Staffwise are proud to become the latest member of the IPM. Staffwise is a software as a service company (SaaS), boasting a simple yet highly sophisticated staffing and job management system. Staffwise is the wise way to manage staff, create schedules, book shifts, pay people and design reports.

Founded by Mark Waddington, a successful tech-savvy entrepreneur with a background in digital media and marketing, with over 20 years’ industry experience. Mark designed Staffwise as a fit for purpose, innovative, agile system. It is a digital solution for the staffing industry across multiple sectors including Experiential, Mystery Shopping, Retail Marketing, Sampling and Brand Experience.

Mark explains, “We’re excited to be part of the thriving IPM community, I’m looking forward to working with other IPM members who could benefit from our time-saving software and bring a unique offering to the membership group.”

Current clients include global brands Omnicom Group and Imperial Brands, as well as IPM members Kru Live, Kreate, Pod Staffing, Circle Agency, Hel’s Angels and i2i Marketing.

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Read what Bryan Gildenberg, SVP of Commerce at OCG, sees as the most important commerce technologies to emerge from this year’s CES show and the implications it has on future trends.

Well, CES 2022 (Consumer Electronic Show), was certainly interesting – having never been before I have nothing to benchmark it against but was great to connect with old friends and new! Earlier this month we posted a three-part series of thoughts on what I saw there through a decidedly retail and commerce lens. These thoughts ranged from the future of data, analytics the “practical metaverse”, data twinning and simple AR applications to name a few – and of course, it wouldn’t be 2022 without some thoughts on the Metaverse! An internal acronym here for Omnicom is OMC, which I’ve begun to joke it should stand for “Obligatory Metaverse Conversation”. Enjoy reading these “Through A Commerce Lens” observations, as all these trends should be interesting to watch in 2022 and beyond. 

Data science in the 2020s will be less about data and more about science – true science. You will be able to know anything, and EVERYTHING will be easy to measure. The amount of money being put into systems that monitor, record, recognize and process people, things, environments, and body functions is, truly, astonishing. Leaders will have to pick and construct meaningful KPIs out of this ocean of observed phenomena.

Commerce Implications: combining granular metrics into meaningful metrics is the real work of commerce data science in the 2020s.

The gap between omni-present granular data and how resources and capital are allocated in most of the companies that represent most of the GDP in the world is gargantuan. VCs are investing in millions of companies that act as aggregational middleware between this ocean of data and scalable opportunities. Watching players that can be more commercially nimble and less constrained by the old regulatory restricted model outmaneuver entrenched players will be a multi-trillion-dollar re-allocation of market value during the 2020s as improved data gets linked to better health outcomes and lower healthcare costs.

Commerce Implications: retail-centric healthcare will use this new ecosystem of alternative health management models, combined with commercial data, to help shoppers manage their healthy lives better.

Parallel ecosystems are evolving in the B2B metaverse which is “twinning”, or the practical metaverse. The idea is to build an exact replica of something and then observe how it responds to complex stimuli – it’s the metaverse with a purpose. Whether it’s the COVID-19 virus, the human heart, traffic patterns or the composition of the atmosphere, it is now possible to build an accurate model of complex systems, and then test/validate shocks and changes to that system.

Commerce Implications: Using the practical metaverse to predict the impact of anything that happens in a physical/digital retail space, and then modelling those spaces based on how it drives the most important KPIs, will gain traction across retailers.

The other critical part of the practical metaverse is the development of low-cost unobtrusive AR enabled eyewear, allowing a machinist to see exactly how to assemble a hydraulic pump, or closer to home for us, a store associate to see exactly how to planogram a shelf.

Commerce Implications: Planogram compliance will become more like “pick to the light” DC fulfilment – a remarkably accurate and old technology that allows simple visual cues to govern repetitive and highly detailed work.

The metaverse appears to have some much better near-in applications when compared to the world of NFTs/blockchain/Web3.0. A lot of the use cases discussed at CES were around NFTs, particularly NFTs of visual images.

