Podcasts about commerce cloud

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Best podcasts about commerce cloud

Latest podcast episodes about commerce cloud

Immigration Law for Tech Startups
230: Humanizing Sales in the Age of AI with Venki Pola

Immigration Law for Tech Startups

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 3, 2025 42:46


Venki Pola, co-founder and CTO of OneShot.ai, shares his incredible journey from a career at Salesforce to becoming an immigrant entrepreneur. After experiencing personal tragedy and navigating the complexities of the U.S. immigration system as an H-1B visa holder, Venki's story is one of resilience and determination. We explore the additional hurdles he faced while transferring his visa to his startup, managing responsibilities, and ensuring his status enabled him to chase his business dreams. His story is a testament to perseverance and the relentless pursuit of one's aspirations, against all odds. Peda Venki Pola is the co-founder and CTO of OneShot.ai, recently spotlighted by Forbes for launching Execution OS, a platform that orchestrates AI agents and human experts to drive B2B sales prospecting outcomes. Previously, he joined Salesforce through its acquisition of Dimdim and spent a decade architecting products like Chatter, Lightning Bolt, and Commerce Cloud. Beyond tech, Venki is also a speaker, writer, dancer, and trader. In this episode, you'll hear about: Venki Pola's inspiring journey from Salesforce employee to immigrant entrepreneur, highlighting his perseverance in navigating the U.S. immigration system as an H-1B visa holder. The challenges and triumphs of transferring his visa to his startup, OneShot.ai, showcasing the hurdles immigrant founders face. The transformative power of AI in outbound sales, with OneShotai revolutionizing sales prospecting by integrating AI capabilities with human expertise. The importance of moving from solution-focused mindsets to understanding real market and customer needs, emphasizing customer discovery and market research. Addressing misconceptions about AI, particularly in marketing, and the critical balance between AI's capabilities and the indispensable human touch. The future of AI and its impact on job roles, encouraging professionals to embrace change and innovation while highlighting AI's role in enhancing, not replacing, human contributions. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/polavenki/ Website - https://oneshot.ai https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidprosser/2025/04/22/why-your-ai-marketing-strategy-needs-a-human-touch-after-all/ https://www.linkedin.com/posts/polavenki_1-cold-email-changed-my-entire-life-fifteen-activity-7211360022889459712-0RVW?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAAJKGlAB3IRNNa3bQYvEmLk8DelI5oWTEFQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfTluBmBLzU&t=279s Alcorn Immigration Law: Subscribe to the monthly Alcorn newsletter Sophie Alcorn Podcast: Episode 16: E-2 Visa for Founders and Employees Episode 19: Australian Visas Including E-3 Episode 20: TN Visas and Status for Canadian and Mexican Citizens Immigration Options for Talent, Investors, and Founders Immigration Law for Tech Startups eBook

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
095: REPLAY: Commerce Developer Experience and the Power of Community with Kasama CEO Mark Rubin

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 12, 2025 37:38


In this episode, e-commerce pioneer Mark Rubin, founder of Kasama and Salesforce aficionado, takes us on a digital odyssey through his illustrious career in e-commerce development. From foregoing law school to embarking on a journey that's seen coding breakthroughs and vibrant city living, Mark reveals how personal passions and a humorous life philosophy have shaped his professional triumphs. He shares insights into the thrill of launching an e-commerce platform for St. Jude's and discusses the power of AI in commerce, the importance of soft skills, and the innovative strategies for deploying sites on Commerce Cloud. Whether you're a developer, project manager, or simply curious about the future of commerce, this episode offers a wealth of knowledge and inspiration to navigate the ever-evolving world of e-commerce with success. Show Highlights: The role of personal interests and "superpowers" in Mark's professional success. Insights on rapid e-commerce development for St. Jude's and the thrill of launching innovative projects on Commerce Cloud. The importance of soft skills in tech, agency growth, and balancing technical expertise with leadership and communication. Approaches to deploying sites on Commerce Cloud, catering to B2C, B2B, and D2C business needs, and leveraging headless commerce. The transformative role of AI in commerce, enhancing capabilities for developers and project managers, and its application in real-world projects. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Join the Commerce Cloud Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
089: Ethics-Driven AI: Nicholas Teodori and Fatemeh Khatibloo Unpack the Power of Agents in Personalization and Commerce

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 20, 2024 48:42


We explore the role of AI in commerce with Nicholas Teodori, a product manager at Commerce Cloud, and Fatemeh Khatibloo, Salesforce's Director of Responsible AI and Tech. They discuss the ethical integration of AI, emphasizing how digital personal assistants can be tailored to individual needs while navigating corporate algorithms. The conversation highlights the importance of AI agents in augmenting human roles, allowing workers to focus on meaningful tasks and enhancing productivity.  By exploring principles such as accuracy, safety, honesty, empowerment, and sustainability, the episode provides insights into deploying responsible AI solutions aligned with brand values. Looking to the future, Fatemeh and Nick envision AI assistants revolutionizing shopping experiences, emphasizing the need for equitable and responsible AI-driven solutions as the digital marketplace evolves. Show Highlights: Exploration of AI's role in augmenting human tasks. Emphasis on responsible generative AI. Examination of AI's potential in digital shopping experiences. Insight into future AI assistant capabilities. Challenges and strategies in integrating ethical AI practices into product development and overcoming biases in AI models. Innovative AI solutions for modern markets. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review,” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second, and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Join the Commerce Cloud Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew To learn more about Commerce Cloud Innovations, go here: https://www.salesforce.com/commerce/innovations/  Interested in being a guest or know someone who should be? Use this nomination form: http://sfdc.co/podnomination  *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

Unpacking the Digital Shelf
The Future of Shopping is Nearer Than You Think, with Natalija Pavic, Sr. Product Marketing Manager for Commerce Cloud at Salesforce

Unpacking the Digital Shelf

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 11, 2024 42:37


Sometimes talking about the Future of Shopping, in capital letters, can be so annoying. Well, thanks for telling me someday we will be flying like the Jetsons, look it up GenZ, but what good does that do me now? That's why it was so satisfying to talk about the near future of shopping - the cool, impactful experiences that are being created now by early adopters, with Nat Pavic, founder and host of the Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations Podcast, and product marketer at Salesforce. Take a listen - maybe the next best thing for your company is nearer than you think.

The Six Five with Patrick Moorhead and Daniel Newman
Enterprising Insights: Episode 38 – Dreamforce Wrap-Up

The Six Five with Patrick Moorhead and Daniel Newman

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 26, 2024 32:04


In this episode of the Six Five Podcast Enterprising Insights, host Keith Kirkpatrick discusses the key highlights, areas of emphasis, and takeaways from Dreamforce, Salesforce's annual user conference. He discusses Agentforce, enhancements to Data Cloud, and the Salesforce Foundation program, among other announcements from the show, and closes out with his weekly Rant or Rave segment.   

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
080: Agents, AI, and Unified Commerce with Commerce Cloud CMO Kelly Thacker

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 18, 2024 34:26


In this episode, we dive into the future of digital commerce with Kelly Thacker, CMO of Commerce Cloud at Salesforce. Kelly shares her journey and passion for e-commerce, emphasizing how Salesforce has been instrumental in helping businesses across various industries navigate the digital shift post-pandemic. She highlights innovative tools like Salesforce Checkout and AI and Data Cloud integration to enhance customer experiences. Kelly also discusses her side hustle, Banalco, a nonprofit supporting human trafficking survivors.  This episode offers valuable insights into the power of AI and data in revolutionizing the shopping experience, making it a must-listen for anyone looking to stay ahead in the digital commerce game. Show Highlights: The impact of the pandemic on digital strategies and how Salesforce has assisted non-traditional commerce sectors in establishing online presences. The importance of delivering seamless, hyper-personalized experiences across various touchpoints. Introduction of the innovative Salesforce Checkout feature and its applications in unconventional settings. The new pricing model of Salesforce making Data Cloud accessible to all customers and enhancing AI capabilities. Exploration of future AI applications in commerce, including autonomous agents and headless checkout experiences. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Join the Commerce Cloud Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew Learn more about Commerce Cloud Innovations, go here: https://www.salesforce.com/commerce/innovations/  Would you like to be on the podcast, or do you know someone who should? Check out the nomination form: http://sfdc.co/podnomination  *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
075: How Black Rifle Coffee Found Headless Success With Colin Tracy, Director of Engineering

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 14, 2024 35:35


Headless e-commerce might be the future, and Colin Tracy from Black Rifle Coffee Company is here to tell you why. This episode features Colin Tracy, Director of Engineering at Black Rifle Coffee Company, who shares his pioneering journey from Shopify to a robust serverless and headless-first technology stack with Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Explore the innovative shift to Commerce Cloud and Builderio CMS, which allowed Black Rifle Coffee's marketing and e-commerce teams to gain unprecedented independence. Colin dives into the benefits of a headless CMS setup, explaining how it offers an elegant, maintainable, and scalable solution compared to traditional templatized approaches. Maximizing the capabilities of a fully headless, composable solution, Colin shares the advantages of adaptable deployments across web and mobile platforms. This episode is packed with insights into the flexibility of headless commerce, the power of Salesforce's ecosystem, and the future of technology in crafting personalized user experiences. Tune in to hear how a strong mission combined with cutting-edge tech can drive unprecedented success in the e-commerce landscape. Show Highlights: Insights into the unique founding of Black Rifle Coffee by a former Green Beret and its mission to serve veterans. Exploration of how moving to Commerce Cloud and Builderio CMS has reduced developer dependency, allowing marketing teams more autonomy. Discussion on the agility and scalability provided by a headless, composable solution, enhancing web and mobile application management. The role of AI in coding, testing, and the future potential of AI-driven development in e-commerce. The importance of accessibility and personalized experiences in e-commerce, facilitated by Commerce Cloud's capabilities. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Join the Commerce Cloud Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew To learn more about Commerce Cloud Innovations, go here: https://www.salesforce.com/commerce/innovations/  Register for the B2C Commerce Roadmap Webinar on August 21 at 1 pm ET: http://sfdc.co/B2Croadmap  *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

The eCommerce Toolbox: Expert Perspectives
E-commerce Expert Michael Affronti of Salesforce: How SFCC Has Evolved to Meet Consumer Demand

The eCommerce Toolbox: Expert Perspectives

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 10, 2024 24:33


Join Kailin Noivo as he sits down with Michael Affronti, SVP and General Manager of Commerce Cloud at Salesforce. Together, they explore the strategic vision and offerings of Salesforce Commerce Cloud, highlighting the platform's evolution through COVID-19 and the influx of AI as well as its flexibility to meet changing consumer demands.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
070: How Data Cloud Enhances Commerce Cloud with Salesforce Product Leaders Pree Kalyanasundaram and Sasha Golubova

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 10, 2024 19:57


Join us as we welcome Pree and Sasha from Salesforce to explore the critical role of data in business operations, particularly within the Commerce Cloud. Pree emphasizes the strategic use of high-quality, actionable data to make informed decisions and enhance customer experiences. Meanwhile, Sasha shares her passion for crafting innovative solutions to complex problems. We also address the anxiety retailers often feel around data collection and underscore the importance of having a solid data strategy. Listen in as we discuss the importance of connected data in maximizing the potential of Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Discover how Data Cloud for Commerce provides valuable insights by contextualizing data, enabling businesses to avoid costly inventory mistakes and deliver personalized experiences. We also stress the necessity of breaking down data silos to unlock the full potential of integrated data, leading to smarter decision-making and innovative solutions. Show Highlights: Importance of actionable, high-quality data in driving business growth and enhancing customer experiences. Strategies for effective data utilization to make informed decisions and boost customer loyalty. Innovative solutions to address retailer anxieties around data collection and management. Benefits of seamless integration between inventory systems and marketing efforts to prevent customer frustration. The power of Salesforce Commerce Cloud and Data Cloud for Commerce in breaking down data silos. Role of AI in enhancing data insights, optimizing supply chains, and personalizing customer experiences. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Join the Commerce Cloud Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew To learn more about Commerce Cloud Innovations, go here: https://www.salesforce.com/commerce/innovations/  *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

Futurum Tech Podcast
Enterprising Insights, Episode 26 - Epicor Insights and Salesforce Connections

Futurum Tech Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later May 30, 2024 31:32


In this episode of Enterprising Insights, host Keith Kirkpatrick discusses two conferences he attended during the week, Epicor Insights and Salesforce Connections. Kirkpatrick talks about the key news from each event, new product announcements, and provides his take on each event. He then closes out the show with the Rant or Rave segment, focusing on a particular galling CX experience that saw a failure with applications, training, and the ability to show empathy.  

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
065: Commerce Developer Experience and the Power of Community with Kasama CEO Mark Rubin

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later May 29, 2024 38:15


In this episode, e-commerce pioneer Mark Rubin, founder of Kasama and Salesforce aficionado, takes us on a digital odyssey through his illustrious career in e-commerce development. From foregoing law school to embarking on a journey that's seen coding breakthroughs and vibrant city living, Mark reveals how personal passions and a humorous life philosophy have shaped his professional triumphs. He shares insights into the thrill of launching an e-commerce platform for St. Jude's and discusses the power of AI in commerce, the importance of soft skills, and the innovative strategies for deploying sites on Commerce Cloud. Whether you're a developer, project manager, or simply curious about the future of commerce, this episode offers a wealth of knowledge and inspiration to navigate the ever-evolving world of e-commerce with success. Show Highlights: The role of personal interests and "superpowers" in Mark's professional success. Insights on rapid e-commerce development for St. Jude's and the thrill of launching innovative projects on Commerce Cloud. The importance of soft skills in tech, agency growth, and balancing technical expertise with leadership and communication. Approaches to deploying sites on Commerce Cloud, catering to B2C, B2B, and D2C business needs, and leveraging headless commerce. The transformative role of AI in commerce, enhancing capabilities for developers and project managers, and its application in real-world projects. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Join the Commerce Cloud Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

CPQ Podcast
Interview with Brion Schweers, SVP Salesforce Revenue Cloud

CPQ Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later May 8, 2024 19:08


In this two-part CPQ Podcast episode we explore Salesforce's latest offering: Revenue Lifecycle Management (RLM). Brion Schweers, SVP at Salesforce Revenue Cloud, joins us to unpack RLM's capabilities. Part 1: Building a Flexible Revenue Engine RLM's composable architecture lets you build a custom revenue solution  Powered by Salesforce Einstein: RLM leverages AI for intelligent automation throughout the revenue process. Headless for seamless integration: RLM integrates with existing systems for maximum flexibility. Key RLM features: We'll explore product catalog management, pricing, transactions, contracts, and more. RLM in the Salesforce ecosystem: Discover how RLM works with Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud, Commerce Cloud, and others. Configuration and Testing: Learn how RLM enhances product configuration and streamlines testing. Part 2: Unveiling RLM's Full Potential We'll explore RLM's performance with large and complex quotes. Dynamic Revenue Orchestration: See how RLM manages various revenue streams. Asset & Subscription Management: RLM automates these processes for greater control. RLM and Contract Management: Discover how RLM works with contract management. Beyond the Basics: We'll delve deeper into RLM's advanced features. Join us for a comprehensive look at Salesforce's RLM and learn how RLM could support your revenue operations. LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/brion-schweers-71363211/ 

CPQ Podcast
Interview with Brion Schweers, SVP Salesforce Revenue Cloud

CPQ Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later May 5, 2024 23:57


In this two-part CPQ Podcast episode we explore Salesforce's latest offering: Revenue Lifecycle Management (RLM). Brion Schweers, SVP at Salesforce Revenue Cloud, joins us to unpack RLM's capabilities. Part 1: Building a Flexible Revenue Engine RLM's composable architecture lets you build a custom revenue solution  Powered by Salesforce Einstein: RLM leverages AI for intelligent automation throughout the revenue process. Headless for seamless integration: RLM integrates with existing systems for maximum flexibility. Key RLM features: We'll explore product catalog management, pricing, transactions, contracts, and more. RLM in the Salesforce ecosystem: Discover how RLM works with Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud, Commerce Cloud, and others. Configuration and Testing: Learn how RLM enhances product configuration and streamlines testing. Part 2: Unveiling RLM's Full Potential We'll explore RLM's performance with large and complex quotes. Dynamic Revenue Orchestration: See how RLM manages various revenue streams. Asset & Subscription Management: RLM automates these processes for greater control. RLM and Contract Management: Discover how RLM works with contract management. Beyond the Basics: We'll delve deeper into RLM's advanced features. Join us for a comprehensive look at Salesforce's RLM and learn how RLM could support your revenue operations. LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/brion-schweers-71363211/ 

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
054: The Rise of eCommerce in Non-Retail Industries, Loyalty & Women in Tech with UK AVP of OSF Oana Dereli

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 13, 2024 31:10


Join us for a conversation with the incredible Oana Dereli from OSF Digital as she brings her unique expertise in e-commerce loyalty and women's advancement in tech to the forefront.  Oana's double-edged sword of engineering prowess and sales acumen, coupled with her leadership role in the OSF Women's Network, paints a vivid picture of women's essential roles in the tech and retail sphere. Prepare to be captivated by her passion as we celebrate women's achievements and discuss the innovative master classes OSF offers to push boundaries on personal and professional growth. We also take a dive into the future of retail, where AI isn't just a buzzword but a game-changer in creating personalized shopping experiences and even fulfilling predictions such as same-day delivery. Learn how AI is no longer just a tool but a revolution driving retail forward, urging brands to adopt bold, customer-centric innovations to stay competitive. The path to tech success is often unexpected, and we wrap up by reflecting on surprising career journeys, including Oana's own, reminding us to embrace the opportunities that keep us at the cutting edge of a constantly evolving industry.  Don't miss out on these insights and more! Show Highlights: The impactful role of women in tech and e-commerce. The evolution of e-commerce loyalty programs and their increasing significance for retailers in enhancing customer experience and retention. OSF Digital's contributions to Commerce Cloud. The integration of AI in retail, automating development processes, personalizing customer experiences, and more. The concept of connected commerce and the importance of integrating various customer data points for a seamless omnichannel experience. The significance of internal organizational collaboration across departments. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Join the Commerce Cloud Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.  

