Why Retailers Should Focus on Value, Personalized Service and the Local Market

3. Local relevance trumps national presence. Retail, like politics, is a local issue, and becoming more so. Millennials are a diverse group; retailers taking a one-size approach with millennials will alienate them. Marketing must also feel homegrown and genuine. Insincerity will be called out loudly via social media, and forgiveness will come slowly, if at all. The corollary here is that what other shoppers say about your brand is far more important than what you say about it. While that's always been true, access to peer reviews is now the first stop for consumers looking for information.