Commerce Implications: The way the visual art world has been able to create an entire ecosystem out of NFT’s, is a harbinger of things to come as it tries to address some key issues that are endemic to creativity in the digital space. Expect the entire world of entertainment & commercial commerce to begin to develop attributes of this. Of particular interest is the ability to enforce commercial terms around resale of an item, which could have massive implications for industries like recorded music and event ticketing.

The underrated critical part of the metaverse is a decidedly un-metaversey comms platform Discord, a community management platform that enables large group-text style chats between friends or people who share an interest. Originally a platform used by gamers interested in the likes of Minecraft and Roblox it is today, according to some NFT experts The Headquarters of the Metaverse.

Commerce Implications: Discord does not support advertising so will require real endemic understanding to participate in the ongoing conversations that surround the metaverse. Parallel ecosystems are evolving as “twinning”, or the Practical metaverse.

The NFT world can create scarcity, uniqueness, and authenticity in a digital world of easy replication, zero marginal cost production and a high propensity to fakery. The art market needs all these things to function, hence where you would see this ecosystem take root.

Commerce Implications: NFTs will be a huge part of the economics of fame, style, and status – in the same way Amazon took root as a bookstore because the economics and user experience of bookselling lent itself to a different solution, the economics and experience of fandom and fame seem ripe for NFTs to take root here.

It seems impossible to care about the future and not have a significant, strategic presence in the Korean market. It became a running joke to ask the companies where they had gone live with whatever technology they were selling – the answer was inevitably, “We have x number of these up and running in Seoul”.

Commerce Implications: Companies should use Korea for what they’re using China for today – a Dr. Strange like portal to see the future through. China’s future is so distinctive to China, and in many ways markedly less certain than Korea’s.

Adaptivity will be critical. Coresight Research [quotes] 24% of Americans identify as having a disability – and this number will only increase exponentially, globally, as huge parts of the world’s population pyramid become more top heavy. Simple tools to assist visual and auditory impairment, mobility or even lamps that are designed to improve reading for dyslexics will be enormous growth areas.

The economics and necessity of labour force management will accelerate robotic development and adoption – one of the simplest and best things I saw was a simple model from Bear Robotics that basically handles the scut work of waiting tables (it delivers food and picks up dirty dishes). Brilliant in that it helps the restaurant manage predictability, improves job satisfaction for the human and improves service levels/tips (slow basic service is a tip-killer). Robotics that doesn’t need hand-like function are WAY cheaper to develop than robots that have to grab things (the human hand is one of the most complex machines on earth). 2022 should permit the narrative around robotic technology.

Gaming remains a strangely isolated ecosystem. Much of the excitement about the metaverse is from people enamoured with Blockchain, but its basic premise is most easily imagined in the gaming world. Think of popculture 30 years ago existing entirely contained within subculture, instead of being its foundation. Add to that the fact that most people’s first experience with the metaverse will be through some sort of gaming experience, yet it remains a mysteriously under-invested platform by marketers.

Written by Bryan Gildenberg, SVP of Commerce for the Omnicom Commerce Group (OCG).

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Fiona Rayner, Head of Experiential & International Operations at Blackjack Promotions, shares how Duty Free can carefully combine humanity and technology to directly engage passengers

Airport Duty Free is the envy of the rest of the retail world, delivering growing profits from relatively small outlets and apparently resisting the threat of e-commerce.

Of course, there are advantages to the airport environment; a captive audience with money to spend and time to kill, for a start. But even air travellers can get bored with a retail offering that stays the same and fails to reflect changes in consumer taste and in retail engagement.

Sometimes, even the best retailers and brands can get a bit complacent and even lazy. Plus, they are just as vulnerable as the consumers they serve to the siren lure of the ‘Next Big Thing.’

Take digital, for example. There’s lots of tech being rolled out in the Duty Free space. Some of it is truly groundbreaking, but much of it is just more of the same.

We see examples across travel retail of what is purely ‘tech for the sake of tech’ – someone places an iPad on a promotion, lets consumers click a few buttons to indicate what their preference is, and the digital aspect of a promotion is complete – just a tick box exercise.