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
053: Introducing Your Hosts Natalija Pavic and Amalia Murray

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 6, 2024 38:23


Join us as we add a personal touch to our Salesforce conversations by finally introducing our hosts, Natalija Pavic and Amalia Murray. Today we'll peel back the curtain on their career stories, celebrating two decades of Amalia's marketing journey and Nat's diverse sales experiences. Our conversation is peppered with personal anecdotes and 'Nat-isms', offering you a deeper connection with the voices that bring this podcast to life. However, this episode isn't just about reflection; it's also about community and innovation. We spotlight trailblazer marketing within the Salesforce ecosystem, particularly for Commerce Cloud, discussing the power of community and the celebration of individual stories. From interactions with the founders of the unofficial SFCC community to the personal evolution within PR and marketing technology, we highlight the adaptability required to thrive in ever-changing industries. Amalia and Nat share a passion for bringing expert insights to our audience, and they delve into the technical world of e-commerce intending to make complex concepts accessible for all. Looking ahead, we're thrilled to welcome a diverse lineup of guests, from CEOs to inspiring female leaders, as we celebrate International Women's Month. We explore the importance of different perspectives and tease the exciting direction the podcast is headed in, with aspirations for more international content and discussions on the intersection of commerce and technology. So, be sure to stay tuned for more engaging conversations and invaluable insights from the world of commerce. Show Highlights: Hosts Nat Pavic and Amalia Murray share their personal and professional backgrounds Discussion on trailblazer marketing within the Salesforce community, engagement with SFCC community founders, and the evolution of partnerships Reflections on the transition from manual media monitoring to automation The value of making complex e-commerce concepts accessible to a wider audience Future podcast plans to look forward to that will highlight a more diverse spectrum of voices on the show Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Natalija Pavic LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natpavicTwitter: https://x.com/natalijapavic Amalia Murray LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amaliamurrayTwitter: https://x.com/emceeamalia/ Join the Commerce Trailblazer Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
047: SEO for Commerce Cloud with Edwin Romero

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 24, 2024 34:48


Listen in as we explore the intricate world of SEO with Edwin Romero, a seasoned expert who specializes in Salesforce Commerce Cloud. In our chat, Edwin walks us through his entry into the niche of SEO within the e-commerce landscape. He shares how SEO isn't just about driving sales; it's about crafting valuable content that meets customers at every step of their buying journey. In our discussion, we tackle the evolving field of SEO and how artificial intelligence is reshaping best practices. Edwin stresses the importance of understanding SEO's place within a company's strategic framework and the need for clear advocacy to communicate its relevance effectively. And with the dawn of Search Generative Experience (SGE), Edwin gives us a glimpse into how AI is set to transform the way we present and perceive search results. With an emphasis on the dynamics between content, development teams, and SEO tools, Edwin advocates for a discerning and nuanced approach to SEO audits and the selection of partners. Whether you're deep into SEO or just scratching the surface, this chat is packed with actionable insights that can help you navigate the ever-changing digital landscape. Show Highlights: The role of AI in enhancing SEO practices, introducing Search Generative Experience (SGE), and its impact on search results. Small, non-disruptive SEO tweaks using Salesforce Commerce Cloud and the significance of data collection for ongoing SEO strategies. How AI tools like ChatGPT can disrupt traditional SEO workflows. The importance of discernment when working with vendors and partners in the Salesforce Commerce Cloud ecosystem for SEO success. Strategies for effective collaboration between content creation teams, development teams, and SEO tools to maximize online presence. Insights into future SEO trends, including the focus on expert content and the concept of the "messy middle" in the customer purchasing journey. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Website: https://www.edwindanromero.com/  Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edwinromero/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/edwindanromero YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@edwindanromero1  Salesforce Commerce Cloud SEO: A Guide To Optimizing SFCC: https://www.edwindanromero.com/salesforce-commerce-cloud-seo-guide/  Google's Search Generative Experience On E-Commerce: https://www.edwindanromero.com/googles-search-generative-experience-on-e-commerce/  Andrew Holland - The Messy Middle: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/googles-messy-middle-sequel-andrew-holland-/ What we now know about 'decoding' consumer decision-making: https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/intl/en-emea/consumer-insights/consumer-journey/the-consumer-decision-making-process/ *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
046: Skilling Up on Commerce in Brazil and Beyond with Mauricio Silva

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 17, 2024 47:47


In this episode, we have a conversation with the exceptional Mauricio Silva, who shares his inspiring shift from a full-stack developer to a Salesforce architect extraordinaire. Mauricio's endorsement of Commerce Cloud as the ultimate customer interaction hub is an eye-opener for anyone interested in the forefront of customer experience technology. As someone who has steered projects in diverse domains, from service to financial cloud, Mauricio offers a rich repository of knowledge on the prospects within Salesforce's vibrant landscape. The episode offers an analytical look into how the pandemic has magnified the indispensability of digital commerce solutions like Commerce Cloud and Marketing Cloud. Mauricio then turns the spotlight on the burgeoning Salesforce community in Brazil and the significance of knowledge sharing in nurturing a well-informed and inclusive tech community across Latin America. Mauricio's encouraging message to connect with the Salesforce community is an invitation to embrace the future of e-commerce as Commerce Cloud establishes itself as an integral player in evolving business landscapes. Show Highlights: How major companies like ExxonMobil and Coca-Cola utilize Salesforce, particularly Commerce Cloud, to enhance their customer journey. The opportunities and importance of specialization in Commerce Cloud and Marketing Cloud within the Salesforce ecosystem. The growth and development of the Salesforce community in Brazil. The latest innovations in Commerce Cloud. Mauricio's advocacy for connecting with the Salesforce community. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: www.dvlprbr.com https://www.linkedin.com/in/dvlprbr/ https://twitter.com/DVLPRBR  *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.

Irish Tech News Audio Articles
Salesforce Report Highlights the Latest Ecommerce & AI Trends in Ireland

Irish Tech News Audio Articles

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 10, 2024 2:21


Salesforce, the global leader in CRM, has released its latest State of Commerce report with insights from 2,700 ecommerce practitioners across 15 countries, including 100 from Ireland, as well as a global analysis of the buying behaviours of over 1.5 billion B2B and B2C customers. The report highlights key trends on topics such as payment types, global expansion efforts, and ecommerce functionality across customer touchpoints, as well as insights on organisational plans for the adoption and implementation of artificial intelligence (AI). Key insights from this year's State of Commerce report include: Ecommerce stands at the cusp of mass AI adoption. 75% of ecommerce organisations in Ireland already use AI, with 30% having fully implemented it and 45% experimenting. An additional 20% are evaluating if and how AI can fit in their operations. Digital wallets surge as a payment type of choice. According to Salesforce Commerce Cloud data, worldwide use of digital wallet payments like Apple Pay and Google Pay grew 56% in Q3 2023 versus a year earlier. In Ireland, 65% of organisations accept Apple Pay. Commerce is increasingly embedded across the customer journey. No longer limited to digital storefronts or mobile apps, commerce functionality is being embedded into other pre- and post-purchase customer touch points. For example, 39% of organisations in Ireland have payment capture functionality in marketing emails, and 90% see incremental revenue from customer service channels. Commenting on the results, Michael Affronti, GM and SVP of Commerce Cloud said: "Commerce businesses are focused on driving efficiency and growth with new built-in and AI-powered innovations that enable a faster path to purchase and greater customer satisfaction. The companies that can leverage their customer data effectively to build these new connected commerce experiences will enable strong customer loyalty and profitability in the years to come." The full report can be viewed here. See more stories here.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
039: Commerce Cloud Development, Open Source, and Martial Arts with John Facey II

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 29, 2023 19:03


The world of Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations is vast and infinitely curious. We take a deep dive into this universe with our distinguished guest, John Facey II, a technical architect at Merkle who is shaping the landscape of e-commerce with his innovative tools. This episode is a celebration of open-source contributions and their profound impact on the middleware needs of clients. We discuss the power of open source with another veteran member of the commerce cloud community. As we connect with John, he generously shares his blogging journey and enlightens us about his upcoming book. His thoughts on the future of e-commerce are especially thought-provoking.  Tune in to this episode brimming with inspiring journeys, innovative insights, and a sneak peek into the future of e-commerce. Show Highlights: The Ocapi proxy, an open source middleware that aids clients with their middleware needs.  How open source contributions have profound impacts on the commerce cloud community. The importance of community in the world of e-commerce How the commerce cloud community has evolved to become more supportive and accessible. Discussion on John's website and his future plans. Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. Supporting Resources: Website: https://johnfacey.dev/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/johnfacey LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnfaceyii/ Github: https://github.com/johnfacey Books: Mastering Salesforce Commerce Cloud & Developing Salesforce Commerce Cloud: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0BV29MLFP Commerce Trailblazer Community: http://sforce.co/commercecrew  *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.  

Remarkable Retail
You Can't Spell Retail Without "AI" featuring Michael Affronti, SVP/General Manager Commerce Cloud at Salesforce

Remarkable Retail

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 28, 2023 44:09


This episode we welcome Michael Affronti, the SVP & General Manager of the Commerce Cloud business at Salesforce for a fascinating look at the rapidly evolving world of generative AI. In an expansive, yet highly practical, discussion Michael helps us separate the hope from the hype and "chalks the field" on the most important applications to automate mundane tasks or enhance the customer experience. We also go deep on where retailers are already gaining traction and where they need to begin to test and learn.But first we open up with our take on the most interesting recent retail news, including a new retail monitor just launched by CNBC and the NRF and a quick look at what it tells us. Then we unpack lots of retail earnings, which were mostly disappointing--and in a few cases downright scary (Kohl's, Macy's, Allbirds, and most of luxury). Yet Walmart, Abercrombie & Fitch, the off-price apparel players, and, most notably On Running, managed to rise above the rest. We close with our view that BFCM may ultimately be much ado about nothing much.About MichaelMichael is the SVP & General Manager of Commerce Cloud at Salesforce, overseeing the various Commerce Cloud products and services that enable customers to build commerce experiences and grow revenue their way. In this role, he focuses on the critical interlock between sales, marketing, and product development to generate aligned and effective GTM strategies.Michael Affronti is a seasoned Senior Product Executive, Advisor, Investor, and Board Member with more than 19 years of success building and leading high-performing organizations across the entire product life cycle from incubation to $1B+ in revenue.Prior to Salesforce, Michael held senior leadership roles at several enterprise tech and AI companies including Dataminr, Fuze, Contactive, and Microsoft. He holds four U.S. patents and has 11 pending for innovation in the enterprise productivity space. About UsSteve Dennis is a strategic advisor, board member, and keynote speaker focused on strategic growth and transformation and the impact of digital disruption. He is the author of the bestselling book Remarkable Retail: How To Win & Keep Customers in the Age of Disruption and the forthcoming Leaders Leap: Transforming Your Company at the Speed of Disruption , which will be published in March 2024 and is now available for pre-order at book retailers everywhere. Steve regularly shares his insights in his role as a Forbes senior contributor and on social media..Michael LeBlanc  is the Founder & President of M.E. LeBlanc & Company Inc and a Senior Advisor to Retail Council of Canada as part of his advisory and consulting practice.   He brings 25+ years of brand/retail/marketing & eCommerce leadership experience, and has been on the front lines of retail industry change for his entire career.  Michael is the producer and host of a network of leading podcasts including Canada's top retail industry podcast,       The Voice of Retail, plus  Global eCommerce Leaders podcast, and The Food Professor  with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois.    You can learn more about Michael   here  or on     LinkedIn. Be sure and check out Michael's latest venture for fun and influencer riches - Last Request Barbecue,  his YouTube BBQ cooking channel!

Salesforce Developer Podcast
204: B2C Commerce Cloud with Thomas Theunen

Salesforce Developer Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 27, 2023 35:16


Ready to jump into the captivating realm of coding and computer technology? This episode promises an intriguing exploration of the journey from early computing to the cutting-edge applications of artificial intelligence in software development. Join us with Thomas Theunen, head of commerce at Forward, as he reminisces about his fascinating evolution from a curious child tinkering with his first computer to becoming a tech-savvy forward thinker.  Interested in how languages evolve in the world of coding? From Thomas's maiden voyage with C Sharp, his engagement with Windows Phone applications, to his dedicated seven-year expedition with Java at an enterprise level, it's a rollercoaster ride through the tech landscape. Our discussion dives deep into the Salesforce ecosystem, JavaScript development, and the emerging uses of AI in speeding up workflows. Lastly, Thomas discusses the burgeoning B2C Commerce Cloud community and his invaluable contributions to it.  This isn't just an episode; it's a chronicle of a tech enthusiast's journey, making it a must-listen for all computer technology and coding enthusiasts! Show Highlights: Thomas's professional journey with software development languages. His experience transitioning into the Salesforce ecosystem, JavaScript development with BTC Commerce Cloud, and his evolution from a developer to an architect. The role of AI in software development, how it has helped Thomas speed up his workflows, and the importance of human involvement in reviewing AI-generated solutions. Thomas' contribution to the B2C Commerce Cloud community, its growth over the years, and his insights into using React in development. The transformative role of AI in workflow improvement, from aiding in code generation to simplifying unit tests. Links: Thomas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomas-theunen-10905680/  

The Jason & Scot Show - E-Commerce And Retail News
EP313 - Holiday 2023 Preview with Rob Garf of Salesforce

