eTail Blog - Case Studies, Keynotes, Tech Posts & Innovation Briefings

At eTail, we love giving away plenty of free content, so you can always keep up with the latest developments in retail eCommerce. Below we have a few of our most popular articles and case studies.

Retailer Case Studies

Google Shopping's eCommerce Strategy: A Case Study

What about Google Shopping has positioned the search giant to challenge Amazon for the eCommerce crown?

How Walmart is Thriving in the Ecommerce War Against Amazon

Walmart has also developed strategic partnerships with technology powerhouses such as Google and Microsoft, which allow it to bring its products to Google Express and sell them through voice search with Google Home and other applications.

What Amazon's Whole Foods Purchase Means for the Future of Retail

The immediate implications for the grocery industry are huge – and there’s more than a whiff of fear coming from retailers.

eTail Boston Keynote Series

6 Digital Strategies | Chico's Keynote

In this chapter of the eTail Boston keynote series, Chico's Senior Marketing VP, Shelagh Stoneham introduces six key digital strategies for retailers.

How To Engage Online Shoppers With Text | Teleflora's Keynote

In this chapter of the eTail Boston keynote series, Teleflora's Senior Director of eCommerce Marketing, David Lorango shares his strategies on text engagement.

How To Enable Connected Commerce | Retailer Panel Discussion

In this chapter of the eTail Boston keynote series, executives from IKEA, Wearit, Shoptype, and Logicbroker discuss how retailers can enable connected commerce.

What's The Digital Marketing Formula? | J Jill Inc.'s Keynote

In this chapter of the eTail Boston keynote series, J Jill Inc.'s Brian Beitler shares his formula for successful digital marketing for retailers.

How Dollar Shave Club Drives Adoption By Solving User Problems

In this chapter of the eTail West keynote series, Alan Wizemann, CDO of Dollar Shave Club, draws on his experience with three major retailers – Target, Lululemon Athletica, and DSC – to discuss how retailers can solve customer problems with solutions that promote both brand engagement and technology adoption.

How Home Depot is Upgrading Their Customer Experience Strategy & More

In this chapter of the eTail West keynote series: Igor Cherny, Home Depot's VP of Online, Marketing, & Merchandising Technology discusses various issues and challenges that Home Depot has faced in recent years, and the innovative actions the company has taken to address them.

How To Humanize Your Retail Brand

In this chapter of the eTail West keynote series, a panel of retail industry experts from Dollar Shave Club, LVMH, Boot Barn, and BazaarVoice share their views on how to humanize your brand - and how to make that humanization a sustainable part of corporate culture

How Harry & David Shares Their Experience & Connects With Customers

In this chapter of the eTail West keynote series: Michelle Farabaugh, Harry & David's CMO, emphasizes the importance of sharing your brand experience - not just in a social media sense, but more broadly, and at a more personal level.

eTail Boston Research Briefs

How To Build A More Customer-Centric eCommerce Supply Chain

In this exclusive 2020 eTail report, we uncover the key steps that leading retailers prioritize to build a more customer-centric supply chain.

Marketing & Customer Experience Strategy w/ CCCM Technology

Uncover how leading retailers are using CCCM and campaign intelligence to tailor successful marketing campaigns to their target customers.

Digital Marketing Strategies for Year-Round Holiday Sales

As shoppers are spending more outside of traditional Q4 holidays, retailers must come up with new seasonal sales strategies to capitalize on this new trend.

eCommerce Strategy for Retailers on Google & Amazon

In this 2020 report, we explore how retailers not only survive but thrive in this new, search and marketplace-driven retail environment.

Holiday Retail 2019: Customer Insights Will Drive a Fundamental Transformation in Retailers' Product Presentation Strategies

In 2019, retailers will transform customer engagement into a holistic user experience, implementing not just the latest technologies but adopting new and novel ways to showcase their products and individualize their brands.

Cross-Border Commerce 2020 Research Brief

eTail is partnering with the WBR Insights research team for a closer look at how international retailers are facing down these challenges. In our upcoming Cross-Border Commerce 2020 report, we study how retailers are improving international eCommerce in the face of four major challenges—fulfillment, payments, fraud, and email marketing.

Technology Blog Posts

CarMax's New Omnichannel Shopping Experience

CarMax is revolutionizing the industry yet again and is blazing ahead with a bold new omnichannel strategy that empowers customers to buy cars and trucks on their terms.