I think mechanics like this need to go to a new level. I was at Jewel Changi Airport recently for the Tax Free World Association (TFWA) Asia Pacific Exhibition and Conference. They’d given the iPad data collector an extra twist. They had a little robot; not a real robot, but one of those ‘telepresence’ devices where you position an iPad and a digital screen on a vaguely anthropomorphic body. But it works: people like interacting with something new, and these robots can be very likeable.

However, cuteness alone isn’t enough; relevance is key. If it’s not relevant to the individual, then it’s just a tablet asking questions. It has a passing suggestion of personalisation, but it’s not real personalisation, it’s just form-filling. At the end of the day, it’s just another way of collecting data from consumers.

Technology should be used not simply as a passive receptor, but as a communicator that uses data to engage consumers with relevant content that actually enriches and improves the customer experience.

There is support for this viewpoint, ironically, from a new report by e-commerce specialists Attraqt, entitled Luxury Retail’s Digital Dilemma – How To Inject The ‘Wow’ Into ‘Buy Now’.

Although the report’s over-riding objective is to get luxury brands to spend on e-commerce, its authors warn, interestingly, against an over-reliance on AI and data-driven websites.

The report says: “focusing on automation alone will hamper a luxury brand’s ability to create rich discovery experiences. High end retail experiences will thrive on the ability to over-ride automation with human merchandising creativity – for instance the opportunity to respond to ‘in the moment’ trends and events.”

Now, they aren’t talking about physical high-end stores; they are talking about effectively online moderators who inject some humanity into a website’s otherwise cold and analytical delivery of results based just on data.

But the point the report makes is just as valid when you apply it to Duty Free outlets and how luxury brands communicate with shoppers in the physical airport space. There is indeed a need to “create rich discovery experiences”, both on-and off-line.

In a world of General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and where people feel bombarded with marketing messages and demands for their data, brands and retailers need to figure out how to gain trust from passengers, so they are happy to give you more information that can be used to deliver a more tailored, personal and relevant experience. This will both drive sales and boost loyalty.

There’s also the challenge of understanding the data that consumers are giving you and turning it into real, actionable insights. Tech, right now, is great at capturing raw data; but real people, whether Brand Ambassadors or retail staff, don’t just provide data, they add nuance, context and interpretation. This is why the human touch retail remains vital, regardless of technology.

Well-trained retail assistants and brand ambassadors engage directly with passengers. They are the eyes and ears of brands and retailers on the shop floor in the airport space. They report back what customers are telling them about a brand or a retailer, how they feel about offers, and their personal reactions to what they are being told, shown and asked to pay for.

Real people are also much better than robots or tablets at understanding the subtleties of human interactions and human emotion. That’s why technology, no matter how sophisticated or intelligent, should only play a supporting role to real people in retail. It can liberate them from behind counters; analyse customer data, turning it into key insight they can use to deliver a better-informed service; provide automation for repetitive tasks so they can dedicate more time to customer engagement. But it should not and will not ever replace the human touch.

Airports are buzzing places, full of human energy and emotion. We have to make sure that this isn’t thrown away in a headlong rush to embrace new technology. With increasing competition and the rise of ecommerce, it’s important for real world retail to be more experiential than ever before. Carefully combining humanity and technology holds the key.

To find out more about Blackjack Promotions, get in touch with Fiona.Rayner@abm.com

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Jo Curtis, Director ad Co-Founder of Jackanory, shares how brands can emotionally engage with consumers in this data driven age.

There’s no doubt that more and more of our lives are becoming automated. From smart phones to smart cars, from music streaming to mobile banking, whether we like it or not, the rise of Automated Intelligence, or AI, is affecting our lifestyles every day.

AI has revolutionized the technology landscape, bringing about huge societal benefits by driving innovation in healthcare, transportation and farming; by creating smart cities and smart homes, undeniably enhancing our day-to-day lives. Rather than stripping people of their jobs, many argue that AI could in fact deliver a boost to the economy by enabling humans to still work but in a more efficient way. It’s no surprise that there’s a continued interest in AI, with budgets being diverted to automated marketing. But those holding the budgets should remember that AI has its limitations. While it works to mimic human intelligence, it’s only one-dimensional; it’s driven by data and algorithms, completely lacking the human feelings that guide our everyday thoughts.