The Jason & Scot Show - E-Commerce And Retail News

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 9, 2023 53:54


EP313 - Holiday 2023 Preview with Rob Garf of Salesforce Episode 313 is preview of Holiday 2023 with Rob Garf, Vice President and General Manager, Retail at Salesforce. This is Robs' fifth time on the show, having previously been on episodes 110, 248, 282, and 299. It's happened again. Your Halloween decorations have come down (or at least your pumpkin is not in good shape), you survived Amazon Prime Big Deal Days, and now you're getting ready to ditch your in-laws and enjoy one of the most exciting retail weeks of the year. Yes, it's time for Holiday 2023! This year, we've decided to do things a bit different by previewing the holiday in advance of Turkey 5. Rob Garf has kindly joined to walk us through Salesforce's e-commerce forecast for November and December, and we compare it to all the other forecasts out there (NRF, Deloitte, Bain, US Dept of Commerce). In addition to the top line forecasts, we touch on retail versus e-commerce, changing shape of the holiday, discounting climate, inventory and supply chain impacts, top performing categories, the economy, and the impact of rapidly growing Chinese brands (Temu, Shein, TikTok). Throughout this episode make liberal use of real-time data from Salesforce Shopping Insights HQ, which tracks how 1.5+ billion consumers are shaping shopping trends. You can see a real-time holiday dashboard, powered by Tableau so you can interact with the data yourself on the Salesforce Holiday Insights page. Episode 313 of the Jason & Scot show was recorded on Wednesday November 8th, 2023. http://jasonandscot.com Join your hosts Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg, Chief Commerce Strategy Officer at Publicis, and Scot Wingo, CEO of GetSpiffy and Co-Founder of ChannelAdvisor as they discuss the latest news and trends in the world of e-commerce and digital shopper marketing. Transcript Jason: [0:23] Welcome to the Jason and Scot show this is episode 313 being recorded on Wednesday November 8th 2023 I'm your host Jason retailgeek Goldberg and as usual I'm here with your co-host Scot Wingo. Scot: [0:39] Hey Jason and welcome back Jason and Scot show listeners Jason is 3:13 the lucky number I had the 13 is kind of on there so I think we'll count it. Jason: [0:48] It's a lot of threes. Scot: [0:50] Yeah yeah I think it's a primal have to get one of our research analyst to work on the okay so we are recording this in early November as Jason said so at that critical part of the retail calendar all the plans are laid the discounts are on the table Cyber Monday. Thanksgiving Black Friday everything's teed up and everyone's waiting in anticipation of what holiday is going to bring us this year. And we know longtime listeners will know that our holiday turkey five coverage with a lot of sprinkling of data is second to none in the industry and this year we're going to take it up a notch in past years we've had our friend of the show Rob Garf VP and GM for retail at Salesforce on after the turkey 5 give us a real-time view of what they saw and for those of you that have been with us very long time this is her Jason's mom primarily those were episodes 110 249 282 and 299 man that's quite a track record this year we are going to take it up and have a delicious rub Garf before and after holiday sandwich it's kind of like that turkey sandwich but we're going to kind of sample it here before we even even have Thanksgiving. Rob before I before I go on welcome back for the fifth and I think record time on the show. Rob: [2:11] Wow I love it this is I will have to call the Guinness book up and make sure we get this knocked in memory on this is fantastic it's always good to be here and even better Scott and Jason and first of all thank you for having me on doing a little bit of a preview because as you mention were normally crawling through the data talking about the holiday weekend and seeing where everything lands after the critical time period and it's fun to take a little bit of a sneak preview and look at what we're anticipating and what we're seeing going into as you mentioned one of the most critical times of the year. Jason: [2:45] I think you're exactly right Rob I don't know why we didn't think of this sooner I feel like they should have always been part of our holiday tradition. And I do feel like we're getting all of the Rob protein with none of the nasty carbs so that's like a. Particularly healthy Thanksgiving treat but Rob before we jump into all of the good data remind listeners what the heck it is you do for Salesforce and how you get all this juicy data. Rob: [3:13] Yeah that's awesome let's by the way the listeners decide you know how. Advantageous this is after the fact I hope it is and again we'll do our best so yeah and I've been I always thinking about it thinking into this conversation now at Salesforce for over 7 years but I came. To the CRM Leader by way of demand where and if you remember demandware now Commerce Cloud was the leader and the cloud space and we instrumented the platform early on to get access to everything that flows. Through our Cloud so you think about all the Taps all the clicks all the swipes. [3:48] Now we don't have any access to personally identifiable information but we bubble that up and it becomes really The Benchmark for what's happening in digital and over the years we've included. Things from marketing and Service as well to look at a more complete buyers Journey. [4:08] And it's been really fun each quarter we release our shopping index which is available on salesforce.com built on Tableau and it's interactive so you can slice and dice it by vertical and by geography and it really helps. Retailers gauge how they're doing vis-à-vis their peer set which of course is extremely important anytime of the year but certainly even more important during. The holiday week now I think there's one thing that I sometimes forget to say so I want to make sure right cover it now which is. Our index and by virtue of that our benchmarks are from a outside in perspective so they are a look at the entire industry, not just Salesforce data we've modeled this over the last 10 years since its Inception so it's really intended to look at. The overall industry and benchmarking how peers are doing rather than speaking to anything that Salesforce is doing so that's my quick infomercial but hopefully more than anything just a little bit of credibility as to where we get the data, what we do with it and most importantly the conversations were able to have similar to what we're doing here. Jason: [5:19] God so that that sounds perfect. I do want just a couple clarifying questions before we jump into the actual data because I know we're going to talk about holiday like what is your official definition of holiday what what dates are you looking at. Rob: [5:38] Yeah thanks for asking that's always an important question so we've defined it over the years as the complete November and December so that's our holiday our peak season look. And we look at in particular for again the holiday weekend I know you call it cyber five or thirty five, we have cyber week which starts the Tuesday before, American Thanksgiving and works its way through Cyber Monday it's just something we started from the beginning and 4y like to like, your rear comparisons we've kept that intact so in on referencing cyber week or cyber five it's really looking at those, those seven days now of course the definition by some has been elongated and I hope we'll get into that in terms of when does the official real demand start but to answer your question straight on Jason it's for us at Salesforce November December. Jason: [6:27] Got it and so for historical purposes you've always been located in November December and then you're predominantly or exclusively focused on digital sales so you're you're reporting on what actually happened and forecasting what you think is going to happen in terms of e-commerce sales but unless I had this wrong you guys don't put a flag in the ground on on what you think is going to happen in brick-and-mortar is that true. Rob: [6:50] That is accurate now we do kind of go on the fringes a little bit because the bleeding between online or the blurring I should say between online and offline so we do have, data on buy online pick up at store we do have data on returns as well which is by virtue of, definition multi-channel omni-channel type of process but we don't put a stake in the ground because we just don't have the intrinsic data to be able to bubble that up and provide on the actuals. Jason: [7:20] Sure and then one other fun fact you reference the shopping index and you always have like the quarterly recap on there but I think. For sure during holidays and I think you're going to tell me your round you actually have a real-time dashboard up there so it's kind of a fun thing during the individual days of cyber week to kind of pop in and see see what's going on after your family Thanksgiving dinner to see if you're still going to have a retail job when this is all over. Rob: [7:50] Yeah yeah we do exactly so during particularly cyber week each morning the team is getting up super early as you can imagine and work around through the data and we're updating in real-time the data from the previous day and so for any retailer who is looking for the latest and greatest certainly by I would say 10:00 eastern time at the latest you will get that and see that up there we do have many customers who do use that in there Roundtable boardroom discussions each day to understand how they're doing it repairing it and more than anything Jason truth be told we need to get it up that early because our boss this guy named Marc benioff is typically texting us saying where's the data because I want to tweet it so yeah as much of a motivator as anything else. Scot: [8:40] Always fun when you get the text from The Seer. Jason: [8:44] Slack's slacks the he sends wax not to. Scot: [8:48] A slacks yes sorry I was off I was off brand for a second yeah he Einsteins it to his his Einstein slacks you. You mentioned one follow-up on that you mentioned American Thanksgiving that prompted me to ask this is largely we're talking about the u.s. here primarily we're not going to this is an international I'm sure you can go International but, we're doing more us right. Rob: [9:12] Yeah I'm prepared to do whatever I thought we'd probably borrow a bit more into us but we do have Global numbers but yeah. Scot: [9:20] Okay we have time Jason's obsessed with these Chinese companies I'm sure he'll ask you some questions so. Rob: [9:25] That's fair that wouldn't. Scot: [9:26] Yeah he gets all his clothes from she in any way. So before we dive into the topic du jour which is this year's holiday 2023 maybe recap for listeners kind of that you know. I know we had you on but the dust has settled and I'm sure you're going back and looking at it now with holiday 22 what were some of the bullet items that you kind of you you're thinking about as we go into 23. Rob: [9:56] Scot you don't think the listeners have totally taken This to Memory what we talked about last November 29 come on. You're probably right that's fine yeah I get it not all of us live and breathe this but yeah let's bring us back and you know actually if I could just for a minute, to put 2022 in context you need to think a little bit about 2021 and let me just spend a minute there and then I'll fast forward to 22 which is if you remember some of us don't want to in 2021 it was truly one of the first times that demand, actually got pulled forward in the holiday season and the reason was. The first mile delivery issues were stuck if you remember so many products were stuck in the port in the US of a Lala. The containers if they even got to the port or having a difficult time getting off the ship in into the domestic supply chain and people saw a headline after headline when I say people like consumers by or shoppers and they realized if they didn't buy early in the season. [11:03] They might not get the product that they actually want because in the past they would just have a waiting game and wait for the last and final deal and so. Demand got pulled earlier in the season and oh by the way retailers didn't have to Discount as steep as they normally do so going into 2020 retailers thought. [11:26] All of a sudden there would be this magical shift to Consumers buying earlier in the year and you know what that just didn't happen, there was actually a really good point of why that didn't happen when you look at the first two weeks of November we saw some of the lowest discounting rates that we typically see during the holiday season and because of these lackluster deals. People really didn't buy anything they waited and they again went back to their normal buying Behavior. One other by-product out of that is those that did by early. [12:04] We saw that they actually return the product during cyber week cyber week last year 2022 at some of the highest. Return rates during that week of the entire season people were doing their own price adjustments if they bought the product earlier in the year and realize they could have gotten a better price so there's like. I don't know how you calculate a triple or quadruple whammy on the bottom line that retailer saw. Because they were hoping to chase the deals earlier or wait I should say for the deals into the season and consumers just didn't bite. Overall and then I'll stop talking for a second here is what we saw. For let's just take cyber week as an example in the u.s. we saw a nine percent year-over-year growth growth online and globally we saw a 2% growth so us was really buoying up the global number there but a lot of that Sales Online happened right before cyber week and through the Thanksgiving holiday. Scot: [13:07] Got it it's kind of coming back to me I Remember You coining The Phrase discount chicken I remembered that is that right remember. Rob: [13:15] Yeah yeah yeah totally and thank you so discount chicken you know for the first time that we saw, retailers won the game of discount chicken last year I'm sorry in 2021 they tried to win again in 2022 but it just didn't happen consumers are really wise the real patient and now especially as they're seeing headwinds in their economic future there's definitely searching out for better and best deals. Scot: [13:46] Yeah this this kind of goes back to our data question it just occurred to me as we were talking about this obviously the macroeconomic is different now does that factor into your when you swirl all this together and you guys put together a funk forecast is that is that an input. Rob: [14:00] Absolutely yeah for sure and another piece that we look at very closely because it's driven so much of the growth over the last two years is inflation as well and so when you look at the last two years much of the online and growth is from increased prices not increased demand so people are just not getting as much from their dollar because of those increases we're starting to see that settle down the last couple quarters which is good news we're not quite seeing in Europe by the way but here in the US and so we're hoping, some of the growth will come from We're anticipating I should say some of the growth this holiday season coming from actual increase demand. Jason: [14:41] God so I want to I want to jump in the big reveal but a quick quiz first if you don't mind so last year us e-commerce growth nine percent G20 21 was also an incredibly abnormal year do you remember what the actual number you guys got for 2021 was. Rob: [15:00] For cyber week that's a. Jason: [15:02] No or sorry for holiday if you don't have it it's fine. Rob: [15:05] Overall holiday for 2021 was nine percent but that's Global so I'd have to go back to see what it was with the US. Jason: [15:13] No problem but so last year in the u.s. nine percent growth which was outlier for because Global growth was quite a bit softer. And so now here we are getting ready for Holiday 23 and what what do you think's going to happen when how much stuff we're going to sell online in November and December of twenty three in the US. Rob: [15:35] Yeah, so we're anticipating here in the US basically flat online growth and anybody I'm talking to is candidly quite okay with that and let me tell you why they're not overly bullish about significant growth online this year. For two major factors one is, we actually looked at the kegger over the last couple of years going back to 2019 and if things play out the way we anticipate we're still looking at for the holiday season compound annual growth of somewhere between 20 and 25% and so we're really where we are better than where we've been in 2019 year-over-year so we're you know we've been looking at these data points for quite some time during the holiday season if we're going to do 10 to 12 to 13 percent year-over-year growth online we're feeling really good and we've seen the average over the last couple of years come out well over that so there's a baseline that we're still needing to consider as we think about growth the second factor is. [16:50] The store. And we can't forget about even though our data doesn't explicitly account for that what we've seen in our data is that people are still going online very, aggressively meaning traffic quarter-over-quarter year-over-year is still really strong however what we're finding is people are then doing what they've naturally done for a long time which is in many cases then go into the store to actually make the purchase and so it doesn't necessarily tell when you look at flat growth year over year for the holiday season the entire story we're still feeling really good about it what helps us by the way one more caveat that I'll put in there and I should have mentioned it's got just a moment ago when you asked how we get to the numbers one of the key influences, is what does it October look like and particularly prime or we should I was about to say Prime day but the prime big deal days and so what we've seen when it first came out a nice halo effect. And we still see a halo effect certainly during the dog days of summer in July since the Inception of prime day. What was that 56 years ago but we although we saw bumps in the early part when it. First was established in October there wasn't a significant halo effect that happened during Pride a meaning those. [18:18] Not named Amazon during the October event we saw nice traffic we though saw really low discount rates once again so people were being patient they're biding their time and so we are seeing some nice add to cart rates as well so we saw people were poking around they were doing their research they were starting to. Think about what their holiday gifting this look like but they were waiting and so that's my long way of saying we're anticipating a fairly moderate holiday but we're not at all discouraged by what we. Jason: [18:54] Totally fair and so and I want to put your forecast in a little bit of context but before I do you kind of open the door on this whole October and shape of holiday thing like hey. Super useful to have historical consistency so I'm glad you guys report. The same time period every year right like I'm by no means proposing that everyone should change periods but it is interesting there's there's a lot more promotional activity. Happening in October than was true 10 years ago right and in very specific ways you convoluted 22 years ago, Prime day was cancelled in summer and happened in October and then they move prom date back to Summer but they added this second prime day and put a lot more marketing behind it this year than last year so and every other retailer on the planet. Counter programs against that that holiday and so there's been a. An increasing amount of pressure to pull sales in in October and then on the flip side a lot of people feel like holiday doesn't really end. And told mid to late January and there's a variety of reasons for that but one very particular one heck of a lot of gift cards get sold and gifted during holidays and they get redeemed. [20:18] Predominantly in January and so I guess I'm just kind of curious I'm not sure you would have necessary data behind this but like it does feel like holiday is flattening out and I know you guys pay particular attention to cyber week which you know is still a huge outlier and obviously we see way more sales on Cyber week than a traditional holiday week but. As a. Relation to the total holiday period it does feel like that spike is starting to flatten out a little bit like do you see holiday getting kind of stretched and flattened. Rob: [20:53] Yeah I love the question in this I feel like we could look back you know in a year or 25 years and do a whole. [21:03] I don't know extensive research project around how, people in mindset and shopping has evolved because it has and of course the pandemic had a big accelerator to that what we've seen in our data Jason is there has been a flattening out throughout cyber week meeting the big Spikes have typically been Black Friday and Cyber Monday and those still remain the two largest online days of the entire year but we are seeing a flattening out throughout the entire week but we haven't seen a lot of the sales, when it's all said and done pulled into October we do see a little bit of a blip in and around, the big deal days and we actually to your point other retailers have preempted the sales and we saw that in July as well meaning doing sales events the week before and it does draw them up, some traffic but we haven't seen a large portion being pulled into that time period what I will also say again lackluster discounts played a big role we're anticipating, comparing big deal days to cyber week cyber week we'll see about a 40% higher discounting rate. [22:28] Then what we witnessed just a couple of weeks ago in October you are totally right by the way that. [22:37] The holiday season does definitely extend through December and into January that's why most every retailer has there. You know fiscal year ending in January so they can really reconcile and get out from under what happened in the holiday not just gift cards but all of the returns and exchanges that invariably happen as well but at the end of the day just put a nice little underscore here is in 2020 and 2021 we did see a bit of pulling forward into October a couple of percentage points of sales but we're forecasting that 25% of all holiday sales will happen again as we Define it the 7-Day is of cyber week. Jason: [23:27] Interesting very cool okay so before we dive into some more granular topics I do you want to put the 9% in context and some listeners will be familiar with Nate silver and his poll of polls in the the kind of boring, boring a political forecast but the way more interesting March Madness forecast so I like to fancy myself as the Nate silver of e-commerce and so I do try to watch all of this data and huge caveat, nobody's data is Apples to Apples right so it's not really a matter of though this number doesn't match up to this number. Everyone has a slightly different definition of what e-commerce means everyone has a slightly different set of dates that they're looking at and they have different methodologies right so your methodology I feel like you get perfectly accurate data from a slice of the market right like there's there's no like. Human. [24:30] Are introducing your data because it's coming right from the systems and that the challenge for you guys is to take your slice and extend that to the the entire world of retail. The and I feel like you guys do that really well. So another data source that of course people are sick of me talking about is the US Department of Commerce which are these like surveys that they force retailers to fill out and. There's. Entirely different challenges and flaws in their survey methodology and how they defined e-commerce but just to kind of put things in perspective. I'm going to talk about they give us both brick-and-mortar and e-commerce data and so I pulled right before a show I pulled their data for the historical averages of November and December and so for the 27 years before covid-19. November and December sales grew, 3.8 5% per year so that's brick-and-mortar that's not related to the number you gave it all so average retail growth in that States of America / the US Department of Commerce in November and December three point eight five percent so and then I remind people the three covid years 20 21 and 22. [25:45] Were the greatest three years in the history of retail right because we didn't let anyone spend any money on travel and we mailed 10 trillion dollars to every man woman and child in America, to spend and so via the US Department of Commerce data 2020 Drew 9.2 percent. [26:04] 20:21 Drew 12.5 percent in 2020 to grew 5.4% so three straight years of, way over the historical average growth right and then using that same methodology they US Department of