Assignment Sample on BMG814 Digital Landscape

The traditional way to do shopping has been identified as a wider trend, which human society at large has experienced over time. The line of distinction that is drawn in reference to the question are the physical points of retail, which have variably proliferated all across the mass consumer landscape. They deal generally with goods that both constitute essential aspects to effectively live a normal life, and also other aspects with respect to the act of consumption (Gauri et al., 2021). However, the online retail has brought a major and distinct shift as it delineates from the idea of having physical points of retail, addressing the parameters to provide inherently digital solutions that encompass the consumer’s outlooks. The most notable sector that has emerged in directly provisioning widespread retail in e-commerce, which has grown unprecedentedly than at any time specifically observable all throughout history. Alibaba Group (2018) has certainly established itself as a global market leader in that vein, and has posed the question whether traditional brick-and-mortar retail would be decrease with respect to their presence across the physical landscapes, as many have indicated.

However, what Alibaba Group (2018) presents it would seem that the outlooks would be associated with transformative states of traditional retail as opposed to being widely usurped by options of digital retail. This is a necessary outlook to establish and point since it effectively points out the necessary initiatives that e-commerce giants have started taking in order to achieving maximum levels of value, instead of adhering to a competitive outlook to disrupt and replace. Alibaba Group (2018) having e-commerce activities at its heart are constituted of having technological details, which would be necessary to gain insights into the strategic formulation comes when addressing a question. The brick-and-mortar stores still derive value, and the only specific reason that they have been affected is because of the loss in total market capitalization to new technologies and the entrepreneurial options that are available through them (Gauri et al., 2021). The best possible option that would serve new entrants and players across the entire retail market is to actually pivot with the help of new technologies to enhance and favor the retail experience attributed upon such an instance.

This is exactly what Alibaba Group (2018) has done with a number of identifiable projects wherein there is notably effective introduction of digital technology to enhance the physical retail experiences on behalf of both the customers and the specific retailers. The latter have set up retail businesses of many different sizes, specifications and range of products that are made available. The e-commerce giant’s strategic mission in terms of ‘new retail’ refers and associates with the idea of complete ‘digitization of all commerce’, including the brick-and-mortar ones. One of the key aspects that Alibaba Group (2018) has focused upon is removing unwelcome aspects of traditional retail like waiting in line or not having a product that would suit their needs at the given moments they visit stores. Digitization through the help of innovated tools in which shopping would be enhanced upon this basis by making possible to apply digital processes involved under wider degrees of derivation certainly reflect the achievement of such results (Gauri et al., 2021). This is what is meant in terms of not having the total domination of digital e-commerce, as opposed to measured ways in which transformative solutions are developed and launch to pluralize the experiences of consumers.

2. The retail evolution with respect to new technologies have taken many shapes and forms, but they are identifiable on the specific name of the technology that they employ. They are the following:

Beacons

The retail locations of today use beacons that are made inherently sophisticated with new technological solutions, which make their activity constant, unceasing and able to exchange data and information. The inherent advantages that they provide constitute enhancing the in-store experiences by connecting with customer owned devices through which it can connect to obtain information based on a very specific identification of an aisle, which would provide with important reflections (Lifelong Learners, 2017). Furthermore, it shall be also able to bridge the gap between digital and physical experience. This is showcased on the basis of providing with options by pushing them to customers for products that each and every single one might want to specifically purchase. However, it is also possible to regard beacons as affecting the consumer experience by distracting consumers with respect to alternative options that they could provide.

Facial Recognition

Facial recognition technology has incrementally developed in order to gather data from any case of facial image or series. Normalizing technology that provides extremely high accuracy has led to effective implementation in terms of personalization (Lifelong Learners, 2017). This advantage is pushed through on the basis of existing digital advertising technologies as well as through personalization data that are processed and derived results over very short periods of time. Furthermore, this technology has also become developed to identify emotions from facial expressions with greater accuracies, which would tie into what reactions and patterns could be drawn upon specification of products and other aspects of retail. Threats to privacy, desired anonymity, data theft and other aspects are consequential under this case at large.

Robot Assistants

Robotics also have been enhanced over major innovations and advancements, and offer many options regarding what they could bring to individual customers. The various options of robot assistants can clear standard queries that customer could have, physical ones can aid in guiding customers, and offer new and far accurate measures in monitoring and determination of results (Lifelong Learners, 2017). However, while other aspects of robotics have undergone major changes, there are other intangibles pertaining to human mimicry and representation that have failed. These could affect customers greatly regarding their reflections and outlooks over the experience.

Smart Mirrors

This specific technological case combines virtual reality, artificial intelligence and gesture recognition, which can perform unprecedented and highly valued returns. These include superimposing clothing on an image reflected in a mirror appropriately by taking everything into consideration (Caro, Kök and Martínez-de-Albéniz, 2020). The many options that are available with this highly effective mirror images through advanced interfacing underline a major change in these options. Issues with proper performances, however, still exist with gesture recognition being delayed or becoming fixed (Lifelong Learners, 2017). This is because of the usage of sensors that are often underpinned by faults and issues.

Auto Checkouts

This is the next step in the emergence of changes that have occurred with payment options and processes in retail over a long time (Lifelong Learners, 2017). Auto checkouts identify the users under the retail environments whereupon the checkout process becomes accurately and properly effective without any extraneous movements or gestures (Caro, Kök and Martínez-de-Albéniz, 2020). However, the lack of people representing a business and the possible lack of maintenance that could lead to malfunctions could often make customers prefer the other option altogether.