So what does this mean for brands looking to embrace the ever-changing technological landscape while still connecting to their consumers’ hearts as well as minds?

Clearly brands need to balance the increased use of AI with marketing activity that will truly connect with their consumers’ thoughts and feelings, tapping in to emotions that AI simply can’t.

Machines, for all their automated intelligence, data and algorithms, do not and cannot have the complex emotions or moral values that we have as humans. As human beings we’re highly sensitive and emotional intellectuals; we see, hear, think and feel. Surely in this increasingly data-driven, automated world, brands need to work harder to really connect with their consumers on an emotional level? This means working to engage hearts first, then minds, which can be tricky with automated intelligence alone. It requires something more, a means of connecting emotionally through shared experiences, stories, pictures, metaphors. Whether we’re conscious of it or not, we all make decisions emotionally and then justify them rationally. We may not like to think of ourselves operating in this way, but if we want to persuade someone to buy or try something, then we have to first connect with them emotionally, get into their world and find out what makes them tick. When people make purchases, they are motivated by emotion and once they’ve decided emotionally to buy or try something, they’ll grab at any proffered reason to justify it. It’s only once we’ve won them emotionally that we should provide reasons why buying or trying a product or service is a good thing.

So how can brands connect emotionally with consumers in this data-driven age?

We’d argue that experiential marketing – face-to-face interactions, harnessing the power of emotions – is more important than ever. Done well, experiential marketing really can connect with people emotionally and make them think or feel differently, ultimately persuading them to try or buy. The best brand experiences are thought-provoking and engaging, appealing to people’s senses, curiosity and feelings. What’s more, they allow us to tell stories – and it’s these stories that help create emotional connections with consumers – it’s not data, facts or figures. And while we believe that every brand has a story, as individuals we too are constantly collecting stories of our own, seeking out events and experiences that will build memories, create stories and make us feel different in some way.

As Maya Angelou said “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” In a brand marketing context this is backed up in a report by Forrester which states that emotion and the way an experience makes people feel is the number one factor driving brand loyalty, over and above ease and effectiveness. All of which demonstrates that the power of emotion cannot and should not be overlooked.

While AI is undoubtedly making our lives easier in many ways, the power of human emotions shouldn’t be forgotten, particularly for brands who are looking to stay ahead of the curve, build real consumer relationships and long-lasting brand loyalty.  It’s only by connecting with consumers’ emotions, engaging with their hearts first then their minds, that we can truly balance the one-dimensional aspect of AI. Experiential marketing – with its human, face-to-face interactions that engage all the senses, connect on an emotional level and make people really feel something – is surely more important than ever? After all, without feelings, without real human contact and emotional connections, where are we? Who are we?

To paraphrase the famous beer slogan: experiential marketing – reaches the parts AI can’t.

Let’s keep the human connection going.

For more information on how Jackanory can help you, contact Jo Curtis at jo@wearejackanory.com or call 020 7470 8847.

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Huawei, the global technology leader is bringing the Northern Lights to London.

Overlooking the iconic Tower of London, the Aurora Borealis will be staged by immersive artist, Dan Acher, whose bespoke installation will feature a series of lasers to create the stunning spectacle that many Brits cite as top of their bucket list.

The recreation of this breath-taking natural phenomenon has been designed to showcase the unparalleled photography capabilities of Huawei’s latest P30 Series, which features technology that will allow users to capture detail and vibrant colours, even in low-light conditions. The P30 handset will be available to try out and capture London’s very own Northern Lights.

Viewers can post their pictures of the event tagging #Huaweilondonlights @Huaweimobileuk.