Commerce reports internet sales I'm way more skeptical of their internet sales because of the methodology in the way they Define it but just to put it in perspective. [26:32] For the 27 years before covid they have e-commerce growing eleven point two five percent a year and so then 2020 when everyone was locked in the house and not going to retail we had this monster year e-commerce group 35% in November and December from their data and then the following year because there was sort of a rebound and a return into two brick-and-mortar sales e-commerce sales were actually lower than the industry average so 2021 they had sales at 10.5% so a little bit off of the historical average and then last year they were the softest of all they were seven point six eight percent which is the slowest e-commerce growth in Holiday in the last 30 years so that's just kind of an interesting context right so the orders of magnitude are all right you had nine percent growth last year they had seven point six percent growth they don't forecast of course and so then I start looking at the forecast and a big forecast that comes out every year we're all friends of the NRF here and there in RF members the NRF just did their holiday forecast their forecasting brick-and-mortar growing three to four percent so. [27:45] Pretty much in line with that historical average that's a deceleration from last year which was 5.4% and they're forecasting internet sales of 7.9 percent so they're kind of perfectly splitting the difference between the US Department of Commerce and Salesforce for whatever that's worth by pretty pretty broad range and so that just kind of passes my quick sanity check Deloitte also does a forecast now deloitte's forecast is a different time range they consider holiday November to January and they're forecasting brick-and-mortar 3.5 to four point six percent so a little more optimistic and they're forecasting e-commerce at ten point three to twelve point eight percent so again a little more optimistic and then Bain did a forecast this year and they have three percent brick-and-mortar so I just wanted to throw that out there that most people are expecting this kind of three to four percent brick-and-mortar growth and this kind of we'll call it eight to eleven percent e-commerce growth. Rob: [28:51] Yeah and I would say given what you just talked about. Others a bit more bullish on the e-commerce growth than we are but I think directionally both brick and mortar and e-commerce are telling a very similar story which is e-commerce is still alive and kicking but it now has to be looked at in the context of brick and mortar and I think there's a lot of factors in that that actually will make the reporting moving forward even more difficult it is making it difficult and Jason you and I have talked about this before it's just the attribution models because it's not just about last-click anymore especially as people might you know in many cases go online and then go into the store where's that last click and how is that I'd be factored so everything from. [29:38] What we had anticipated in seeing around, you know 60% of digital sales now influenced by the physical store because the associate is driving demand through, customer service or client telling or social media or they're fulfilling Demand with being able to, you know pick pack and ship and online order. Or what's happening in digital as well in terms of people buying online and then picking up in or around the store so I think what is super interesting. In addition to what you said is how these metrics might evolve over time because it will depend a lot on, by retailer who's getting the credit and I know that's something that's been talked about for quite some time but literally how to is it how is it being accounted for and what does that do to how their reporting the numbers. Jason: [30:33] Yeah couldn't agree more and just 11 sort of example to illustrate that 11 kind of category that sold almost no meaningful volume online before the pandemic was grocery right second biggest category of consumer spending but none of it was online before the pandemic now depending on how you count ten to twelve percent of its online and guess what it all gets attributed as store sales right because it all it's all bananas that are getting delivered from a store and you know so 100% of instacart sales look like store sales to the retailer. And so it like I agree with you it's just it's just getting more and more convoluted. Rob: [31:14] Yeah well it's an interesting point around grocery you know our data showed in 2020 and most of 2021 we saw Triple digit growth year over year because of what you just talked about you just wouldn't ordinarily or historically by groceries online what drove a lot of that and what I think will drive Behavior moving forward is in 2020 we saw a 40-percent increase of net new. Digital Shoppers so these are people that hang out online but they wouldn't click the buy button and so a lot of those people now want to go back into the store but they're using digital they're using their phone in particular to really be that connective tissue. Scot: [31:55] What's a continue to peel the onion here you hit on this a little bit but tell us more about what you think is coming up in the 2023 cyber week for example if I recall last year Cyber Monday was the biggest e-commerce Day Ever set, is that did you guys agree with that or what's a my misremembering. Rob: [32:14] Yeah yeah so we actually have seen Black Friday actually. Bust up to the largest I know that's kind of hard to how others have looked at it but they're both really strong and we anticipate that being the case again again though we are seeing a bit of smoothing out of demand throughout the seven days. [32:36] Particularly on phones and I guess that's not a big butt when we weren't traveling we saw the Resurgence of you know iPads and tablets and actual regular computers especially when you get nice groovy one Scott like you did just recently but anyways I am getting distracted here by your awesome new computer but. What we are now seeing though is I move back to mobile and what we saw also during Thanksgiving a really strong traffic particularly local times between 4:00 and 8:00 if you think about it that's essentially when people are finishing their Thanksgiving Neil and they need a little break there sitting on their couch and they pull out their phone and so we're seeing a lot of traffic. Via Mobile and social as well by the way we are anticipating and we predicted this going back in June that we're going to see. Traffic via social be at a 10 times higher rate. Than traditional marketing so there's a lot of budget being pushed towards that media and we're seeing. [33:49] A lot of success there now they're still a bit of a gap in terms of conversion rate through that channel but again if you connect the dots mobile. And social happening over cyber week in particular on Thanksgiving it's going to be really strong and we're seeing again retailers lean into that. Scot: [34:10] So Black Friday was bigger growth last year or bigger absolute dollars or both. Rob: [34:18] For us it was biggest absolute dollars the growth was essentially spot-on for both Cyber Monday and Black Friday. Scot: [34:28] Jason and I'm assuming that did other people say it was Cyber Monday or it was at all. Jason: [34:32] Yeah they're they're different different folks had that different Peak yeah so but. Scot: [34:39] Controversy in e-commerce I love it. Jason: [34:41] Yeah controversy and they're getting closer together like they're worth in the early days. E-commerce Cyber Monday was a giant Tower and no one had internet access on Black Friday like that that could really is no longer the case. Scot: [34:55] Yeah well rip Cyber Monday cool I don't have any follow-ups Jason's Europe. Jason: [35:03] Awesome so. I want to jump into one of the other topics you introduced a little earlier so far we've been mostly topping up talking about Top Line which is a kind of easy way to think about this and it's you know it's a it's a kind of easy way to get your brain around it, at the end of the day retailers care a lot more about bottom line and a huge impact on holiday bottom of line is how aggressively in deeply folks have to Discount in order to achieve those sales so, are you guys like what do you forecast I don't know if you have a formal forecast for discounts but what what should people expect from discounting this year versus last year and what what are the trends there. Rob: [35:46] Yeah yeah yeah this is good because I missed a point before that I want to make as a relates to Discount and so this will give me a good opportunity to bring that up but still has to go right at that Jason we're forecasting on average a. Thirty percent discount rate throughout cyber week and again to put that in perspective it was 20% here in the US during the October event for. Prime big deal days again we look at the entire industry not just Amazon as a relates to that and so we're seeing a much more aggressive, discount rate now it's going to differ obviously by different segments you're not seeing as high in luxury as an example we do anticipate for tour toys and a consumer electronics which have been a bit of a softer category over the last 12 months again especially because because of the high Baseline they had because of the growth over 2020 2021 but we're also seeing and this goes back to the pulling forward of demand. Is more and more retailers are providing. [36:55] Black Friday deals throughout the course of November and. What's different in the past was it was fairly opaque in terms of we're giving you deals but we're not really sure those are going to be the best deals right and though we're seeing now much more transparency there's one major retailer that I'm sure you can guess who's doing Black Friday deals throughout the course of November and they are guaranteeing price matches. If for some reason they do go lower and they are also offering buy now pay later so you can commit to getting the product so you don't miss out on it but you can then pay over time and so what really came to life for me in this topic was we were doing a round table. [37:47] In Toronto in June and one of the attendees and she talked about this again at dreamforce in. September so I feel comfortable talking about it is a digital executive from Desi mm which is a cool health and cosmetics and Beauty brand that also has two other brands one called the ordinary and they have something that they've been doing for quite some time calling it, slow vember and their whole point is don't cause any urgency but rather. Make it a more relaxed buying experience and their point is throughout the course of all of November we're going to provide the same exact discount no matter when. And if you buy it and so we're seeing that a bit more and more some of it is coming by way of. [38:38] Early Access or exclusivity but also again extending and providing visibility, part of it is again trying to create that confidence that you're getting the best and final deal and also by the way you talk about the bottom line Jason. Is trying to reduce the Deluge of returns that often happen a lot of retailers. Are changing 88 percent according to our research are changing their returns policies and that's going to be a. Big risk and what and how that impacts holiday purchases this year. Jason: [39:13] Yeah you know it's funny there's so many moving Parts it's so complicated you think about like what a big impact inflation had on last holiday and you know good news like it seems like inflation is going to be lower this holiday. Consumer was in a better economic position last year than it seems like they're getting their sure we're seeing credit and defaults and things like that start start to creep up so there's there's just all these moving Parts but one thing I think a lot of people lose sight of is in the last three years predominately driven by the pandemic every retailer has completely reinvented their supply chain and their demand forecasting and I would argue everybody's way better at it now and they have way more agile Supply chains and there they're they're a lot more accurate with their level of inventory which means. They're more confident they're going to sell through their inventory and that changes their discount strategy like they're just all these moving parts that make it really hard to compare your over year when you know. Preview point the last three years sometimes we didn't have anything to sell and then the next year we had two years worth of stuff to say so. Rob: [40:24] I was just talking about that with an executive just earlier today and how retailers have gotten as you said better at demand forecasting. Better at Inventory management and I joke sometimes although I'm only half joking that supply chain has really come to the front office it's like really part of the customer experience at this point and has such an opportunity, to either negatively impact our hopefully positively impact. The customer experience especially when you're you know trying to find product after the shipping cut off window we're anticipating once again a huge uptick for those that have the ability for Consumer to buy online and. Pick it up in and around the store after. [41:06] The ship and cut off window we're seeing seven times higher growth rate for those that have that capability because essentially you're kind of shutting down your online doors if you cannot. Fulfill those orders after the fact and so but that requires to your point Jason like a lot of tuning. Around supply chain order management inventory oh and by the way store associates as well we have to. You know planned for that extra time that they'll have to take to fulfill that order will have to provide the right incentives and will have to give them the tools as well and I think retailers have gotten better at it. I don't think anybody's fully cracked the code but going back to your bottom line point last year for us the holiday theme was profitability and that doesn't go away I think people have gotten meaning retailers have gotten better at it but certainly always opportunity so I'm glad you called that out. Jason: [42:02] Yeah I like to say profit is cool again. Rob: [42:04] Providence cool again yeah. Jason: [42:06] The if you take nothing else away from this episode profit is cool. The the way it's funny like I joke about this but it's kind of serious when I started my career the the VP of supply chain probably started his career as a truck driver and and today that VP of supply chain like probably has a PHD in data science um so it's a that that occupation has dramatically changed the one other follow-up question. One of the cool things about your data set versus some of these other ones I look at is. You guys have real-time access to the data so as we record this we're eight days into November have you seen anything interesting or there any patterns that have stood out it you does it make you more confident in your forecast or in anything that's interesting for listeners to know. Rob: [43:01] Yeah we did look at the first couple days of November and also of course looked at October it's pretty consistent with what we saw, in Q3 in the US we're basically flat in terms of growth however traffic is up so traffic is up four percent. Orders are slightly down what we've seen which I think again is a very nice leading indicator is, product view rates have increased by 5% and add to cart month-over-month so September to October plus a little bit of November we've seen a slight uptick as well so what that's telling us is people are interested. They're doing their research. They're looking for the best deals they're understanding where the inventory is available and so that they're ready to make the move when they feel like they're getting the best and most value. Scot: [43:58] Cool so it sounds like if traffic's up in orders are down a lot of Tire kick in and kind of prepping and watching and making your list and you know could be the start of discount chicken 2.0 will see. Rob: [44:10] There you go exactly 2.0 I'm using that Scott I'm grabbing that I hope that's okay. Scot: [44:14] Discount chicken the chickens Strike Back. Rob: [44:18] Well and also I mean you talked about kick the tires so I think it's a good opportunity for a promo for spiffy at this point too so don't forget to get your gift cards as well right. Scot: [44:28] Yeah yeah we will be running some promos thanks. Jason: [44:30] And if you do kick your tires Scott can come to your house and replace them for you. Rob: [44:34] Exactly. Scot: [44:36] And shop for the new shoes online. Rob: [44:38] There you go I think there's a mash up there there's going to be spiffy and a DDOS coming together for anyways I don't know we'll leave that to the markers. Scot: [44:48] That's a good segue into my question in the predictions on category so I remember last year you guys had some interesting data on that does your prediction. Kind of data science get down into the category slicing of things or that's going to be more in the rearview. Rob: [45:06] Yeah no we certainly look at that we do it obviously based on what we've seen historically we're anticipating for the holiday. Active apparel active Footwear Health and Beauty being really strong so. You know we talk about the big number because that gets the headline in terms of essentially flat growth but we had tisza Pate some nice growth in those areas it's going to be a challenging partly because of comping as a relates to toys and gaming and consumer electronics if you think about that's just macro trend. People are looking for Comfort part of it is coming out of covid and maybe not all of us getting back into three piece suits but also when you feel a little bit of economic uncertainty I was listening to some Financial show. [46:02] While I was traveling over the last couple weeks and somebody put it as kind of the household PL or the household balance sheet you know when you're looking at that in your making choices you're taking more control of your finances which is happening people often migrate not only obviously to value, and safety they're looking at comfort and so there's something to be said for comfort and shoes and Footwear comfort, in apparel and almost the openness to be a bit more comfortable both in Social and in work situation so what are anticipating like I said active apparel active Footwear Health and Beauty being really strong luxury as well don't sleep on luxury they've been the most resilient category. In the pandemic and coming out of the pandemic and so that end of the market has held really well we're seeing a little bit. Of softness and what I'll call the aspirational luxury but as a whole that category is looking really strong and we anticipate it looking pretty strong, during the holiday as well. Scot: [47:12] Yeah this is old school but I remember a channel advisor going through 08-09 we were always shocked that luxury you know it's like the world is falling apart around us and people are like oh yeah I'll get a get a 400 dog and back it's gone. That part of the market just doesn't care that they're immune to those things I guess. Rob: [47:30] They're pretty resilient. Yeah I mean one other thing I'll throw in there just because I'm talking about it more and more with customers as we think about the holiday more as a. I think Bellwether to what will anticipate next year over the course and this is a global number but over the course of holiday were anticipating 194 billion dollars of online sales being influenced by a. Sorry are you thought you were going to get through this whole I know should I have not done that I'm sorry because you definitely that's on your bingo sheet. Jason: [48:07] Now I have to check the there's a I in this episode flag on iTunes. Rob: [48:11] Exactly well might get some more traffic that way so who knows but we find that super interesting most of it I want to like temper that. A lot because people are getting really excited about that headline is most of it will be from predictive a I like product recommendations which we've been doing for quite some time we're starting to see some early adoption of generative AI whether that's in email marketing with subject lines or body copy for that Saint product detail page with product descriptions or in service super interesting wood Gucci is doing and what they call a Gucci 9 their service center and teeing up responses for their agent to make them more efficient and allow them to scale but also stay on brand and so we'll see that a bit more but again a vast majority like I said it's around globally sixteen Seventeen percent of all sales will be influenced by AI this holiday. Jason: [49:06] That interesting so Rob we're almost out of time but I want to throw a super meaty 12 you for for a final question Scott was making fun of me but I am super interested in these Chinese brands that are capturing attention and share in the u.s. right and in particular that's that's Tim ooh which is has more traffic than Target more sales than Ed see in the United States Xi'an is the largest apparel reseller in the United States and then to a lesser extent Tick-Tock which has the vast majority of consumers attention in the United States and is now trying to sell stuff to people. What super interesting is it's not obvious those guys are all growing at Breakneck Pace much faster than your your nine percent growth number it's not obvious if or who they're taking share from so I'm curious of you if you have any POV it kind of seems like there they're inventing new demand or at the very least they're taking sure from brick-and-mortar it does not appear they're taking sure from the Amazons of the world. Rob: [50:09] Yeah that's awesome I'm glad you're addressing this I've just spent a couple weeks. In Europe I was in four different cities so talking to a lot of luxury Brands talking to a lot of traditional brick and mortars, and this is an area one of the executives put out Tech intermediary and I told him I would steal that and here you go I'm stealing it. Because I would say those that you just categorized are really wedging themselves in between the demand and the supply and they're creating a whole new platform where. It was just an originally with Tik-Tok and others about inspiration and now it's about purchase and so you know what we're seeing in Jason you and I have talked about this got 20 degree as well this idea of embedded Commerce or shopping at the edge. Where the buy button is being pushed up through the funnel on these delivery platforms again these Tech intermediaries I mean if you think about it they're almost like. The next generation of the shopping mall the shopping mall is created because of access because the highway here in the states and it created a place for people to hang out for people to get some food for people to shop. [51:16] People to socialize and because of that hey they could have tenants who that would then pay rent and sell stuff right and it's not dissimilar to what these Tech into mediators are doing in that they're monetizing their traffic I think they're coming after, the brick-and-mortar to a degree they're all so I wouldn't say creating more demand but fraying some of the man from. The brand sites because the brands are showing up there and so I would say there. [51:52] A little bit creating more demand but more than that they're kind of defraying the demand we've seen is. A high degree of growth thirty percent over the last couple of years of growth on these third-party intermediaries that we're talking about and they are taking from other platforms. Jason: [52:14] Interesting I don't know what the real answer is but I do know it's super interesting and important to pay attention to so I'm glad we brought it up but Rob that is going to have to be where we leave it because we have used up all of our allotted time I'm going to make sure to put a link to the Salesforce holiday dashboard in the show notes and super grateful for you taking at time and I hope you have a great Thanksgiving and we're looking forward to talking with you right after Cyber Monday. Rob: [52:45] Thanks Jason Banks got ya looking for doing a short couple weeks looking forward to talking to you then. Scot: [52:50] You robbed remind listeners where they can find your pontification xand and do they just Google the the index to find your daily things or like is there a quick URL that you guys have that. Rob: [53:04] Yeah you know to be honest with you the best way to is go to Google and put in shopping index Salesforce and you'll get to our holiday insights Hub so it not only has the dashboards but has all of the blog's were writing and all of the up-to-date analysis. Scot: [53:20] Cool well thanks we really appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to deliver this delicious holiday sandwich for our for Jason I in our listeners. Jason: [53:31] All right you guys be well and until next time happy commercing!