3. Symphony RetailAI’s (2018) vision of Supermarket 2020 possesses many details and characteristics, which deliberate on the previous forms of existence referring to this specific type of retail at large. In that perspective, there are specific perspectives of the architectural planning and layout with respect to the layout and other important characteristics that are offered in the vein of supporting and provisioning the key aspects of offering. There are distinctive ways in which the allocation of specific types of behaviors essential to retail experience by consumers that are provided at large (Caro, Kök and Martínez-de-Albéniz, 2020). They are all arranged so because of increasing or maximization of driving people into such stores for them to obtain the necessary amounts of value. However, from a personal standpoint, the supermarkets of the future need to have other aspects of value in them. This is possible to address if one actually focuses upon and detail the necessary options pertaining to it.

One of the most obvious considerations that need to be made and supplied are upon the basis of social interactions and exchanges. These tend to guide a pretty significant portion of why consumers could have, which drives the notion that retail on the basis of recognizing customer preferences shall tend to imply a wider grounds for consideration than before (Caro, Kök and Martínez-de-Albéniz, 2020). What Symphony RetailAI (2018) implies is that the essential aspects of conversation and communication, which shall happen inside the supermarket must be based upon primarily human expectations. The robot assistants and other technological options that lead to a certain possibility of isolation need to be resisted and avoided under these circumstances.

This means that my personal perception is to recognize the fact that supermarkets serving as socializing spaces need to be enhanced on the basis of positively affecting the customer psyche. It could also possibly mean that the options in stores need to be conveyed on the basis of other kinds of technologies being implemented (Von Briel, 2018). Varied conditions are critical in order to understand that supermarkets of the future could be evaluated by customers on the basis of their unique nature, which would go against the aggressively lowering costs that exist within such circumstances (Von Briel, 2018). It means that innovation and creativity in stores must walk hand-in-hand to ensure that all specific and dividing demands from consumers would be satisfied.

Moreover, speaking about technology, it is also important for future supermarkets to become flexible in terms of operations and processes. In that vein, there should be widespread removal of options that seek to effectively underpin the options of technologies in ways, which would relay them on the basis of easy and low cost replacements.

4. The important concern of location as an extremely important and/or essential forms of marketing. They relate and establish important consequences through which organizations perform and provide solutions for would be heavily transformed, especially in the event of providing with very helpful outcomes of possible values (The LBMA, 2020). Driving the significance related to location data and information with respect to constant monitoring and responding by software programs have existed for some time. Nevertheless, there are rather multiple ethical issues that are relevant to address and delineated by and large.

The important distinctions that are relevant to address and detail the location comes at the heart of the contemporary concerns that marketing functions and processes seem to indicate. It is generally done through phones, which tend to offer and exchange certain notable aspects and concerns relating to which important outcomes would be possible for determination. In the digital domain, the most prominent way in which such exceptional goals are achieved are primarily through cookies (The LBMA, 2020). They are usually web based programs, which are sent by a business application to the accessing participant’s device in order to obtain necessary information so as to operate properly. In reflection to these concerns, it has become important to observe and provide with certain important achievements related to which the allowance for proper functioning and details of processes become possible (Von Briel, 2018). However, cookies obtain critical information at all times with respect to information, which make it harder to understand the conflicting outlooks and privacy. The location is an extremely specific information that most often are not disclosed by people, and this ethical issue could greatly harm the circumstances and the concerns.

Most cookies are optional whereby businesses have to seek express permission of the buyer in order to actually obtain necessary outcomes or results. Nevertheless, the basis of treating locational details also have to associate with the buyer autonomy, which the wider outlooks of implementing such technologies so intensely would seek to eliminate (Von Briel, 2018). Under these circumstances, they are quite important with respect to the necessary outcomes, but it could be regarded as a notable case of optionality, which businesses need to comply with. The final point of the ethical issues that apply to this problem specifically are the ways that organizations utilize. This is an important point because gathered information on an individual or a group could actually lead to some form of harm on the basis of other players or third parties, which may seek to obtain such data (Von Briel, 2018). It is an instance of the major issues being realized, which must be prevented as well.

These ethical issues and the ways that new technologies and outlooks tend to signify a challenging state of options to deal with, and they may manifest in other ways and through prominence in the future.

 Reference List

Alibaba Group, 2018, 30 March. Alibaba’s “New Retail” Explained [YouTube Video]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=336YkwayCD4 (Accessed 13 August 2021).

Caro, F., Kök, A.G. and Martínez-de-Albéniz, V., 2020. The future of retail operations. Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, 22(1), pp.47-58.

Gauri, D.K., Jindal, R.P., Ratchford, B., Fox, E., Bhatnagar, A., Pandey, A., Navallo, J.R., Fogarty, J., Carr, S. and Howerton, E., 2021. Evolution of retail formats: Past, present, and future. Journal of Retailing, 97(1), pp.42-61.

Lifelong Learners, 2017, 5 December. Retail 2020 | 5 Technologies that will change the way you shop [YouTube Video]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRvaWHk3A8k (Accessed 13 August 2021).

Symphony RetailAI, 2018, 10 April. Retail Stores of the Future: Supermarket 2020 [YouTube Video]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6Ezl-_jhzU (Accessed 13 August 2021).

The LBMA, 2020, 10 February. Location Based Marketing 2020 [YouTube Video]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC5vB7wLXcA (Accessed 13 August 2021).

Von Briel, F., 2018. The future of omnichannel retail: A four-stage Delphi study. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 132, pp.217-229.

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