Where: Tower Hill (by the Tower of London – the best vantage point is in front of Tower of London’s ticket booth)

Date: April 5^th and 6^th

Time: 20.00-22:30

What: Huawei are bringing the Northern Lights to London, overlooking the iconic Tower of London

Cost: Free

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Written by Paul Cope, Managing Director of the IPM in collaboration with Andrew Orr, Client Services Director, TRO, Helen Hanson, Founder and Creative Director, Hel’s Angels, Neil Survilla, Business Director, Kreate and Joe Sheppard, Managing Director, POD Staffing.

This article was first featured in Campaign this week and presented by this group on behalf of the IPM Experiential Community at the Event Production Show, Olympia on 26^th February.

The past decade has seen a much-reported surge in the ‘experience economy’. People are seeing the value of moments and interactions over stuff. Which makes sense. We’ve got loads of stuff, but we crave opportunities to connect, experience and share more than ever. Watch ‘Minimalism’ on Netflix, read ‘Stuffocation’ by James Wallman or talk to your nearest millennial if you’re yet to be convinced by this burgeoning trend.

As a consequence, the expectation of what experiential marketing can, and should, achieve for brands has not unreasonably increased significantly. Our understanding of consumer behaviour and how people interact with experiences, the opportunities presented by emerging new tech, and the tools and techniques we use to measure the effectiveness of these experiences have all evolved at great pace.

However, this development doesn’t appear to be equally true of the highly specialist area of experiential staffing. Commoditisation and a ‘race to the bottom’ on price have been worryingly prevalent during the same ten-year period. Hourly rates have, for the most part, remained at the same level as they were in 2009. Not when adjusted for inflation or in real terms… the same amount. This has had – and is having – a hugely detrimental effect on the quality of individual that can be hired and the level of training that can be given, inevitably impacting the success of experiential activation.

According to Andrew Orr, Client Services Director at TRO: “In a world seemingly dominated by the language of uncertainty – the gig economy, surveillance capitalism, fake news, chat bots, click farms, Artificial Intelligence and so on – people are crying out for the human touch, and that includes from brands. In our headlong rush towards all things tech, it is essential that we don’t forget the human and their unique role in delivering emotional connection”.

Who hasn’t been enjoying a well thought-through and fantastically realised event or brand experience, only to have the whole thing scuppered by a monosyllabic gum-chewing student or grumpy out of work actor thrusting a product sample in your general direction? Often this is the outcome of a depressingly familiar erosion of the staff hourly rate and training cuts throughout the development process, and is entirely avoidable.

Effective recruitment and appropriate levels of training are, of course, essential steps in delivering remarkable human interaction. Helen Hanson, Creative Director and founder of Hel’s Angels, is very clear on this point: “There are many different types of staffing, but we must accept that experiences which demand hand-picked and trained Brand Ambassadors will cost more. The job of a Brand Ambassador is often to be the face of a brand, to create a bond of trust between that brand and its target consumers. Like any credible role, this requires a thorough search and selection process, skills testing, cultural mapping and matching, and a fit-for-purpose training programme.”

Perhaps then, by glimpsing into the near future and attempting to understand the context within which brand experiences will need to perform, we can truly appreciate what we need to do now from a staffing point of view to positively influence success. For Neil Survilla, Business Director at Kreate, the first step is to appreciate the cultural landscape: “We’re seeing a number of growing trends that are influencing the work we do: the desire for deeper, longer-term experiences, the expectation of cultural relevance and appreciation, sustainability, seamless integration of tech, social reach and proof of success. These are all aspects which require very specific skills from the brand ambassadors staffing the experience, and if any of these elements falter then effectiveness measures usually suffer”.

Add to this the need for water-tight compliance (codes of conduct, HFSS, GDPR, employment law etc), the opportunity to develop rich content that can be enjoyed beyond a one-off experiential campaign, and a growing transactional/retail aspect and it’s clear that much is expected of the people at the brand coalface.

At the IPM we will be supporting the industry in this evolution of the brand ambassador, specifically by working with our members (and beyond) to agree future-proofed standards of skills, training, pay and conduct. Creating a support network that protects brands, staff and agencies alike, and calling out great – and less than great – working practices, will go some of the way to securing a bright future for experiential staffing. The rest will be up to the people that do it.

I’ll leave the last word to Joe Sheppard, Managing Director of POD Staffing: “Our industry is actually in a pretty good place. The benefits of experiential are clear. But there’s still work to be done. The very best activations have a quality brand ambassador team at their heart, so cutting standards, pay and training at this key point of interaction is completely counter-productive”.

The message, then, is clear: when it comes to implementing great brand experiences, whatever you do, don’t forget the human.

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Brandwidth, the digital agency which specialises in providing practical innovation, has announced the launch of a new augmented reality experience for Toyota GB, which enables customers to ‘see inside’ the carmaker’s C-HR model.

The new Toyota Hybrid AR application uses AR technology and objective recognition software to overlay graphics of the inner workings of the Hybrid drivetrain onto physical vehicles, helping customers to gain a better understanding of how the system works.

The iPad app, which will be used in Toyota showrooms as well as at other locations including shopping centres and trade shows, brings to life the different drive states of the vehicle, showing how the various elements of the drivetrain interact with each other. By tapping on a drive state, such as ‘deceleration’ or ‘heavy acceleration’, customers can see which parts of the hybrid system are in use and how energy is passed between them.

The 3D experience also features a number of ‘hotspots’ which, when clicked on, enable customers to get in-depth information on key features of the system, such as the motor, battery and fuel tank.

Brandwidth worked with Toyota to develop the Hybrid AR app as part of an ongoing drive to educate the brand’s customers on hybrid technology and the benefits it offers.

The app currently supports the Toyota C-HR model, across all grades and colours.

Chris Wicks, Group Account Director, Brandwidth, said: “Toyota has always been a leader in automotive technology, selling hybrid cars for more than 20 years. Now, with the launch of the Hybrid AR app we’ve created, it’s breaking new ground in the use of AR to enhance customer experience in the car showroom. We’re delighted to have partnered with them on this exciting initiative – another great example of the innovative technology solutions we’re offering our clients.”

Stephen Duval, TCMS & Direct Marketing Manager, Toyota, said: “As pioneers in the hybrid space, we wanted to find a way to help our customers understand how hybrid technology works, and demonstrate the many benefits it offers. This innovative new AR experience, created in partnership with Brandwidth, brings the C-HR’s hybrid drivetrain to life in a simple yet highly engaging way.”

See the app in action here.

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BAM Student Marketing explores some of this year’s biggest student trends and how brands can tap into them to target the student audience. 

Just when a business thinks they know their audience, new technologies, new behaviours and even new audiences appear that shake the market once again.

At BAM knowing students is our bread and butter and we’ve got 20 years of experience that proves it. So after two decades of connecting brands with the student audience, we’ve got pretty good at predicting the next big trends that connect these consumers in the ever-changing landscape of Student Marketing.

Transparency is key

We strive to continue to develop the latest technologies, but as we do so we also make it possible for our consumers to view and track us at every stage of the development and delivery journey.

This is why Transparency is more important than ever before. If you’ve got something to hide then you should be prepared for this to be found out.

Communication will always happen between humans, this works in your favour if you are a transparent brand with a lot of positives to showcase, but it will work against you if your product or service journey isn’t meeting the ethical or moral ideals of your audience.

The 2019 student is more conscientious than ever before, they care about where their products come from and the process that gets them to their door.

Transparency is now key in winning the hearts, trust and most importantly, the Capital of the student consumer. Share your values, goals and processes in a transparent and authentic way and your brand will be rewarded.

A password protected lifestyle

After all the hacking’s, breaches of data and invasions of privacy over the past year, people have seriously clued up about their online security and are more cautious than ever before, with students being no exception.

No matter the size of your business, you should ensure your security is meticulous, even if this isn’t obvious to your consumers, they still deserve thorough online protection when it comes to their details, data and privacy.

You may think that in 2019 that this is now a compulsory business requirement, but it’s not and customers are starting to notice this. Win the trust of the student consumer by promising them your bullet proof protection and increase your reputation of online safety and watch students favour you over your competitors who have not been as fail safe with their online security.

Becoming the face of your brand

As a brand your audience is everything to you. Utilise this and start to make your student consumers part of your student brand stories.

Students connect with students, even if they share no other connecting qualities or factors, they are all united by the fact that they are students and they trust each others recommendations and reviews.

Whether you include students in your brand stories though publishing testimonials, recruiting student Brand Ambassadors or even curate a place for students to discuss and review your brand online, showcasing your engagement and activity with this audience will inevitably influence the student market into seeing your brand in a positive and student loved light. It also provides you an organic and cost effective way of bypassing traditional influencer marketing.

Think Visual

It’s no secret that the use of imagery and strong visuals has been a fast growing trend in general marketing within the last 5 years, but taking this one step further in 2019, visual searches are set to become the norm.

Today’s students have grown up alongside the highly visual and engaging worlds of Instagram and Facebook and as a result of this constant bombardment of digital imagery has become a part of their everyday lives.

Although voice searching is also on the increase, when it comes to a more accurate and specific search, the future is visual.

A pioneer in this technology, Google, has long enabled reverse-image searching, but more recent developments in recording technology now makes it possible for consumers to take real world pictures and accurately and effectively find information about the subject of the image.

Pinterest was one of the first student favourite sites to implement this lens feature back in February 18, with ASOS following close behind by launching its Style Match reverse image search for shoppable clothes in March 18.

Although it is unlikely that visual search will replace text based searching over the next year, or even within the next few years, it does open the door to a new word of exciting possibilities that will inevitably play a large part in the future of searching (Sentance, 2016).

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Virgin Holidays has once more revolutionised its retail experience by opening the first-ever travel agent to feature an operational spa. The brand new store in Milton Keynes offers customers a totally immersive holiday booking experience.

Spas are already a staple in many Virgin Atlantic Clubhouses around the world, but this is the first time the concept has been available in a v-room store.  Now, customers will be able to enjoy a relaxing manicure or hand massage, as they peruse an extensive collection of holiday options – courtesy of experts trained by the Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse.

The Milton Keynes v-room is designed in the style of a luxurious airport lounge to provide a relaxing environment for customers.  As well as the spa, unique features include a virtual reality rollercoaster, a complimentary bar serving bubbles, a children’s play area and a selection of Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class and Premium Economy seats to enable customers to “try before they fly.”

Lee Haslett, VP of Sales and Product at Virgin Holidays, commented: “We’ve been revolutionising the way our customers book their holidays for several years and our latest v-room in Milton Keynes is the next step on that journey.  We know that our customers are looking for something extra than just a standard holiday and our v-rooms are the first step on that journey – whether that’s the instore bar, children’s play area or rollercoaster simulation.  I’m excited that we’re able to bring our v-room concept to Milton Keynes and I can’t wait to see what our customers think of our first ever in-house spa.”

Mark Morton, Milton Keynes Store Manager, added:  “Whether it’s a beach holiday in Antigua, a cultural excursion in Havana, a throw of the dice in Las Vegas or the family holiday of a lifetime in Orlando – we’ve got a tonne of brilliant long-holiday deals for Milton Keynes residents.  The entire store concept is relaxed and informal; we want people to feel as if they’re chatting to a friend over a glass of Prosecco.  If you want to explore holiday options in a welcoming environment you can’t go past this world-first concept.”

In total Virgin Holidays now have thirteen v-room high street stores across the UK, as well as a number of recently opened concession stores in retail giant Next.

Key features of the new Milton Keynes v-room:

• A spa area, allowing customers to enjoy a manicure as they peruse holiday options
• A complimentary bar serving soft drinks, Prosecco and snacks
• A children’s’ play area with interactive screens
• A selection of Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class and Premium Economy plane seats to enable customers to try before they fly
• A unique virtual reality rollercoaster experience – taking customers to Las Vegas and back, via space
• Five kiosks with relaxed seating for families to consult with Virgin Holidays’ expert travel consultants

The store is the biggest Virgin Holidays has launched to date – spanning an impressive 1,700 square foot – and was designed by YourStudio and project managed by Resolution Interiors.

The innovative v-room design has recently won a “Gold” award at the 2018 London Design Awards for openings in Cardiff and Norwich, and the Milton Keynes store is the third opening under the new v-room design principles.

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Katy Brown, Associate Planning Director at Haygarth Group, considers whether the rise of automated technologies last year has really changed the way we shop. 

Automated technologies have been a hot topic inside the marketing bubble for some time, but many predicted that 2018 would be the year they reached their potential – with both retailers and consumers.

Let’s reflect on three predictions, and what the year behind us says about the year ahead.

The UK was certainly armed with the tech needed to make 2018 the year that marketers got to grips with Voice, according to Marketing Week – with huge Christmas 2017 sales theoretically changing the way consumers completed any number of online tasks overnight.

But did this really change the way that we shop? Depends who you talk to. Google claims that 44% of users buy through their voice device every month, but third party estimates for Alexa commerce range from 16% down to a tiny 2%. It seems that despite the wealth of “skills” that brands can now teach Alexa, the usage reality is more mundane: music, weather, and boiling an egg.

Recent years saw social networks unlock APIs to give brands greater powers within their messaging platforms, and so we anticipated a proliferation of chatbots this year. But after the immediate launch of some sexy but gimmicky ones, has their use really passed in to the mainstream and everyday?

Research by AI specialists Ubisoft shows that three quarters of UK consumers have yet to interact with one. Of the one in four who have, nearly half find them “annoying”, whilst three quarters find them impersonal. The most motivating factor for interacting with a chatbot is to get a fast answer – so when the shopper has time for a richer interaction, they’re not yet top choice.

Automated retail formats grabbed headlines, with Amazon announcing it would be bringing its Go format to London, and Sainsbury’s and Co-op also claiming to be developing new, seamless formats.

WHAT IT ALL MEANS

Whilst these innovations make for a smoother experience, they only affect one part of the purchase journey: transaction>exit. This is nothing new – self checkout and scan-and-go have been around for some time, and have successfully demonstrated to retailers that they can trust (most) shoppers. The only thing that Amazon’s “Just Walk Out” model does differently is the way that they monitor baskets and payment.

Not all kinds of shopping can be reduced to simply the buying of stuff. In some categories, we welcome the opportunity to be entertained and educated during the process. At the moment, automated technology can only go so far to deliver this.

Trust and empathy

The argument against the inevitable ubiquity of automation comes down to two factors: trust and empathy. Over time we might build trust in automated services, but this can only happen through repeated, satisfactory encounters. What is missing from an interaction with a robot, although it might beat a human on speed and accuracy, is empathy – a trait which (currently) can’t be authentically embodied by an algorithm.

The uptake of voice shopping is a case in point: we need to spend a little more time with Alexa until we trust her to make brand choices for us, or chat to her about our tough day.

Investing in skills

We’re undoubtedly moving to a retail world where some human roles become less necessary, but with this comes a risk that automation will not just make consumers lazy but will cause a downskilling of the staff who do remain.

I was on my local high street last week and, on the spot, decided to buy a wireless keyboard as a Christmas gift. Eschewing my normal tech buying process (Google it > Prime it), I headed to the nearest with the intention of not only receiving the expert advice I needed, but walking out with the right product under my arm.

What actually happened, when I managed to attract the attention of a member of staff, was this:

Me: “I want to buy a wireless keyboard that’s compatible with my dad’s LG Smart TV. You sell both. What are my options?”

Assistant: “Nah – no, I dunno about compatibility. You’ll need to Google it.”

Needless to say, I left without making a purchase. This scathing review is based on one encounter, but does hoist a red flag for retailers.

Mastering the mix

It is essential that retailers don’t lose sight of those uniquely human skills of empathy and trust when blending staff and technology. For the meantime, there are still areas where humans trump robots – entertainment, advice, upselling, warmth, familiarity – and the retailers who will survive the high street’s tough times will be those who combine technology and skilled personal interaction to create a shopping experience that is both fulfilling as well as seamless.

Haygarth is an award-winning creative agency that create powerful brand and retail ideas that amaze and persuade people to buy.

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