In Depth
How Vercel found extreme product-market fit by focusing on simplification | Guillermo Rauch (Vercel's CEO)

In Depth

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 2, 2023 67:01


Guillermo Rauch is the CEO of Vercel, a frontend-as-a-service product that was valued at $2.5b in 2021. Vercel serves customers like Uber, Notion and Zapier, and their React framework - Next.js - is used by over 500,000 developers and designers worldwide. Guillermo started his first company at age 11 in Buenos Aires and moved to San Francisco at age 18. In 2013, he sold his company Cloudup to Automattic (the company behind WordPress), and in 2015 he founded Vercel. — In today's episode we discuss: Guillermo's fascinating path into tech Learnings from building Cloudup and selling the company to Automattic (the company behind WordPress) Vercel's origin story and path to product market fit How to make an open source business successful Vercel's unique philosophy on developer experience Insights and predictions on the future of AI — Referenced: Algolia: https://www.algolia.com/ Apache Zookeeper: https://zookeeper.apache.org/ Apache Kafka: https://kafka.apache.org/ AWS: https://www.aws.training/ C++: https://www.techtarget.com/searchdatamanagement/definition/C Clerk: https://clerk-tech.com/ Cloudup: https://cloudup.com/ Commerce Cloud: https://www.salesforce.com/products/commerce/ Contentful: https://www.contentful.com/ Debian: https://www.debian.org/ Fintool: https://www.fintool.com/ Figma: https://www.figma.com/ GitLab: https://about.gitlab.com/ IRC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Relay_Chat KDE: https://kde.org/ Linux: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux Mozilla: https://www.mozilla.org MooTools (UI library): https://mootools.net/ Next.js: https://nextjs.org/ React Native: https://reactnative.dev/ Red Hat: https://www.redhat.com/ Redpanda: https://redpanda.com/ Resend: https://resend.com/ Rust: https://www.rust-lang.org/ Salesforce: https://www.salesforce.com Servo: https://servo.org/ Shopify: https://www.shopify.com/ Socket.io: https://socket.io/ Symphony: https://symphony.com/ Trilio: https://trilio.io/ Twilio: https://www.twilio.com Vercel: https://vercel.com/ V0.dev: https://v0.dev/ — Where to find Guillermo: Twitter/x: https://twitter.com/rauchg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rauchg/ Personal website: https://rauchg.com/ — Where to find Todd Jackson: Twitter: https://twitter.com/tjack LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/toddj0 — Where to find First Round Capital: Website: https://firstround.com/ First Round Review: https://review.firstround.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/firstround Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@FirstRoundCapital This podcast on all platforms: https://review.firstround.com/podcast — Timestamps: (02:35) Becoming an “internet celebrity” at age 11 (08:30) Guillermo's first company: Cloudup (11:09) Biggest learnings from Cloudup and WordPress (15:06) The insights behind starting Vercel (17:11) Sources of validation for Vercel (20:29) How Vercel formed its V1 product (23:25) Navigating the early reactions from competitors and users (25:58) The paradox of developers and how it impacted Next.js (31:20) Advice on finding product market fit (34:48) The forces behind a trend towards "Front-end Cloud” (38:35) Why people now pay so much attention to the front-end (40:06) How to make an open source business successful (44:54) Insights on product positioning and category creation (48:52) Vercel's journey through becoming multi-product (51:44) Guillermo's take on the future of AI (53:43) Heuristics for building better product experiences (55:49) AI insights from Vercel's customers (57:37) How AI might change engineering in the next 10-20 years (62:43) Guillermo's favorite advice (65:45) Guillermo's advice to himself of 10 years ago

Mastering Metail
Announcing One Flywheel with Duncan Painter

Mastering Metail

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 24, 2023 21:45


In sync with the release of this episode, Flywheel has announced to the world the coming together of the Ascential Digital Commerce brands as one unified, more powerful Flywheel. Tune into CEO Duncan Painter explaining the rationale behind this initiative and how the unification of our brands & launch of the Commerce Cloud sets us up for unparalleled capabilities and services for all of our customers and clients.

Salesforce Developer Podcast
191: Composable Commerce with Nat Pavic

Salesforce Developer Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 28, 2023 37:02


Welcome to a futuristic ride through the world of composable commerce and technology with our distinguished guest, Nat Pavic, a senior manager of product management for Commerce Cloud. Nat, with a remarkable background in coding, programming, physics, quantum computing, and biophysics, is currently navigating the path of innovation for Commerce Cloud. He unravels the concept of composable commerce and reveals how this new approach provides unprecedented freedom and flexibility to customers, revolutionizing the e-commerce landscape. We delve into the realm of group shopping and digital experiences, studying innovative applications like Slack's group dressing room. The discussion leads us to witness the transformative potential of VR and AR in enhancing online shopping efficiency. We close with an exploration of the growing trend of shoppable ads and their potential to revolutionize media revenue. Don't miss this enlightening journey into the future of commerce! Show Highlights: In-depth exploration of headless and composable e-commerce platforms, emphasizing the shift towards 'commerce anywhere' and the role of being an API-first company. Discussion on group shopping and digital experiences. Examination of the potential of VR and AR in the realm of online shopping. Analysis of the trend of shoppable ads and their potential to revolutionize media revenue. Conversation around AI's potential in e-commerce, specifically in terms of predictive AI, generative AI, and their roles in enhancing shopping experiences. Case studies and practical applications of the concepts in various industries, including retail, travel, and the media sector. Links: Twitter: https://twitter.com/NatalijaPavic  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natpavic/ 

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
021: In Conversation with Resident Golden Hoodie Recipient and Commerce Cloud Community Pillar Thomas Theunen

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 26, 2023 28:44


Join us for an enlightening chat with the remarkable Thomas Theunen, the brain behind the Rhino Inquisitor blog and the head of Commerce at Forward. Thomas is a remarkable raconteur as he takes us on his thrilling journey from developer to architect and, now, the head of commerce at a Salesforce implementation partner. Unlock the potential of AI in the realm of Commerce Cloud, with Thomas sharing his experiences with pipelines, Salesforce's Composable Storefront, and, most intriguingly, shirtforce. We also delve into the crucial aspect of secure data storage and the varying regulations across industries. Lastly, we discuss the future of commerce cloud, e-commerce, and AI. Don't miss out on this engaging conversation that spans across a wide array of topics. Show Highlights: Thomas's innovative use of generative AI in creating designs for shirtforce. The role of AI in the future of Commerce Cloud, including its application in pipelines, Salesforce's Composable Storefront, and e-commerce. Discussion on the secure storage of data being fed to AI services and the importance of adhering to varying regulations across industries. Insights on the potential future of commerce cloud, e-commerce, and AI from Thomas' perspective. The exploration of AI applications in creating SEO titles and descriptions, as well as optimizing product catalogs. The importance of adhering to data regulations and the potential legal implications when working with AI. Resources: Blog: https://rhino-inquisitor.com/ Company site: https://forward.eu/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/theunenth Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomas-theunen-10905680/ Follow and Review: We'd love for you to follow us if you haven't yet. Click that purple '+' in the top right corner of your Apple Podcasts app. We'd love it even more if you could drop a review or 5-star rating over on Apple Podcasts. Simply select “Ratings and Reviews” and “Write a Review” then a quick line with your favorite part of the episode. It only takes a second and it helps spread the word about the podcast. *** Episode Credits If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Emerald City Productions. They helped me grow and produce the podcast you are listening to right now. Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com. Let them know I sent you.  

Salesforce Developer Podcast
185: Data Cloud with Danielle Larregui

Salesforce Developer Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 17, 2023 26:36


Navigating through the tech world can feel like stepping into a labyrinth, but our guest Danielle Larregui has found her own unique path. Now a senior developer advocate for Marketing Cloud at Salesforce, Danielle shares her experiences that have transformed her from an accidental admin to a ‘casual teacher' of developers. We chat about her intriguing journey into the tech world, her engaging first public speaking experience, and how she embraces each new challenge as an opportunity for growth.  We also dive deep into the world of customer data platforms (CDPs). Our conversation with Danielle is inspiring and packed with insights, offering a fresh perspective on the evolving tech industry. Show Highlights: Danielle's journey from an "accidental admin" to a senior developer advocate for Marketing Cloud at Salesforce, discussing her career trajectory and experiences. The role of customer data platforms (CDPs) in consolidating customer data from disparate sources to provide a comprehensive view of the customer journey. How Salesforce's Commerce Cloud, Marketing Cloud, and Data Cloud can be used together to create intelligent, data-driven marketing campaigns. The significance of data in modern society and the differentiation between data lake objects and data objects. Exploration of Danielle's work with Marketing Cloud, including her projects involving AMPScript, server-side draw script, and the platform's REST and SOAP API. Discussion on the role of Data Cloud in AI and its future prospects. Introduction to Salesforce's Data Cloud, its structure, and its difference from standard Salesforce objects. Insight into the connection between Data Cloud and Tableau and how they work together for data analysis. Links: Danielle on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DnLarregui Danielle on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielle-larregui-1567b973/   

The Jason & Scot Show - E-Commerce And Retail News
EP306 - Apple WWDC announcement, Generative AI, and Holiday First Look

