TechTalk Magazine: The Retail Edition

The first 2012 edition of our magazine, TechTalk, is now out, exploring current trends, issues and market developments affecting technology organisations today. In this edition we take a closer look at the customer purchase journey for technology products, with a particular focus on retail.

Retail, both online and offline, represents the part of the customer journey where value is ultimately generated and money changes hands. Given the current tough trading environment technology brands are facing across markets worldwide, it is hardly surprising that there is so much interest in how retail is evolving. Retailers are feeling the effects of disruption as technology itself changes the way consumers shop for technology products. It is this which sets the topic for the lead article where we explore the nature of these changes and set out a vision for traditional ‘bricks and mortar’ stores through an omnichannel approach.

In a number of articles we then dissect different aspects of bricks and mortar including the importance of the sales person in the purchase process and the way in which smartphones are rapidly becoming indispensable shopping companions for many.

Beyond this, we scrutinise the entire customer purchase journey beyond the context of the traditional yet restrictive linear process, and review the significance of initial online brand relationships within this process in forming consumers’ purchasing preferences: the potential of the so-called Zero Moment of Truth.