online retail - about ten years ago and counting - brick-and-mortar outlets have convinced themselves that, if only they could make physical shopping more interesting or fun - anything - they would somehow return to their rightful position at the top of the pile.

It was inevitable that something would come along to put paid to this wishful thinking, writes CEO Richard Harris, in a new article for Business Reporter. And the Covid-19 pandemic has not, he says, so much hurt retail as taught retailers how seamlessly consumers could move online. "It turns out that although buying is essential," Harris writes, "Shopping isn't."

With the concept of "experiential retail" now rapidly fading into a past that isn't coming back, retailers need to focus on how to best approach the new post-experiental era.

Harris outlines two key concepts that businesses need to master if they're to prosper - "understanding intention" and "clearing the path". Machine learning will have a big part to play in the "new normal" of online retail, and the ability to predict consumer behaviour, and respond to it in real time, could mean the difference between a completed transaction and an abandoned cart.

"When you visit a retailer's website, the site knows what you're likely to do and behaves accordingly," Harris explains. "The site 'clears the path' and offers a clean interface to someone ready to buy. By contrast, it shows ads and landing page varieties to someone who is unlikely to convert."

is already leading the way, building thousands of models for companies using its Predictive Intelligence Platform, that boost revenue and reduce inefficient ad spending. Rather than getting people to linger in stores where they'll eventually buy something, in the post-experiential era, it's all about making shopping as fast, seamless and simple as possible.

To find out more, you can read the original article here.

Notes for editors

This press release has been provided by Business Reporter (www.business-reporter.co.uk).

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is the machine-learning company that empowers marketing and media teams with real-time predictions from first-party data. We predict the behaviour of every website user, faster than anyone else, enabling our customers to activate immediately against this insight.

makes more than 4 billion predictions every month to help thousands of performance marketers intelligently serve consumers at every stage of the shopping process.

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