Gartner Cool Vendor 2012

Submitted by admin on Mon, 05/07/2012 - 06:10

The team at First Retail is proud to announce that leading analyst firm Gartner has included First Retail in its 2012 list of Cool Vendors in Analytics and Business Intelligence. The report notes that "First Retail represents the crowded market of content analytics, but it was its machine learning that caught our attention."

Semantic Retail

Submitted by gammydodger on Sun, 12/18/2011 - 02:47
Why would a retailer care about the semantic web? Surely this is just another technology fad that the IT department can distract itself with instead of delivering faster transaction systems or more accurate and up-to-date reports. Not so. In fact it turns out semantic technology may enable robust solutions to your retail business users' most pressing problems.

First Retail Consultants - what to expect

Submitted by gammydodger on Sun, 10/30/2011 - 15:35

When you hire First Retail consultants, we want to make sure that they deliver on promise and that you gain the maximum benefit. Although we hire mature and experienced consultants who have exceptional client-facing skills, we still like to provide a set of guidelines for to help them help you - and there's no harm in sharing this with everyone.

Value Added Aggregators

Submitted by gammydodger on Sun, 08/14/2011 - 16:57
Value Added Aggregators
Retailing has been with us for as long as we can remember. Aggregation and Comparison Sites are today's drivers of traffic and how consumers search for products. Vendor Relationship Management (VRM) has yet to take off bringing the ability for consumers to interact with vendors of products. Do retailers need to behave more like aggregators, particularly as they grow their marketplaces? How are retailers gradually and perhaps unconsciously beginning to adopt VRM practices?

Data Analytics - from Big to Huge to Streaming

Submitted by gammydodger on Wed, 07/06/2011 - 01:53
Data Analytics - from Big to Huge to Streaming

Data has always been the driver of successful retailing whether that was in the head of the store owner or delivered from a vast data warehouse. New technologies mean that there is more data being created and stored - and competitive advantage will be gained from the analysis of that data

Payments - The Re-Statement of Currency

Submitted by gammydodger on Wed, 07/06/2011 - 01:50
Payments - The Re-Statement of Currency

Retailing has always been the exchange of goods for money. However the social web, the semantic web and the internet of things is opening up new possibilities as to how this exchange can be made. Barter, new currencies and new economies will create new forms of exchange

Global Markets - When Supply and Demand Move Offshore

Submitted by gammydodger on Wed, 07/06/2011 - 01:44
Global Markets - When Supply and Demand Move Offshore

Globalization has been with us for a while - the next few years will see more expansion into new markets where supply and demand both exist. What will the role of the new entrant retailer be in those markets and will new retailing forces appear from those quarters?

Multi-channel - Stores, Online, Mobile and More

Submitted by gammydodger on Wed, 07/06/2011 - 01:33
Multi-channel - Stores, Online, Mobile and More

The online, offline, mobile and social channels are all viable ways to buy, but the consumer will want to hop between them seamlessly. Retailers must provide truly multi-channel experiences and to do so will require deep integration of systems, processes and performance measures

Business to Individual, the maturing of VRM

Submitted by gammydodger on Wed, 07/06/2011 - 01:22
Business to Individual, the maturing of VRM

Over the next 5 years we will see a shift in the power balance between retailers and consumers. Social Media followed by VRM will spawn a new generation of applications that will shop on behalf of the consumer - the fourth parties

Five for Five - 5 Retail Trends 2011-2016

Submitted by gammydodger on Wed, 07/06/2011 - 01:16
Five for Five - 5 Retail Trends 2011-2016

Five emergent trends that will shape retailing - VRM, Multichannel, Globalization, Payments and Data. What will be the evolution of each of these trends and how should retailers respond?