Friday, December 20, 2013

NORM!

Interesting article about stores who want to do what I'll call the CHEERS move = I enter, they know immediately that I'm there, they know what I like, they make me offers designed to appeal to me. Everybody knows my name.

Healey Cypher, the head of retail innovation at eBay, tells a story about a bookseller who was convinced that online commerce would kill his business: ‘‘I said to him: ‘How do you know when someone’s in your store? You don’t, unless they bought something, and then only after the purchase. What if you had a platform for the first time ever that said, ‘‘This person is in your store, they like these things, they bought these things on your web store, and here’s an offer you should give them based on their purchases’’? 

I find it seductive, but also scary.  I do want them to recognize me, but I don't want them coming up to me and saying here's a book that 83% of the people who bought that last one you bought, the one you got at the airport book kiosk in Bozeman, say they liked, too.  You should buy it.  I want anonmymity until it helps ME.

2 comments:

Tabor said...

I am guessing they know far more about you than you think. I know "they" know what I buy, what I eat, what I cook, where I travel, what I believe, how I vote, who I donate to....and on...and on.

Cerulean Bill said...

But they don't know its YOU, the moment you walk into the store, and that's what they'd like to change.