Content Marketing

By putting you in close contact with the private lives of your customers, empathic research helps you see your product through the eyes of someone with values, concerns and emotional triggers that are different from your own. This perspective becomes absolutely critical when you are dealing with products that are highly personal — like photographs. So when I worked on a project involving the design and marketing of digital cameras during my time at Sony, empathic research on how the camera and its pictures were used became absolutely

If you need more evidence of major shifts going on in retail, a recent report says changing consumer expectations mean it's time to switch up the industry lingo. The report by PwC found that brands should forget what they've heard about "omnichannel," a piece of jargon that means retailers must have physical stores, as well as web and mobile sales platforms. The new buzzword is "total retail." "Consumers now view multichannel shopping as a given," said Steven Barr, PwC's U.S. retail and consumer practice leader. "Today's nonstop shoppers have taken things into their own hands, becoming more tech-savvy than retailers."

Retailers are generally doing a pretty good job of maximizing the desktop user experience. They also seem to understand the importance of the mobile user experience. For many, however, mobile is synonymous with smartphones, not tablets. Slow load times are the biggest point of frustration for mobile web users; consequently, the next step in the evolution of mobile retail is the recognition and adoption of best practices that deliver a faster, more reliable and consistent user experience. 

Barnes & Noble, the largest U.S. bookstore chain, is cutting jobs as revenue at its Nook tablet unit continues to shrink. "As we've aligned Nook's cost structure with business realities, staffing levels in certain areas of our organization have changed, leading to some job eliminations," Mary Ellen Keating, a spokeswoman for the New York-based retailer, said in an email. She declined to say how many jobs were cut and from what areas of the company. Barnes & Noble reduced Nook prices during the holidays amid continued competition from Apple's iPad. 

An everything guide on how to be a successful omnichannel retailer in 2014

Anyone who has gone through a home improvement project knows what a hassle it can be to find a trusted professional to do electrical, plumbing and other work. Home improvement retailer Lowe's is backing a website that it believes can make the process better for its customers. Lowe's is partnering with a startup in Seattle, Porch.com, that's come up with a novel method for recommending home improvement professionals, one that the startup's executives say is resistant to the kind of manipulation that occurs on other review sites.

Barnes & Noble said on Wednesday that Michael Huseby, the head of its digital division, has been named chief executive, effective immediately. The largest U.S. bookstore chain had been without a CEO since William Lynch resigned in July in the wake of several quarters of poor sales of Barnes & Noble's Nook e-readers. Huseby joined Barnes & Noble as finance chief in March 2012, and last summer was made head of its Nook digital unit. The bookseller, which is contending with declining book sales, is set to report its holiday sales today.

For every sensible gift of a flannel nightgown, tie or pair of socks opened on Christmas, some merry prankster will be sneaking something edgier under the tree and into the stockings — a "Duck Dynasty" Beardhead, Roadkill Summer Sausage or perhaps Camouflage TP. At least that's the hope of the people at Burnsville, Minn.-based Northern Tool + Equipment, which also owns ­Kotula's, a catalog and online retailer with a good share of hardy, har har-type gifts. 

It took almost two years, but a seller who filed a class-action lawsuit against eBay over its Featured Plus optional listing upgrade has reached a court-approved preliminary settlement. The retailer, while denying the allegations and not admitting fault, has agreed to pay $4.75 million to settle the lawsuit, including $7,500 for the seller who initiated the lawsuit. Furthermore, it stopped offering the feature earlier this year. But sellers shouldn't necessarily expect to receive a check in the mail — the default method for distributing funds to class members with active eBay accounts will be to give them account credits.

Marketers have made their lists and they're checking them twice, sometimes even three times. If the conversion needle isn't moving, you might need to rethink your digital strategy. To avoid any holiday hiccups, here are 12 tips on how your content management and personalization strategies can boost conversions, foster brand loyalty and keep customers returning year-round: