by Barbara Thau:
The other day I was browsing a Verizon store and fell in love with a Kate Spade cell phone cover.
The young sales associate I was chatting with also liked the fun, funky design. But what she didn’t like was the designer’s name plastered on the item. The logo made the phone about the designer, instead of her.
These days, the shoppers themselves, are the brands. And it’s a sign of the times.
This is an age of the personal brand, when consumers — who curate their public profiles on Facebook and Instagram and sound off on their virtual Internet pulpits — enjoy infinite shopping and merchandise choices online, catering to all possible tastes, styles and sensibilities.
This endless aisle of options is unprecedented. And as a result, cookie-cutter retailing in the era of self-expression just doesn’t cut it anymore. At the same time, there is an innate human desire to be seen, to be picked out in a crowd, to be recognized and rewarded for our idiosyncratic tastes, wants and needs.
For retailers, data offers a means to know your shoppers like never, before, and go from marketing to many, to marketing to one. It holds the potential for mass customization.
And retailers have gotten the memo.
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