The Jason & Scot Show - E-Commerce And Retail News

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 12, 2023 58:20


EP306 - Apple WWDC announcement, Generative AI, and Holiday First Look  Apple previewed a new mixed reality headset called the Apple Vision Pro at it's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) this month. Apple calls the new category spatial computing and we speculate about how it may or may not be a big deal. We also discuss the latest Echo hardware from Amazon, which is mostly disappointing. We discuss the rapidly evolving generative AI space and some of the commerce use-cases. And we take a first look at Holiday 2023. Don't forget to like our facebook page, and if you enjoyed this episode please write us a review on itunes. Episode 306 of the Jason & Scot show was recorded on Thursday, June 8th 2023. http://jasonandscot.com Join your hosts Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg, Chief Commerce Strategy Officer at Publicis, and Scot Wingo, CEO of GetSpiffy and Co-Founder of ChannelAdvisor as they discuss the latest news and trends in the world of e-commerce and digital shopper marketing. Transcript Jason: [0:23] Welcome to the Jason and Scot show this is episode 306 being recorded on Thursday June 8 2023 I'm your host Jason retailgeek Goldberg and as usual I'm here with your co-host Scot Wingo. Scot: [0:38] Hey Jason and welcome back Jason Scott show listeners well it's been about a month our weekly pot has become a monthly cut pod because our lives have gotten pretty busy here in this postcode world I know you've been traveling a lot what else is new with you. Jason: [0:57] Yeah yeah it's finally feels like summer which I'm very grateful for, a lot of interesting stuff going on in the world of Commerce that keeps me engaged but I feel like the main reason our podcast is slow down is because you are an entrepreneurial mogul. Scot: [1:15] I don't know about mobile but I'll take the entrepreneur piece yeah the day job is a occupying 100 or 99 point, eight percent of my time and I used to be able to use speed like 97 and I could squeeze in more time so I podcast start button but got a there's a lot of cars out there to take care of and we're doing our best to get to all of them. Jason: [1:35] And we are grateful for it I feel like I'm I'm going back in time about six months because we've been on such a leg but I feel remiss. There was a huge accomplishment like six months ago you were named one of the founding members of the. Marketplace Hall of Fame. Scot: [1:57] I saw that yeah yeah. Jason: [2:01] Here's the thing I'm going to say about that I didn't know that much about it and I don't think anyone would be surprised to hear you're a founding member but like. Don't like five names and it was like Jeff Bezos Mar Quarry. And you and Jack Ma I'm like I'm like man you are going to be the best looking dude on that Mount Rushmore. Scot: [2:24] Yeah usually I'm I'm kind of Groucho Marx not sure I want to be in the club but this is one I was very happy to be being is like me and like three or four other billionaires all I'll take I'll take being included in that group. Jason: [2:39] Yeah yeah you don't want to be the fanciest house on the Block so. Scot: [2:42] Yeah I got a yeah I'm I'm excited I'm punching way above my weight on that list for sure. Jason: [2:48] Yeah well so anyway congratulations on that for sure I know and westerners would appreciate it and then while I'm thrilled for summer I've been a little down about one bit of news. Scot: [3:00] What is it Jason. Jason: [3:01] Disney click closed the Star Wars Hotel before you and I got to go there. Scot: [3:08] Yeah I know we could have done a live stream when this thing was announced I was excited and then I saw the price and then I saw the promo video and then I saw the reviews and you could just tell they had totally the totally whiffed on the whole thing it was. It was it wasn't just kind of a hotel you stayed at you had to just do that thing alone you didn't have to but it was so expensive. You're paying like two or three thousand dollars a night which I don't know this gonna be some. Someone in California makes these decisions I guess I don't understand the the tolls of the everyday American or even the higher in Star Wars hand that's a that's a big ask and you know I'm not in the cosplay so I think they had this if we kind of put on our marketing hats they had death by a Thousand Cuts so you had to be a Star Wars fan number one number two you had to be willing to spend 5K on this fancy hotel experience number three had to be in the cause playing and then number for the experiences that people that try to gave it you know at best a. Jason: [4:11] Yeah mediocre. Scot: [4:12] Yeah it felt very Star Trek e which is definitely a problem for Star Wars fans and you know it had a lot of kind of fun Spacey kind of vibe but like not enough Star Wars so yeah but you know. I'll say kudos to them for trying but it was an expensive mistake and I'm sure they can repurpose the real estate it's not like they're gonna I'm not shedding a tear. Jason: [4:36] Real estate has been depreciated I'm sure. Scot: [4:38] I think they'll be okay but yeah you know it is bummer because I was kind of hoping it would work, I've done some other Star Wars experience you'll stuff that was really fun there was there's this group in the UK and they go create movie scenes and industrial areas it's really weird the way it's described is called like underground movies or something like that they did a Star Wars experience that was like amazing where they had a Cantina I guess galaxies Edge is kind of like yeah. As when I mean I haven't been yet but I'm actually going to go this summer so I'm excited about that all. Jason: [5:11] Yeah it's really good you should. Scot: [5:12] Yeah everyone says it's good so that's on my list. Jason: [5:15] Yeah I'm in the same boat like it I don't feel like I'm disappointed that I missed it because I feel like. It sounds poorly executed in poorly conceived but the high-level concept of a. Experiential Star Wars Hotel experience I was super excited about and I hope the fact that this does didn't work isn't going. Like slow down future future ideas on that space because it could have been cool if they did it really well. Scot: [5:44] Yeah yeah I don't put salt down. Jason: [5:47] Onto something more reliable Apple announcements. Scot: [5:51] Yeah this was exciting so I'd love to get your take on the Apple Vision Pro so first of all the the earlier announcements I was kind of like I was getting a little concerned because they're like you know coming up the biggest new feature in Mac OS is a really cool screen saver and then the phone had a new sleep display mode I'm like, we've kind of jumped the shark if this is the big new OS features there were some other ones and I'm being a little bit facetious but there were there were to say there were minor tweaks which is kind of a Fair assessment I think. [6:24] And then they finally gave us that one more thing that we've been waiting for and I went and our crack staff of interns went into the Jason and Scot show vault and you and I and 2016 gave a talk at an in our F / shop dot-org event where we were asked to talk about the future of retail and in there I remember I pulled up the presentation we talked about drones and 3D printing and then we talk about a rvr and at that point in time Facebook they're used to this company called Facebook now you may know them as meta they they had just acquired Oculus and we were speculating would Apple enter the game and turns out we were right but like many of our predictions we were maybe a little early if I've done the math on this right we were about seven years ahead, but I think the wait has been worth it because they definitely swung for the fences on this one and you know the the feature sets and the user interface no one none of us have experience to have read the reviews of folks that have sounds like it I can't wait to get my hands on one and I'm definitely ordering one so excited to hear what you think. Jason: [7:37] Yeah yeah so maybe half a step back Apple tends to do two big events a year they and they do as software announcement and they do a hardware announcement this is normally the software announcement where they detail all the. New releases of the various operating systems for all the devices and they do sometimes, launch devices at this which they did again they launched a number of new configurations of Max and then in like September they announced. The hardware which is up you know generally includes a new phone for October. So you don't necessarily expect a huge new hardware product at this announcement and I was I was kind of with you most of the OS and announcements were very incremental the new. Computers were all like like very very incremental there is like. [8:35] The new 15-inch the the MacBook Air is now a 15 inch. So that's maybe going to be an appealing laptop for people that want to pretty powerful laptop that's super light. But I will say there's a number of small enhancements in the OS has that I'm looking forward to like they their incremental but they did you know call out a number of sort of pain points where like. The autocorrect on the keyboard can often be very annoying and they're going to use a large language model too. Um what you keep your curse words and proprietary language a lot easier and, a few little bits like that and then yeah to your point like at the end they go and one more thing and as I assume most of our listeners know that's magic language at Apple, that's that's the language Steve Jobs used before he pulled the first iPhone out of his jeans pocket or the first MacBook Air out of the manila envelope and you know that language has been used to introduce a lot of apples game-changing products and it frankly hasn't been used very much. In the in the modern era so the mere fact that they started the innocent reduction with an one more thing tells you that Apple thinks this is a. In extra big deal and. I'm with you like I will I'm embarrassed to say somewhere in some ways I will probably buy one I think there's a bunch of. [10:03] Cool things about it like the the hardware achievement is is pretty impressive so this is a. They would be pissed at me describing it this way they invented a new term they call this spatial Computing but it's a it's an AR VR headset and it kind of looks like ski goggles. And you know a lot of people had predicted this and their renderings that weren't too far off but the hardware is beautiful as you would expect from Apple it has a bunch of Premium finishes it is not an accessory that talks to a computer a phone it's a. Computer that you wear in your face and in fact I think it has to M2 chips in it. And in the specs are really high each eye has more than a 4K screen so very high resolution VR headset and the latency, it has this Mode called pass-through mode which means there's cameras in front of it and it can feel like a transparent visor because. The the cameras see outside and then you know project that onto these two 4K screen so it makes it feel like you're seeing through the visor and it's in full color at 4K with less than 12 millisecond latency which is. [11:20] Other VR headsets have a pass-through mode like the Oculus has a black-and-white pass-through mode but the latency is. As much there's a lot more lag and so that creates like all these like motion artifacts and stuff. That this is all very premium high-end Hardware which seems, pretty cool and so the experiences seem cool everyone I've read you know just got to actually try it thanks though I. On your face experience was vastly better than any other a rvr. They had experienced and then they also you know brought in Bob Iger from Disney and who announced that they were doing a bunch of proprietary content for the platform which is a. Another exciting thing right because the these headsets are only as good as the. The content you have for them so all that to me was super favorable the things that they're rightly getting knocked on is you just talked about the price of the Disney hotel being unrealistic they didn't really even mention the price in this announcement but they released it afterwards and it's the base price is going to be over 3500 bucks and if you're blind like I am you're going to have to then buy some prescriptions Iceland's is that screw into it. And so it's an expensive device. [12:43] It also has kind of mirror battery life like the there's a small battery on the device but in order to get a two-hour battery they make you put a battery pack the size of an iPhone in your pocket and connect it via a cable, to the headset and that gets you two hours which frankly isn't even enough time to watch a lot of movies that are out these days. People have talked a lot about it being really heavy. On your face because of all this like you know metal hardware and premium materials that it feels pretty pretty meaningful on your face and then the biggest weird thing to me. In the announcement they made multiple they took multiple occasions to talk about. [13:28] How important what they called presences right so they talked like there's a lot of new features and all the OSS around FaceTime. And making it a more useful meeting thing and and all of those features were around making you feel like you were. More together with the people you are FaceTiming with and when they first show this, this apple Vision Pro experience the first thing they show is video conferencing with other real people and how their faces are floating right in front of you and it you know it's this great presence experience. Except for anyone wearing. This bloody device because guess what you don't get is a picture of the person wearing the device wait what what you get is a. Uncanny valley like semi-realistic Avatar of the person. [14:18] And it just feels like very incongruity us that they're both saying presents a super important and then they're partitioning, anyone wearing this device sort of away from real people and so I that to me is worrisome I got to be honest when I add up all the pros and the cons it feels like people like you and I will buy it, but I kind of suspect that this is going to be more like an apple Lisa than the first Macintosh. Scot: [14:44] It you know but you gotta start somewhere and this is by setting the goalposts hi it's easier to go down than up so you know I can imagine several iterations and maybe it'll take another seven years but at some point I think they'll solve all those things and they'll get the cost way down but. Jason: [15:00] 100% if you look at this as like the entree into a new form of computing I'm totally with you right and and I get I wish I owned one of the a police's but and it did pave the way for the Macintosh so so I'm all down for it I don't think, if you're a retailer at home and you're going like hey do I have to invent some new Commerce experience for the. For the Apple Vision Pro like the answer is no right like and what like unless maybe your Louis Vuitton and you want to get a good press release about being a first mover you know it's unlikely that there's going to be 100 million people sitting in their house wearing this thing on their face all day and wanting to shop on it. Scot: [15:42] Yeah I saw so to last comments on this one I saw One reviewer who's really into a rvr and it was interesting framing he basically said Facebook is going down this path of VR is a social experience and you're using it for meetings and for meeting people which aligns since their social network right and that's part of their DNA where's apples kind of more saying we're heading into a world where we're more alone and you'll you know your increasingly you'll be working for home alone and remote and your you'll you know you'll be interacting with your family with this mask on it's kind of a I don't buy this framing but it's kind of an interesting you know the way it's set up today is very different view of things and then you know then the conclusion was you know for society I hope it's the Facebook silly should be good or else we're all going to be ready player one like sitting in little tiny you know compartments never interacting with each other at a human level and. Jason: [16:38] Yeah no I agree and then ironically like apples Imaging everyone sitting at home except for Apple employees who will get fired and they said. Scot: [16:46] Yeah. Jason: [16:48] Yeah another framing I heard which makes some sense is like they talked about meta really thinking of their device as a gaming platform and it's kind of priced at parity with gaming platforms and the, Partnerships that are leaning into a really gaming Partnerships and it comes with very sort of gaming friendly controllers and things like that and apple is really thinking of this as a compute platform and I think on an implied in their announcement is they Envision a future when. You know we don't we don't own clamshell devices with keyboards that we used hitter. Get our work done and that we're more likely to sit in a comfortable chair with one of these things on our face and be much more productive. Scot: [17:28] Yeah another thing that was interesting this got obscured by the announcement was I've heard a fair amount of Buzz about this roller coaster experience in Japan and I think it's a Nintendo theme park and what you yes. Jason: [17:39] Super Mario Kart and I think they did they just did it in. Scot: [17:43] Yeah. Jason: [17:44] Universal Studios in Los Angeles I believe may not have it. Scot: [17:48] Okay well Apple acquired the company that built this experience for Nintendo and. Yeah so you know kind of putting that together you see all right you got Bob Iger on stage and that was like content on the device but think about this killer you know imagine you go to your next Generation Galaxy Edge experience in your writing some kind of a ride and now they throw some AR part on top of that experience that that would be pretty cool. Jason: [18:14] Yeah I guess so to other random things I thought were mildly interesting normally apple is pretty good about dropping these announcements and then having like. Pretty quick of the ability thereafter and so one weird thing they're announcing this and June and it's not going to be available in told 2024. Um which I you know that feels a little unusual for me and then not surprising at all but like very noticeable. Three words that were not mentioned ever in this announcement were artificial intelligence VR or the metaverse. So they kind of invented their own terms and I think they very intentionally avoided. A variety of stigmas that are attached to some of those those other terms and then I guess the last thing in my head you know there's this company and I think they still exist and they have raised billions of dollars. On a lot of hype around a really high-end AR headset it's this company called magically. And I think like if there's any loser in this whole Space. [19:26] Like if there was any hope of magically surviving think I think this you know this seems like a better product in every way than what magically was promising and wasn't able to deliver. [19:46] Yeah I'm sure there's some IP that's that's interesting to someone I hope so they spent a fortune. Scot: [19:48] Yeah I think they're done they yeah they missed their window and they had these really cool early demos but. Jason: [19:55] Yeah I actually got one we're like literally the it was kind of like old-school Oculus like there's a you know a refrigerator size computer that was Tethered to the. To the screen but it definitely it was not 4K with 12 second latency. Scot: [20:10] Nothing yep and so this is where Apple wins because they can they built their own silk and they built a chip for that latency it's called the R1 or something and so they basically said alright we need to create Hardware that can have this under eight millisecond latency and they just did it and you know that's not everyone can do that. Jason: [20:28] Not many yeah so I thought that was interesting again like you and I will be able to have our little Avatar meetings after this maybe we'll be able to record the podcast in it. Scot: [20:38] Yeah people can watch us look at each other with goggles. Jason: [20:42] I feel like if there's two people that would whose attractiveness would be improved by the goggles and might be us we have faces for podcasting. Scot: [20:47] Yeah yeah I can yeah I'm kind of wondering can you change your eyes you know so those are all simulated so. Jason: [20:54] You have to be able to write like if I can buy blue contacts why can't I have yeah because that that is true for those that didn't see the announcement it can look like the glasses are clear because you can see the where's eyes through the glasses but it's because, there's cameras inside the glasses and there's always screens on the outside of the glasses and so they're they're renderings of your eyes. Scot: [21:16] Yeah I want to I'm going to do a Terminator ice that's what I'm going for. Jason: [21:20] Yeah I'm extra weary about Terminator references in our current AI climb. Scot: [21:25] That's a good Segway. Jason: [21:28] Nice I like it. Yeah so there's lots of AI news like we could do a month of AI shows it feels like the only thing I talk about it work but there's one particular subset of all this AI That's often called generative Ai and I'm going to even say focusing very specifically on the image generation Ai and there's tons of cool stuff that I think you and I have both been playing with. Scot: [21:58] Yeah I'm big into mid-journey and then everyone's done chat G PT but then the big the big thing that's helped me is once it became where you could do the links I've been able to I do a lot of writing and I've been able to accumulate all my writing in a file and then feed it in and say Here's my style analyze this so that it goes to, then I taught to start writing in my style and then that has been a huge game-changer for me that's the first one gives you like a decent draft and then you're kind of find yourself editing a lot but like having it where you can now upload new information either from the web or in a file or a PDF is a been a big game changer for me it's it gets it more like you know 95% weather. Jason: [22:47] Oh yeah I think I've mentioned this before but like there's a small subset of the writing I do that I get to partner with a copywriter so I'll like, give outlines or dictate things to a copywriter in the draft I get back is almost always will written but not remotely in my voice and so it takes me a long time to edit it and give I give the same raw inputs to chechi BT that that I've trained. To know my writing style what I get back is is way closer to use them. Scot: [23:19] Does your copywriter listen to this podcast. Jason: [23:23] Hopefully she does not. Scot: [23:25] Okay good. Jason: [23:27] Yeah yeah no I you know again there's a whole we again we could do another podcast about whether AI is gonna create or destroy jobs or both but I think like a lot of things there are things that we used to pay people to do that are it's going to be harder to make a living doing, but there's going to be lots of new jobs to write and those copywriters like ought to be the first ones learning how to write good prompts for these for these things, the image ones I've been playing with image generators to I use mid Journey, you know there's an open source one that you can kind of run on your local hardware stable diffusion, that has a lot less constraints it's not quite as high quality of rendering is mid-journey but I'll tell you the new thing that's been fun for me is Adobe announced a generative AI model called Firefly and they already built it in one of their products so the the if you own Photoshop CC you can download a Photoshop beta and it has this feature that they call. [24:28] Excuse me generative Phil and, generative Phil is a legitimate Game Changer there's a bunch of use cases that used to be super time-consuming for designers that that this beta version already like. Makes Child's Play and one of the sort of unfortunate thing mid-journey generates really beautiful images the one thing it doesn't do is, trademark images or copyright images or text right so very often you might generate an image in mid Journey but then you had you'd have to hand it to a good Photoshop artist to put the spiffy logo in it or to put you know and actual image of Scot Wingo in it or something like that. And Adobe Firefly is really good at that use case so like I've actually done a bunch of kind of Blended image where I made an image in mid journey and then, I refined it in the Photoshop beta and it's, it's super fun but man like you know if I'm any kind of designer or graphic artist like I want to get good at this stuff right away because it, I'm not saying is going to eliminate jobs but it's going to change the kind of jobs people need to be good at. Scot: [25:43] Yeah there's been a lot of really cool use cases of the generative AI feature in Photoshop where people would start like with them Nirvana cover you know the little baby swimming naked and then expand it ever bigger than you can like see the rest of the scene what the computer imagines and they're starting to it with memes to it's pretty wild to watch some output of that it's it's like it's a little scary wow it could be, how real it is it feels like it is it's not real obviously because no one knows what's in that rest of that frame. Jason: [26:15] Yeah there's a real world use case where Nike and Tiffany announced a collab product and everyone saw it and thought it was awful. Right like that it just like is just a very like not inspiring combination of Nike shoes with Tiffany branding and a bunch of people then you know went and use these generative AI models to create. Way better looking shit Tiffany Nike shoes and that really happened and then last night I actually watched the Nike are movie which is the movie about the. [26:50] Both of the Air Jordans with them. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck in it awesome movie by the way especially if you grew up in the 80s like there was a lot of fun nostalgia. But in this movie The they get a meeting with young Michael Jordan and his family who are going to come to Beaverton to talk about. In doing a Nike endorsement and and Nikes though Dark Horse like Jordans not interested in Nike and so the the the team after they booked this meeting on Friday afternoon they go to the the one Nike designer in the basement and they say Hey by Monday I need a prototype and a rendering of the world's greatest basketball shoe and this, this guy had a weekend to invent the Air Jordan which he did right and and history is made like you know it made 40 billion dollars for Phil Knight and a couple billion dollars for Michael Jordan so great success but you imagine that if that kind of thing were to happen today, um there'd be a team rendering, a hundred different concepts in these generative AI models and that it have like a way wider variation of interesting ideas to consider. Scot: [28:10] Yeah very cool. Jason: [28:12] So I will say we're starting to see some interesting Commerce use cases the I have seen a bunch of clients that are using generative AI to create or refine product images and in some cases they are literally saving millions of man hours now. You know so maybe you've got you know a huge catalog of products and they're all shot as lifestyle imagery or they're all sot on a particular background and then you now need to sell them in the new Marketplace at Sheehan that didn't exist a year ago. And there's a requirement for white backgrounds. Well you know you used to pay like an army of graphic designers to mask out all these images and change the backgrounds and now that these like generative things can do it. [29:02] Trivially and you imagine pretty quickly that all these images are going to be personalized right so instead of, you know seeing that that product around some you know model family like at some you know random persons Thanksgiving table, you're going to see that that that new food product. At your Thanksgiving table with your family sitting around it and all of these sorts of you know personalized cases as as the imagery the ability to generate imagery on the Fly gets really good, and I've actually never seen a couple of demos from Google of a product they first announced. Last year and then they announced that it's going to be released eminently last month, it's called Google seen exploration in this is a cool AR use case specifically for retail so this is walk into a store hold your phone with the camera on in front of an aisle and it recognizes all of the products on the Shelf using computer vision, and then it overlays all the products with Google ratings and reviews. [30:08] So like giving you a lot of this like valuable digital information that didn't used to exist on the shelf right and you you know they talk about all the use cases like you know you need to buy a highly rated nut free vegan chocolate bar and you're standing in the chocolate aisle and there's a you know a thousand chocolate bars there's no way to search by that right and and with this scene exploration you know you can now do that on the fly in a store and to me that seems like a, pretty cool use case and it's it's going to be built in the phones and then area of your in the OS in the very near future. Scot: [30:50] Yeah I saw a Salesforce they've been going at this very hard in within the Commerce Cloud they announced like 10 features they have one where it will auto-generate your pdp's for you they have one where it will it'll generate tags so like it'll search the description and come up with sizes and colors and and you know kind of like a variance and things out of a description to have another one, there was no actually go create product catalog for you so if you've you've this was a huge thing we had a challenge with it Channel visor is if you're selling if you're selling on Amazon and you're just matching to their Easter eysan you don't really have the rights to that product information so then you can't just copy that and then put on eBay or something like that or your own website so they've got this whole way that you can take that data your your properties which aren't, sentences create the description and then move it to other sections to a lot of really interesting things going on in the intersection of AI and e-commerce. Jason: [31:56] Yeah absolutely so exciting about that and there's going to be I have a feeling we're going to be talking about significant new capabilities on an ongoing basis for the foreseeable future. Scot: [32:06] I remember you'd walked internet retailer and there be ten vendors there that would take your product pictures and add a white background yeah. Jason: [32:15] And that win from like you know people in America doing that to people in India doing that and now it's it's an Nvidia chip doing it. Which side note like you know people keep asking who's winning the who's going to be the one to monetize a eyes are going to be open AI or meta all these small companies we also got the answer to that this quarter it's Invidia. Scot: [32:36] Yeah they're gonna win yes. Jason: [32:39] So for those that don't know nvidia's market cap Nvidia has a chip manufacturer famous for, these high-performance graphic chips that were originally used for gaming and still are and their chips have been extremely useful for training and doing refining training for all these these large language models in AI, and their market cap briefly passed a trillion dollars, um this month I think it dipped like just below a trillion dollars at the moment but to put that in perspective Intel's market cap is like 130 billion dollars. Like so Nvidia the game chip company is eight times more valuable than Intel at the. Scot: [33:25] It's crazy yeah who knows no one had that on their bingo card five years. Jason: [33:29] No I wish that was one of my year beginning predictions. Scot: [33:34] Yeah anything else on a iron. Jason: [33:38] No no did you Amazon 10 announcement last month you follow. Scot: [33:44] Yeah yeah well it wouldn't be a Jason Scott show without some. [34:00] That's right time for some Amazon news Amazon has been unexpectedly quiet so we've got a new CEO basis is out romping around wearing crazy shirts at festivals and living the high life with his girlfriend so, some of that out there other engage did not know that congratulations Jeff I know he listens to. Jason: [34:26] If you're playing bingo it was a 2.5 million dollar diamond. Scot: [34:29] Nice the one thing I saw just to highlight is a lot there's kind of a, this bit of an economic downturn has made many of the video providers get more serious about profitability so we saw both Netflix and Disney add an ad-supported tier and increase their prices and just as we're recording this Amazon announced they're going to do the same thing with prime so they're going to have an add to your 44 Prime but I know you follow the devices I totally slept on this because I was so eager for the Vision Pro tell me about the new devices. Jason: [35:07] Yeah yeah. I would characterize it as disappointing they want some new Echo devices at. The in the middle of May for release on May 31st and you know I have it. An embarrassing amount of these devices controlling smart home features throughout my house and they when I first got them like. [35:37] I seem very I felt very satisfied with them like the the accuracy of the speech recognition and stuff seemed adequate like based on my expectations at the time but I've grown to be very annoyed by them like they really struggle to know which room you're talking to and they're inconsistent about how semantically accurate you have to be like in in this world where Chad gbt is writing all my articles for me you know you just go I, man the speech recognition in this Hardware has to be better and so I was kind of eagerly looking for some new Echoes that have like an llm in them it seemed like Amazon was a first mover here, and so they did announce some new devices but they're pretty boring so they announced a new form factor called the echo pop which is. [36:27] I want by my count their fourth or fifth attempt to build a more premium speaker into an echo and this is like. A more affordable premium speaker which seems like a weird Niche so that wasn't that interesting I don't actually use the echoes. As speakers so much and then they launched a new Echo Show 5 which is. The the echo with the screen it's the smallest screen has 5 inch screen and then they announced some new Echo buds the echo built into the the earbuds which you and I both tried and I don't think we're very enamored by. The. The features are like oh the speaker sounds better than the old speaker the microphone is more accurate than the old microphone and it's 20% faster. [37:15] And so like I bought a couple of these new new Echoes to see if I you noticed a difference and it's. Like it's to me it's mostly imperceptible from the old Hardware so pretty disappointing. Um but app that announcement I will say Andy jassy said that hey the large language model for Echo is coming and you know there. It does feel like Amazon's a little behind and I don't know if this announcement was meant to apologize for that that. Status or whether there really is something that's going to be imminently announced but you know like he he doubled down on their effort to make this the, the most useful personal assistant on Earth and you know part of that is we're going to have a robust large language model that's you know on has a, a similar number of parameters to to open a I or bear door or Lama from from meta, that the Amazons going to release to make these these sneakers smarter so I hope he delivers on that promise. Scot: [38:23] Yeah the there if definitely feels like chat gbt started this new gear for Innovation and feels like apple even with their big announcement there was they worked some AI in there but it just feels like. There's a lot of people speculating do you really need a phone if we're going to head to a device where you can talk to it and these plugins at chat gbt now give it action so you can say hey book me a restaurant reservation the things you would do on your phone you're going to be almost able to do totally by voice soon therefore will you need a phone so there's a lot of you know that's a new would expect Amazon who was ahead on voice now feels like they're behind on a lot of this so it's be really interesting this next year to see who can kind of hang with this and you can't the R&D budgets are gonna go through the roof that's for sure. Jason: [39:14] Yeah and the irony is you know you go back in time and you know all the retailers in America where happily you know shipping two weeks after you place an order in Amazon you know disrupted Everybody by saying like hey you should get your stuff in two days and then one day and then same day right and they they raised the expectations for everyone else it feels like open AI is doing that to Apple and Amazon right now on the on the natural language models. Scot: [39:43] The to the pop did not pop. Jason: [39:46] It did it did not I did that in full disclosure I did not buy a pop because again like I don't I don't so much by them for their speaker Fidelity I mostly buy them to control my lights and stuff. But yeah I like I still have to repeat myself multiple times and some rooms to just turn stuff on and it's frustrating. Scot: [40:06] Yeah so this one was one I wanted to bounce off of you I'm a CNBC junkie and I was watching the other day and Target stock had a big Miss and the folks on, Talking Heads were saying that in their earnings release they really called out this shoplifting as a. [40:24] A problem and they took a one right off of something like 500 million dollars so I'm sure everyone has seen the videos where you know this is just new organized crime kind of wave going on especially in big cities where you'll see. 20 people go in a store and just run out with arm full of stuff it's happening to starting to kind of luxury then then you saw a little lemon and it happens in Apple Stores and now you're starting to see it in every day department stores and drug stores, so I thought that was you know as e-commerce person I was thinking huh that's interesting you know I wonder if and kind of hi Pro some high-profile store closures have followed from the so Nordstrom closed a store and like San Francisco and that's kind of thing so I was thinking is e-commerce person I was kinda thinking well this is interesting this is gonna this is going to benefit Amazon pretty immensely because as the stores have to close due to this crime wave it's going to benefit e-commerce and then Amazon like 60% of e-commerce so they'll just get they'll just absorb a lot of that that that so that the crime is going to have this unintended consequence of getting rid of stores which is bad for for the local environment and then it'll yeah I don't, yeah I don't think they really want to benefit Amazon but they will so I wanted to get your hot take on them. Jason: [41:40] Well first of all just to complete your thought the the brick-and-mortar retailers and the national retail Federation would actually say Amazon's double-dipping on that benefit because they're both. Selling stuff when the the stores closed in the big cities but also most of the Retailer's blame the organized crime on Amazon. [41:59] So the The Narrative is basically that like you know people here's who used to steal from stores, people that needed something and couldn't afford it for whatever reason right so they. Stalled food for their family or you know items they could afford to buy that was individual shoplifting and, employees told stuff employee shrink and there now is this much higher occurrence of organized crime for profit where where people are stealing you know every bottle of shampoo in the Walgreens and one of the reasons these big retailers say that this kind of crime is much larger now is it's way easier to monetize that stuff after you steal it, and the reason they say it's easier to monetize it is you can go sell all of this this still the merchandise pretty easily on Amazon and eBay. Um so that's controversial like the marketplace is due a lot to sort of avoid selling, um song Goods but that one of the premises why there's more organized crime is because. It is easier to fence and monetize this stuff. But here's the thing that's super interesting about that like there for sure is this new kind of crime and it's. [43:22] It's much more newsworthy so when someone drives a truck through the front of an Apple store and then steals all the phones that's going to be on the local news when someone shoplifts pound of cheese, that's not going to be on the local news right or when an employed as a fake return to embezzle 60 dollars from a shirt like that's not as often on the local news so all of these organized crimes get put on the news and on YouTube and things like that more and and a huge problem is. Like it's much more violent people are getting hurt employees and in a few cases the perpetrators are are getting hurt or even killed and so like there is a way higher human cost to this kind of crime and so we have heard a bunch of. Retail CEOs, you know raising the alarm bells and they say two things like oh man our losses are going up this is having a material economic effect on our business we're closing stores partly because of this and you know we're having to change how we do do store operations and and you know all these things they're also saying that police forces are underfunded and you know don't have enough resources to retailers with this problem so they're there in many cases you know asking for more more Municipal support here's the thing though. [44:51] People have always stolen stuff from retailers there's always been a line item on every retards p&l for shrink and for most public companies that's that's a publicly disclosed number and usually, for most retailers and it varies by the type of retailer and the the geography but usually it's one to two percent of Revenue is lost in shrink and so. [45:19] Target's announcement was hey we lost we potentially could lose 500 million dollars in profit this year. And their stock partly went down from because of it like I would argue their their stock also went down for some, PR missteps they made and then also because their revenue is just soft compared to some of their competitors, they probably went down for that shrink because 500 million dollars in profit sounds like a big deal but if you gross up 500 million dollars in profit to product costs, that's one point six billion dollars in shrink at Target in 2022 and they're saying it could be as high as two billion dollars in shrink in 2023 that means that shrink is 1.5 to 1.9 percent of targets Revenue which is below industry averages Walgreens, has made all of these same complaints and last year the Walgreen CFO like in the earnings call said hey this is a huge deal like our shrink could potentially be up 52 percent from before the pandemic. Um and then he did his swing 22 year in earnings and Shrink was lower then then the last two years and he literally had to say like maybe we cried too much. [46:40] So I do think there is this new crime it's very serious like it is a problem and you know I have great empathy for retailers in addressing that and they shrink should be zero like a butt. It's a little bit of a fallacy to say hey there's this new material economic impact from this shrink that didn't exist before because the employee shrink is way down because the the surveillance and the the big data and in the business process has evolved eliminated a lot of that and so the net shrink for a lot of retailers, really isn't as significant now it might be more significant in particular stores and so some of the the closing of these stores, seems at least partially legitimate I will say there's even controversy about that like when, Walgreens has hey we're closing a store in San Francisco because there's too much crime, the San Francisco Police Department rides in and goes that's weird because we got way less complaints from from Walgreens last year than we did three years ago or whatever so there's there's. Room for disputes about all this stuff but organized crime, is definitely an increasingly serious thing that retailers have to deal with but don't immediately by all the hype that it's. That it's some you know New Economic strain that retailers have never seen before. Scot: [48:04] I wonder if there's a bit of a narrative around this shrink number like I you know I'm sure they're reporting it correctly but so I wonder if it has the same store sales effect like let's say Walgreens has to closed in ten stores because the shrink is so bad. That comes out of the numbers right because it's probably a seems to work kind of metric so they probably you know now gold number would improve dramatically but. They've shrunk their footprint like it's probably not capturing that you. Jason: [48:33] Yeah no agreed, all as a Wayne huizenga taught me 30 years ago like it any good healthy retailers should be closing and opening stores every year why there's like you can't if you had the perfect realist real estate in one year it would not be perfect the next year right and so in many cases like they're closing stores in economically you know unfriendly climates for them and that improves their same-store sales numbers and improves their cops right and you know whether they did that for purely economic reasons or they did it because there was more organized crime or to put protect employees or whatever like, um it's not wrong for these retailers to curate their, they're fully in an economic downturn that might mean having fewer stores than last year historically the challenge with that is investors always expect you to grow. And so infect investors don't like the story of what of closing underperforming stores and having better comps if you if your overall Revenue goes down so, you know this is yet another kind of excuse for them to reset expectations with investors I think I think that's totally fair. [49:44] In some cases I will tell you retailers are closing iconic stores that just feels kind of sad like the the, Nordstrom flagship store in San Francisco is has always been a big deal that's closing I lived in Portland Oregon and they had a beautiful REI in the Pearl District which was, like a great super friendly place to live and they're closing that store and they said partly because they didn't feel they could protect employees like. That there is something happening that feels like a bummer and there's a lot of big cities that it feels a lot less fun to go shopping. Than it did a few years ago which which is I do think a legitimate concern. Scot: [50:26] Yeah so I know you're the king of all e-commerce and commerce data what are you seeing in the the reports that have come out since our last pot. Jason: [50:36] Yeah well we've slowed down a little bit on the frequency the podcast so kind of just super brief recap US Department of Commerce data comes out every month so we we have the May report which has data through April next week we'll get the, the May data so January through April sales for all of retail are up 2.4% from last year that, that is down a little bit from historical averages pre-pandemic you'd expect retail to be up about 4% a year so 2.4%. [51:11] Is concerning if you look at it from before the pandemic retail sales are up year-to-date, three thirty six percent from 2019 for example so still by historic standards that's very high but this year feels like a meaningful slowdown in sales from last year and of course as soon as you start talking about this people go well what about inflation so if I normalize this data for inflation year-to-date sales this year are down three percent from last year, which historically doesn't happen even with inflation so that, that is a real concern like it it feels very legitimate that we're seeing a Slowdown in in consumer spending and particularly in inflation-adjusted dollars so I mentioned retail sales since the pandemic are up 36% if you adjust that for inflation there up about 14% so less than half of all our sales growth since the pend or more than half of our sales growth since the pandemic, has been a direct result of unusual inflation more than typical inflation and then you know people always ask us in particular about the e-commerce numbers again before the pandemic the. [52:25] Over the last 20 years e-commerce would average around 12 to 15 percent growth a year retail would average three to four percent growth a year there was a weird transposition in the middle of the pandemic when people you know finally went back to stores for the first time and slow down their e-commerce bending so like for the only time in my lifetime, 20:22 size. Retail sales growing faster than e-commerce briefly that trend has reversed e-commerce is back on top of retail but it's not back to Historic standards so e-commerce year-to-date is up about 7.4% verses 2022 still, you know, you remember in the pandemic people are talking about e-commerce spiking and then regressing to the mean just want to remind our listeners that's not true the US Department of Commerce revised some numbers and e-commerce growth. Has ended up being much more robust than like the Wall Street Journal reported in in in a famous article in 2022 so e-commerce is up about 89 percent since, since 2019 and that means. [53:29] Above and beyond the traditional growth that I would have forecasted for e-commerce we've sold an extra six hundred and seventy five billion dollars since the pandemic started so e-commerce still is the biggest winner in this kind of. Pandemic accelerated spending and it's you know we'll get the cue to e-commerce data and about two months it's going to be interesting to see, how it plays out and whether you know the consumer slowdown persist through the end of the year and holiday or whether we start to get a bounce. Scot: [54:01] Yeah and I know it's June and but you get paid to think about this more than I do so what when clients are saying Jason what are you thinking about holiday 23 Woody tongue. Jason: [54:14] I think on the aggregate I'm not expecting it to be an awesome holiday I think there's even if, the the economy listens up there's it's going to take awhile for consumer spending to come back and I think the overall consumer spending is going to be you know modest there will be growth but it'll be low growth and because inflation will still be unusually high like profitability is going to really be, be strain for this holiday that being said we are likely to see some clear winners and losers so like not everyone's going to kind of match the industry average and we've already had a couple bankruptcies Bed Bath & Beyond used to sell a lot of holiday Goods so retailers are going to fight over you know who wins that customer this holiday and so I do think. You can expect to see some retailers have a really good holiday and you know, I hate to say this for all the small retailers out there but like at the moment the the likely narrative is the biggest best retailers in the ecosystem are likely that too. Disproportionately win holiday so like if I had to guess I would guess Amazon and Walmart are going to have a pretty good holiday at the expense of the rest of retailgeek. Scot: [55:32] Got it well you're a Grinch. Jason: [55:37] Yeah I want to be wrong I want to be wrong on that I want to be right on all my year beginning forecast which I can't even remember what they were. Scot: [55:44] Yeah I'm just kidding you get paid to tell the real. Jason: [55:49] I'd rather I would rather be prepared for soft holiday and then be pleasantly surprised. I almost hesitate to even bring this up because it kind of feels like it always happens but there there are now some potential new supply chain challenges. Perking up so there's there's some labor disputes our friends the teamsters the unload all the boats on the west coast of America like are threatening work stoppages and, you know any disruption in there like has a meaningful impact on how much Goods we have available for holiday and then one I've never heard before in my lifetime, the worldwide drought is having a material impact on the supply chain what there is not is enough water in the Panama Canal. [56:39] And so it turns out the way the locks work they have to pour a bunch of water into the canal to lift the boats and there's less water available so the water costs more so it is more expensive to take a heavy boat through the Panama Canal today than it was a month ago. Because of the price of water which. It makes sense when you hear it but it's not something you would I would have thought of and so at the moment the supply-chain wonks are are talking about like you know we might have some unanticipated, supply chain cost as you know people have to pay for the constrain amount of tonnage that they can lift through the Panama Canal. Scot: [57:23] Wow learn something everyday and I can check that off my box in it. Jason: [57:26] Nice well that's probably a perfect place to end it because we have used up our allotted time but even though we've been a little less frequent than usual, I always look forward to catching up with you and it's been great to chat but I look forward to hearing how our listeners are doing. Scot: [57:44] Yeah and you know what listeners could do to help us out leave a review we would always love your feedback let us know how we're doing and if there's any topics you want to cover and we appreciate you giving us a listen. Jason: [57:57] Scot that's a great idea and until next time happy Commercing.