Wayfair Adds Augmented/Virtual Reality to Help Find the Best Furniture

The mixed reality Wayfair Spaces app helps to take lot of the guesswork out of furniture buying and gives consumers the confidence they need to make better purchasing decisions.

Vistaprint is Using Online Resources to Help Small Businesses Grow

A small business can often find it hard to know which way to turn when looking for advice on how to make the most of its market. However, with a suite of online resources, Vistaprint is making sure it's on-hand for more than just business cards.

How Wayfair's Chief Architect Is Pushing AI Innovation & More

Artificial intelligence innovation is at the forefront of the modern technology-focused company, and Wayfair's Chief Architect is excited about how it's propelling the business forward.

How Walmart Is Harnessing the Power of VR to Train In-Store Associates

Ultimately, the new VR training initiative from Walmart Academy is all about driving customer experience.

Sally Beauty’s Analytics Strategy: How to Better Target Customers

Remaining relevant is more than simply maintaining a presence and an extensive product inventory. 

Here’s How 1-800-Flowers Leverages AI to Streamline the Customer Journey

There is some great technology at play on 1800flowers.com that streamlines the experience for customers and artificial intelligence is leading the way.

Here’s How Panera Bread Made the Omnichannel Shift with Panera 2.0

Panera Bread’s transformation from a restaurant-only chain into a digitally-powered omnichannel business is what’s putting the company on such a strong growth trajectory.

Here’s How David’s Bridal Leverages Pinterest for Organic Growth

David's Bridal has seen incredible organic engagement since the Pinterest campaign kicked off.

Dunkin Donuts' Mobile Personalization Strategy

Mobile-to-store ordering is just the first step of a larger strategy to improve the brand’s online-offline selling capabilities.

Wayfair Adds Augmented/Virtual Reality to Help Find the Best Furniture

The mixed reality Wayfair Spaces app helps to take a lot of the guesswork out of furniture buying and gives consumers the confidence they need to make better purchasing decisions.

Target’s Omnichannel Two-App Tactic

As strategies go, you don’t get much more (ahem) targeted than Target's omnichannel two-app tactic

Driving ROI and Revenue from Your Mobile Marketing

Here’s how you can drive action from your customers and better achieve measurable results through your mobile marketing efforts.

Walgreens’ Omnichannel Prescription For Success

The Walgreens omnichannel approach is quite clearly at the very top of its game.

Tracking the Evolution of CVS Caremark's Mobile Sucesses

Let’s take a closer look at the evolution of CVS mobile customer solutions.

The Heroic Rise Of Best Buy’s Customer-Centricity Model

Focusing on the customer experience, Best Buy was able to grow its domestic online revenue by 13% overall.

How Home Depot Nails Omnichannel Supply Chain Fulfillment

Home Depot has restructured its whole supply network in order to integrate the experiences of in-store and online commerce.

Sam's Club's Multichannel Customer Experience Strategy

From Scan and Go to endless aisles, to the revamped Club Pick-Up, Sam’s Club is working hard at the customer experience across all touchpoints.

How Le Tote Uses Data to Deliver Personalized Fashion-Rental Experiences

This highly-personalized business model has some highly-powered technology behind it.

Kroger’s Customer Science Division Will Put Omnichannel In the Express Lane

A weapon in Kroger’s expanding arsenal is the company’s customer analytics and insight division – named 84.51°

How Starbucks Created an Engaging Mobile Retail Experience

Starbucks has considered the desires of their customers by researching their buying habits and developing a strategy to cater to their customer’s wants and needs.

Why Luxury Brands Need to Embrace Big Data to Connect with Customers and Drive Growth

The luxury industry is facing many unique challenges in the digital age. As millennials move into their prime earning years, they form the generation that will contribute the most (130%) to the luxury market's growth over the next six years. Appealing to this increasingly important cohort requires a big rethink of traditional marketing strategies.

How to Convince Your Leadership Digital Transformation is Worthy of Investment

As tech-savvy millennials are accounting for more and more luxury sales, investing in technology and digital customer experiences is just as important for luxury brands as it is anyone else. You know this - but how do you go about convincing your leadership that digital transformation is worthy of investment?

How Tiffany & Co. Built a Diamond Digital Marketing Strategy

When it comes to digital marketing – and indeed to Tiffany’s business model – it’s engagement that counts.

Cosabella Is Using AI to Boost Sales with Email

Cosabella's new emails strategy has shown incredible result implementing AI to send customized emails.

Innovation Blog Posts

How Wander Beauty Is Keeping Spirits High During COVID

One of the first beauty brands to acknowledge the crisis on social, Wander Beauty should be proud for how they used the platform to prioritize people over profits.

How Coca-Cola Uses Personalization & Social Media

Brands the world over are discovering that to succeed at ecommerce — or any form of commerce — one needs to find ways to connect with one's audience.

Why Etsy Cares About Positive Social Impact

Does Etsy need to choose between having values or providing shareholder value?

Why Are Crocs So Popular? They Embrace The Narrative

By embracing its kooky nature and actively seeking partnerships with celebrities and brands which fit with their style, Crocs has been winning left and right.

Walgreens’ Personalization Strategy

Personalization is going to continue to be incredibly important for Walgreens and customers will soon expect these kinds of experiences from all retail brands.

Wayfair’s AI + AR Strategy

Data, AI, and augmented reality are powerful tools in the eCommerce playbook. It’s great to see brands such as Wayfair utilizing them to such great effect.

How Staples Evolved into a Invaluable B2B Digital Partner

For Staples it all starts with the support network.

Home Depot's Omnichannel Strategy

As one of the nation’s most recognizable brands, The Home Depot has been investing heavily in omnichannel experiences and is now starting to see the results.

How Burt’s Bees Leveraged Social to Fight Climate Change

For Burt's Bees, it all started with an imaginative partnership with the most recognizable nature photography brand in the world.

ButcherBox's Subscription Fraud Prevention Strategy

Butcher Box has been making serious waves in the subscription business and has also been devoting itself to fighting fraud in the sector.

Tortuga's Remote Business Model

While a 100% remote business model might not seem like the best fit for a retail brand, Tortuga makes it work to its advantage with a solid strategy.

How Rent the Runway is Attracting Fashion Conscious Millennials

Rent the Runway has figured out how to do some good while remaining attractive to the lucrative millennial demographic.

How to Decide Whether Your Web-Only Brand Should Open a Retail Store

The key factors that your web-only business should take into consideration prior to launching physical locations of your own.

Here's How thredUp Is Leading the Charge when it comes to Recommerce

ThredUp is creating a real network of data and people around its recommerce strategy. This is helping it to not only promote the brand and make its products attractive.

TripAdvisor Is Rebranding As A Travel Social Media Platform

TripAdvisor now wants to rebrand as a social media platform and offer its visitors a range of new features, including friend-adding, targeted content, videos, photos, and articles, as well as recommendations and guides from friends and family.

Macy's eCommerce Strategy: AR/VR Tech + Vendor Direct Program

Department store Macy's isn't just banking on one ecommerce innovation to compete with Amazon, but is adopting a more comprehensive omnichannel approach.

Reebok's Marketing Strategy For Millenials & GenZ

Reebok's digital marketing has focused on the sport aspect of its offering - hammering home messages about toughness, determination, and discipline. However, this approach hasn't been resonating with the brand's younger audiences, and so a change of tact was required.

The Honest Company Has a Best-in-Class Digital Marketing Strategy

Brands can learn a lot from The Honest Company when it comes to creating an identity aligned with responsibility and ethical behavior. As time goes on, the need for brands to be seen this way will become even keener and those who get out in front of it will have the best chance of success.

Casper's Innovative Content Marketing Strategy

Being a brand born of the ecommerce age, Casper has long had its finger on the pulse of digital marketing, but most impressive of all is its innovative content strategy.

Parachute Home Is Using Direct Mail to Boost Its Ecommerce Strategy

Many contemporary ecommerce brands may turn their noses up at direct mail and disregard it in favor of more up-to-date marketing methods. However, some brands are still recognizing the power of this kind of marketing, and some are even espousing them over digital methods.

How Farfetch is Leveraging WeChat to Crack China's Online Market

Farfetch, the London-headquartered online luxury fashion retail platform, is on a mission to become the leading luxury ecommerce company in China. With the Chinese market growing at an unprecedented rate in recent decades, global brands have quickly realized the importance of developing a comprehensive China strategy.

Birchbox's New Website Design Increases Discovery and Personalization

The launch of the newly designed site is part of the retailer's larger aim to provide a digital experience in line with the direct-to-customer element of the business.

The New Rules of Holiday Readiness

This report features key insights and data from 167 retailers as they prepare for Q4 2018. We’ve tapped leaders from the best brands in the business—Ralph Lauren, Best Buy, ACE Hardware, and more— for their insights on the most important new approaches for holiday retail success.

