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{"id":5769,"date":"2023-08-11T11:50:43","date_gmt":"2023-08-11T11:50:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.retailprophet.com\/?p=5769"},"modified":"2023-08-22T15:45:03","modified_gmt":"2023-08-22T15:45:03","slug":"how-to-win-in-retail-less-science-more-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.retailprophet.com\/2023\/08\/11\/how-to-win-in-retail-less-science-more-art\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Win in Retail: Less Science, More Art"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/p>\n
By Doug Stephens<\/p>\n
Over the last 20 years, technology has transformed retail. Mobile phones have become essential conduits for communication, entertainment and commerce. Technologies like augmented reality, once a novelty, have become commonplace digital merchandising and selling tools. E-commerce, which in 2003 amounted to a rounding error on most retailers\u2019 profit and loss statements, has become table stakes for any business wishing to survive.<\/p>\n
But the shift is bigger than consumer-facing innovations. Amazon, once a profitless aggravation\u00a0for traditional retailers, has become one of the most valuable companies in history by leaning into the behind-the-scenes\u00a0science<\/i>\u00a0of retail: the physics, math, engineering and data of moving goods from production to consumption.\u00a0And it\u2019s not alone.<\/p>\n
Today, we sit on the edge of yet another technology revolution in retail, with investment by retailers in AI and machine learning projected to increase up to eight-fold by 2032.<\/p>\n
Yet, despite all the investment in technological progress, too many retailers today struggle to stay afloat, grinding it out each day, one promotion at a time. Because while technology has advanced the mechanics of retail, it\u2019s also opened the door to something else: a historic explosion in new competitors to traditional retailers \u2014\u00a0from third-party marketplaces and direct sellers to Asian discounters and social media influencers \u2014\u00a0all of which are now battling it out for finite, fleeting and increasingly fragmented slivers of consumer attention.<\/p>\n
Indeed, the existential challenge facing most retailers today is how to command disproportionate levels of attention. And how to do this when superior selection, convenience and price have largely become the domain of large international marketplaces and mega-chains, and digital advertising is relentlessly more expensive while declining in its effectiveness?<\/p>\n
The answer lies less in deploying new technology and more in something almost never discussed in retail circles:\u00a0art<\/i>. Because, as it turns out, attracting attention and promoting recall are what art does best. In fact, a growing body of scientific evidence suggests that art, regardless of form, has a uniquely stimulating effect on our brains. According to Daniel J. Levitin, author of \u201cThis is Your Brain on Music: The Science of Human Obsession,\u201d listening to a favourite song or a familiar style of music lights up almost every region of our brain, including areas linked to memory. Experiencing art has been proven to boost blood supply to the brain, producing rushes of dopamine and activating both cognitive and emotional activity.<\/p>\n