Retailer says data a natural resource

Exec addresses technology event

Courtesy Photo.
Karenann Terrell. Wal-Mart Exec.
Courtesy Photo. Karenann Terrell. Wal-Mart Exec.

To innovate at Wal-Mart, employees "go fast and break things." It's the only way to keep up when competition attacks both the physical and digital sides of the business, a company executive said Monday.

Karenann Terrell, chief information officer for Wal-Mart, said that as an engineer she would like to develop a step-by-step process that results in innovation -- but she knows creativity doesn't work that way. She spoke at the Northwest Arkansas Technology Summit in Rogers.

"You can't do that. What you can do is let's start with a concept and do some discovery," she said. "Perfect is the enemy of good enough."

Terrell, the keynote speaker, highlighted the company's use of data to analyze and influence consumer behavior. Every transaction has been tallied at every Wal-Mart for at least 20 years, she said.

"Wal-Mart was big data before big data was cool," she said. "Our data is a natural resource for Wal-Mart just as it is a huge competitive advantage to have 11,000 stores."

And to pull a single consumer's information from all that data, Wal-Mart doesn't need a loyalty card. Terrell said the company will never have one.

Instead, the retail giant is using eReceipts, Savings Catcher and other programs to see who their customers are and what they might want.

Once Wal-Mart knows what its customers want, Terrell envisions the company using technology, like smart watches and smartphones, to direct customers to products while they're in the store.

Terrell said 65 percent of Wal-Mart's customers already use smartphones, and the company expects one-third of its customers to have wearable technology, like smart watches or fitness trackers, in a year's time.

"For us, mobile is incredibly important," she said. "It's a platform that will transform us physically and digitally."

Other speakers at the conference highlighted similar themes.

Angelo Welihindha, head of mass market retail sales at Google, said pleasing the consumer involves just a few steps.

Give me "what I want, the way I want it, when I want it, make me love it, remember it and help me tell my friends about it," he said.

Internet startups allow consumers a level of service, convenience and personalization that traditional services do not, he said.

Wal-Mart is beginning to catch up to retailers such as Amazon.com using its new online platform, he said.

Peter Coffee, vice president of platform strategic research and development at Salesforce.com, said mobile technology -- and data from consumers using smartphones -- will upend everything from retailers to the scientific method.

"We have the data flows available to us to answer much more interesting questions," he said. "You don't need to go through that same process of ... building experiments. You just look at the data and say 'Hey, what do you know?'"

Business on 08/12/2014

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