Top 100 RTIH Retail Technology Influencers List interview: Martin Newman
As part of a series of interviews with those who made it on to the RTIH Top 100 Retail Technology Influencers List, we discuss retail’s Covid-19 game of two halves and why customer service is broken with Martin Newman, Founder, The Customer First Group.
RTIH: Congratulations on making it on to the RTIH Top 100 Retail Technology Influencers List. What does recognition as a retail tech influencer mean to you?
MN: First, it’s very humbling when others deem you worthy of being included on a list of influencers within your industry. It’s certainly not something I ever take for granted.
So, thank you to RTIH for including me. It’s important to me to be included on the list on a few levels; It creates credibility and reinforces my insight and what I have to share with my network and businesses I engage with.
To some extent, once you’ve been included on a list there is an onus to ensure you’re included in the future and therefore you need to work hard to stay on top of technology and how it’s evolving.
And ensure you’re able to impart relevant and timely feedback to customers and the market in general on the role you see technology playing in the short and long-term.
RTIH: Who have been the big retail winners and losers during the coronavirus outbreak?
MN: To borrow a football pun, it’s really been a game of two halves.
For the first year and half and during the lengthy periods of lockdown, multi-channel retailers in the main struggled as they had to close their stores.
Albeit many were able to pivot to offering customers kerbside pick-up and found ways of leveraging their stores as fulfilment centres. To offset the loss of demand in-store, along with the pureplay businesses, they saw a huge spike in online demand.
However, not all businesses were geared up to take full advantage of this. Either because they didn’t have the logistics and supply chain geared up for this or because they didn’t have the right skills and organisational structure to maximise the opportunity.
The pureplays performed well as they didn’t have to worry about lost demand from stores being closed and the cost of running a store business.
But when everything opened again in earnest in July 2021, the multi-channel retailers started to claw back sales and profitability as consumers made their return to the physical retail environment in part to enjoy the newfound freedom this offered them.
RTIH: What are your retail predictions for 2022 and beyond?
MN: With all the turmoil in the world right now from the conflict in Ukraine to the rising energy costs and increased cost of living we’ve been experiencing, 2022 and 2023 will be challenging years for retailers as consumers tighten their belts.
From a technology perspective, retailers will continue to join up the channels.
As they seek to deliver the seamless experience consumers demand and enjoy the benefits of doing so, from ensuring their stock can meet demand wherever it takes place and maximising availability, to having a single view of the customer where they can begin to move from a focus on the here and now to building lasting and meaningful customer lifetime value delivered through a more seamless and personalised customer experience.
Of course, I’d add to this the opportunity that experiential retail has to offer both on and offline. The former driven by the metaverse, and the latter driven by better use of digital technology to empower and engage consumers.
As with all new technology led experiences, the metaverse will take time to reach its potential as we move from where we are now with a small number of brands creating experiences for consumers who are early adopters to the early and late majority getting involved.
RTIH: What will be the must watch retail technologies over the next year?
MN: We will see the continuation of show casting/showrooming and leveraging both the physical retail environment and the staff within it to deliver more engaging digital and online sales experiences for customers.
The metaverse will gradually evolve with the advent of many new online environments for consumers to engage. Marketplaces will continue to dominate and take more share of the consumers spend. From Amazon to eBay and Tmall to the plethora of re-loved and vintage platforms such as Vestiare Collective.
Social commerce will also continue to be a key channel to market capturing consumer demand while they’re in a more amenable and social frame of mind as they engage on social media platforms.
For transparency, I have a customer service platform. But I genuinely believe this is one of the next areas for disruption. Because customer service is broken.
It’s a hugely fragmented and frustrating experience for consumers, which is why many now go straight onto twitter to complain and get a reaction. Why would any business be happy with customers doing this and telling many thousands of other potential customers of their bad experience?
RTIH: Which technologies are overhyped in your opinion?
MN: The metaverse is over-hyped in terms of the impact it will have in the next year or two. However, we most likely under-estimate its impact in the long run.
Think driverless vehicles. We’ve been hearing about them for six to seven years at least and despite the hype, there are currently none on the road in the UK. Albeit they’re coming!
I’ve always felt that apps are over-hyped. In the context that not every brand or retailer’s proposition lends itself to having an app.
We’ve only got so much room on our phones and ability to engage with a finite number of apps. What’s more important is to think through how you can drive up ROI – return on customer involvement.
An app is not necessarily going to move the needle on that. It very much depends upon what you sell and the likely customer engagement frequency.
Previously I would have added QR codes to this list. But as engagement has soared as a result of Covid vaccines et al, we might be getting to a point where they’ll play a more active role in engaging consumers.
Chatbots – They absolutely do my head in and do not deliver the experience customers require when it comes to sales, produce advice or customer service. They simply get in the way and frustrate as they are unable to deal with any real degree of nuance.