How Amazon Inspires Buyers to Drive Social Media Revenue

Amazon has been able to drive more sales with social media than any other online merchant. Here's how it's done..

Vistaprint is Using Online Resources to Help Small Businesses Grow

A small business can often find it hard to know which way to turn when looking for advice on how to make the most of its market. However, with a suite of online resources, Vistaprint is making sure it's on-hand for more than just business cards.

How Scholastic Is Working to Help Remove Learning Barriers

Nationwide school districts have found a growing need to remove several barriers to learning for K-12 students, and Scholastic is teaming up with the National Dropout Prevention Center in an attempt to achieve just that.

Evine Live Inc. Is Getting Inventive with Innovation Focused Programming

One may assume the television shopping industry would be losing ground to online platforms such as eBay. However, with its new program idea, Evine Live Inc. is putting innovative ideas in the spotlight.

How Framebridge Has Hit the Bullseye by Smart Partnerships

Teaming up with established and well-known brands can provide a great route for an innovative startup to get its message out there, and Framebridge's partnership with Target is helping the company continue its upwards trajectory.

From Clicks to Bricks: Sugarfina's Digital Marketing Strategy

Moving an online business from the digital space into the brick and mortar arena can make for a bit of a culture shock. However, with a great marketing strategy, Sugarfina has made the transition as sweet as possible.

Rakuten Kobo Inc. Acquisition Strategy Is Driving Their Customer Service

Fans of eBook reader services can often lament the fact that there's no way to connect their electronic books to their collections of physical page-turners. However, with its latest acquisition, Rakuten Kobo is helping its customers achieve just that.

Subway's Facebook Messenger Strategy: Digital Ordering Is Live

In combining its online ordering service with the powerful technology and market penetration Facebook Messenger enjoys, Subway is making sure as many of its customers as possible can savor their favorite sandwiches in a more convenient manner.

How Wayfair's Chief Architect Is Pushing AI Innovation & More

Artificial intelligence innovation is at the forefront of the modern technology-focused company, and Wayfair's Chief Architect is excited about how it's propelling the business forward.

How Le Tote Created its First Influencer Collection Using Customer Data

For Le Tote, servicing customers with extreme personalization has led to retention rates of 94% and year-over-year growth of 500%.

M.Gemi Perfects The Showroom

The flagship store in New York’s SoHo neighborhood has been designed to give M.Gemi customers a whole new experience on their path to purchase.

How Wayfair Is Preparing for a VR Ecommerce Future

Some retailers are hedging their bets that VR is simply bound to take off, and are experimenting with the technology now before it becomes mainstream.

Is Macy's Guiding The Future Of Retail?

One department store that’s carrying the flame for the omnichannel customer is Macy's.

Bullseye! The Power Of Target’s Fulfillment Strategy

Here's how Target's ecommerce order fulfillment strategy is making waves.

Is Rite Aid the Beacon of Modern In-Store Retail?

Rite Aid has created a balance between simply selling more products and improving the whole in-store shopping experience

5 Key Trends Shaping the Luxury Industry

The 16th edition of Bain & Company's 'Luxury Goods Worldwide Market Study' found that the global luxury market is estimated to have grown to almost EUR1.2 trillion (USD 1.4 trillion) in 2017 - a 5% increase over the previous year. This is promising news for the luxury industry - let's take a look at five key trends that are shaping the market.

What Is Luxury? Understanding the Changing Consumer Mindset Of Luxury Brands

What makes a brand a "luxury" brand? Is it the quality of the materials? The design? The price tag? Yes, yes, and yes - but if these were the only criteria, everything from smartphones to well-made running shoes would be considered luxury items.

Five Key Challenges Facing Retailers Today – And How to Solve Them

With the right know-how and tools, retailers can come up with new and innovative ways to keep shoppers coming back for more

How XOJET Is Taking The Digitization Of Private Aviation To New Heights

Can XOJET transform the private charter flight industry to create an "Uber for the airways"?

Here’s How Sotheby’s Is Adapting to the Digital Age with Online Art Auctions

Luxury Shoppers are moving online to fulfill their shopping needs, and in response, the market is gradually trying to adapt.

Customers Won't Bother with a Not-So-Omnichannel Experience

Examples of truly great omnichannel moments for customers are not as prevalent as you might think.

On a Higher PIRCH: A Customer Experience To Look Up To

Rather than being simply a gimmick, the practically peerless in-store experience provided by PIRCH has actually been created with pragmatism.