Salesforce Developer Podcast
177: Custom Property Editors with Alicia Teo

Salesforce Developer Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later May 22, 2023 14:18


In this episode, we have a conversation with Alicia Teo about Custom Property Editors and how you can use them to create powerful user interfaces to configure your web components. Alicia started as an intern at Commerce Cloud while pursuing her MBA and is now a Product Manager for Experience Builder here at Salesforce. On the Experience Builder team, Alicia makes creating websites quicker and easier for admins. Custom Property Editors enable developers to create components that are even easier to use than Experience Builder, leading to fewer user errors and fewer complaints. Enjoy! Show Highlights: What custom properties are The problem Custom Property Editor is meant to solve The new lightning property types and their benefits How to override the date time picker with a new more robust one What needs to be done to a lightning web component to make it a Custom Property Editor The possibility of reusing the code Links: Alicia's Twitter Account: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alicia-teo/ Custom Property Editor Docs: https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/component-library/documentation/en/lwc/lwc.use_flow_custom_property_editor_lwc_example    

RETHINK RETAIL
Exploring the New Contentful & SAP Commerce Cloud

RETHINK RETAIL

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 21, 2023 24:00


In this episode of the RETHINK Retail podcast, guest host and Top Retail Influencer Jeff Roster sits down with Dina Apostolou, Vice President of Content, Customer & Partner Marketing at Contentful and Riad Hijal, Global Head and VP, Marketing and Solutions at SAP Commerce. Jeff recently connected with Dina and Riad at Shoptalk US where they announced the Contentful & SAP Commerce Cloud, an e-commerce platform dedicated to helping retailers drive growth and meet their customers' evolving needs. Now that Shoptalk is over, we're going to take a deeper dive into the SAP Commerce Cloud and explore its features and benefits. Tune in now! - - - - - - Host: Top Retail Influencer Jeff Roster Produced by: Brooke Frankum

The ERP Advisor
The ERP Minute Episode 84 - April 18, 2023

The ERP Advisor

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 18, 2023 3:54 Transcription Available


Microsoft Corp. and Epic announced they are expanding their long-standing strategic collaboration to develop and integrate generative AI into healthcare by combing the scale and power of Azure OpenAI Service with Epic's electronic health record (EHR) software. Infor announced that Amazon Web Services (AWS) has selected it as an Amazon HealthLake Partner, demonstrating Infor's continued dedication to providing industry-specific solutions powered by high-performing, scalable, and secure cloud services. Salesforce introduced new, HIPAA-compliant Commerce Cloud capabilities that streamline healthcare commerce experiences and lower the cost to serve customers and patients. Additionally, Salesforce announced new Customer 360 for Health capabilities that help healthcare providers deliver more personalized patient experiences and reduce operational costs through new Data Cloud, AI, and automation capabilities. OneStream released its 2023 first-quarter financial results for the period ending March 31, 2023. UKG and the National Women's Soccer League will make history on April 19 when the 2023 UKG NWSL Challenge Cup kicks off by bringing the first-ever million-dollar prize pool to U.S. women's soccer.Connect with us!https://www.erpadvisorsgroup.com866-499-8550LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/erp-advisors-groupTwitter:https://twitter.com/erpadvisorsgrpFacebook:https://www.facebook.com/erpadvisorsInstagram:https://www.instagram.com/erpadvisorsgroupPinterest:https://www.pinterest.com/erpadvisorsgroupMedium:https://medium.com/@erpadvisorsgroup

Email After Hours: The Podcast for Email Senders
Using Email to Improve the Ecommerce Buying Experience with Michael Affronti, SVP at Salesforce Commerce Cloud

Email After Hours: The Podcast for Email Senders

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 13, 2023 24:01


Michael Affronti, SVP and General Manager at Commerce Cloud, uses his nineteen years of domain experience to shed light on how companies need to use emails to raise engagement levels by offering personalization options to get to know the customer better.

Ethical & Sustainable Investing News to Profit By!
Podcast: Best ESG Funds and Stocks

Ethical & Sustainable Investing News to Profit By!

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 7, 2023 21:43


This podcast includes these articles: “The Best ESG Funds Of 2023,” by Barbara Friedberg; “5 Best ESG Stocks to Consider in April 2023,” by Benzinga; “Climate Change Stocks - How Investors Can Profit From The Green Revolution,” by Q.ai; and “Five Top Graphite Stocks to Own with the EV Boom,” by Baystreet Staff. And more. Transcript & Links, Episode 103, April 7, 2023 Hello, Ron Robins here. Welcome to podcast episode 103 and published on April 7, 2023, titled “Best ESG Funds and Stocks.” It's presented by Investing for the Soul. Investingforthesoul.com is your site for vital global ethical and sustainable investing mentoring, news, commentary, information, and resources. Remember that you can find a full transcript, and links to content – including stock symbols and bonus material – on this episode's podcast page located at investingforthesoul.com/podcasts. Now if any terms are unfamiliar to you, simply Google them. Also, a reminder. I do not evaluate any of the stocks or funds mentioned in these podcasts, nor do I receive any compensation from anyone covered in these podcasts. Furthermore, I will reveal to you any personal investments I have in the investments mentioned herein. Additionally, quotes about individual companies are brief so that I can get as many companies covered as possible in the time allowed. Please go to this podcast's webpage for links to the actual articles for more company and stock information. Also, some companies might be covered more than once and there are also 2 article links below that time didn't allow me to review them here. ------------------------------------------------------------- 1) Best ESG Funds and Stocks It's been a while since I led off talking about ESG funds. So let's amend that now with this article titled The Best ESG Funds Of 2023. It's by Barbara Friedberg and found on forbes.com. Here are some of what Ms. Friedberg says about her picks. “Forbes Advisor has selected what we believe to be the best ESG funds available in the market today… We began our hunt by paring Morningstar's master list to 140 funds by excluding options that required minimum initial investments of more than $5,000. Also, we eliminated funds that did not lend themselves to the creation of a well-diversified mix of stock and fixed income investments… We then screened out any funds with an annual expense ratio that was above 0.60%. For diversity, we selected passively managed as well as actively managed portfolios. To meet the requirements of a very broad audience, so we deliberately excluded narrowly focused sector funds, geographically specialized funds and age group-specific target date funds. These screens left us with 18 choices. The final list of the eight best ESG funds includes broadly diversified choices that are suitable for the widest possible group of investors. We included short and core fixed-income funds along with U.S. and international ESG equity funds. You might create an entire ESG portfolio from funds on the list or add a few to an existing investment portfolio.” Vanguard ESG U.S. Stock ETF (ESGV) Pimco Enhanced Short Maturity Active ESG ETF (EMNT) Nuveen ESG Dividend ETF (NUDV) iShares MSCI Global Sustainable Developmental Goals ETF (SDG) Fidelity U.S. Sustainability Index Fund (FITLX) Fidelity International Sustainability Index Fund (FNIDX) Calvert US Mid Cap Core Responsible Index Fund (CMJAX) BlackRock Sustainable Advantage CoreAlpha Bond Fund (BIAAX)” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- 2) Best ESG Funds and Stocks Now, from the best ESG funds to the best ESG stocks with this article titled 5 Best ESG Stocks to Consider in April 2023. It's by Benzinga and found on benzinga.com. Here are their recommendations with some quotes on each one. “1. Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) The company is organized into three segments, including productivity and business processes (which includes Microsoft Office, Skype, SharePoint and Office 365) (and) cloud infrastructure and platform-as-a-service offering. The last segment is personal computing including Xbox, Bing search, display advertising, laptops and desktops.  2. NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) The firms' chips are used in a variety of end markets such as high-end PCs for gaming, data centers, and automotive infotainment systems.  More recently, the firm has diversified its focus from traditional PC to more complex sectors such as artificial intelligence and autonomous driving. These sectors increasingly leverage high-performance capabilities in graphics processing units.  3. Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Salesforce.com provides enterprise cloud computing solutions, including Sales Cloud, the company's main customer relationship management software-as-a-service product.  Salesforce.com also offers Service Cloud for customer support (and) Marketing Cloud for digital marketing campaigns and Commerce Cloud as an e-commerce engine. Its Salesforce Platform allows enterprises to build applications, and other solutions, such as data integration. 4. Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Accenture is a leading global IT services firm that provides consulting, strategy, and technology and operational services. These services are the anchor of successful enterprises and cover digital transformation, procurement services and software system integration.  The company provides its IT offerings to a number of sectors ranging from communications, media and technology as well as financial services, healthcare and consumer products. 5. Best Buy Co (NYSE:BBY) Best Buy is the largest pure-play consumer electronics retailer in the U.S., with over $47 billion in 2020 sales alone. This was driven by its 10% share of the aggregate market and nearly 40% share of offline sales, according to Benzinga, CTA industry and Euromonitor data. The bulk of the firm's sales are driven by mobile phones, computers, tablets, computers and appliances, which represent its three largest categories.  Accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. e-commerce channel has roughly doubled from pre-pandemic levels, with management estimating that it will represent a mid-30% proportion of sales moving forward.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- 3) Best ESG Funds and Stocks And now to a listener's favorite sector with this title Climate Change Stocks - How Investors Can Profit From The Green Revolution. By Q.ai on forbes.com. Here are their stock picks and some of their comments on each one. “Here are some examples of some of the most popular investments in this space… Stocks 1. Tesla (TSLA) While electric vehicles are much more widespread now, much of that is thanks to the efforts of Elon Musk and Tesla, who popularized it from quirk to the mainstream. Tesla stock isn't for the faint hearted, with the eccentric billionaire CEO causing wild swings in the price with crazy tweets and ideas. Nevertheless, so far it's been a great long term bet for many investors as the stock is up over 850% over the past five years. 2. First Solar (FSLR) Based out of Arizona, First Solar is one of the largest manufacturers of solar panels. Their panels are used in solar farms whose sole purpose is to generate electricity for the grid, but solar tech is also used in a wide range of other applications too… First Solar's stock price is up almost 200% over the past five years. 3. Enphase Energy (ENPH) Where First Solar helps create renewable energy and Tesla uses it, Enphase Energy acts as the middleman. They create battery systems and electric vehicle charging stations, that allows this to be used functionally in our day to day lives. While Enphase charging stations are attached to the electricity grid, which isn't solely powered by renewable energy, it's a vital piece in the chain to make electric vehicles more usable. Enphase Energy stock is up a whopping 4,220% over the last five years. 4. Vestas Wind Systems (VWS.CO) Even before electricity was invented, humans harnessed wind to power our ships and windmills to run agricultural machinery. Wind farms from Vesta Wind Systems are a lot more complex these days, but the basic concept remains the same. It's another winner from a financial point of view, with Vestas stock up 115% over the past five years. If you're looking for a broader level of diversification and want to invest in clean energy via ETFs, there are some great options for investors. Some examples include: 1. First Trust NASDAQ® Clean Edge® Green Energy Index Fund (QCLN) This fund aims to broadly mimic the NASDAQ Clean Edge Green Energy Index… by investing in green energy companies. Some of the largest holdings in the fund include companies like ON Semiconductor, Tesla, First Solar, SolarEdge, Albermarle, Rivian and Plug Power. 2. iShares Global Clean Energy UCITS ETF (IQQH.DE) This ETF has a similar objective, but instead aims to benchmark against the S&P Global Clean Energy Index. Some of the major holdings in the fund include Vestas Wind Systems, First Solar, Plug Power and Consolidated Edison.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- 4) Best ESG Funds and Stocks Continuing in a related field to energy is this article titled Top of Form Five Top Graphite Stocks to Own with the EV Boom. It's on baystreet.ca and by Baystreet Staff. Here is some of what is in the article. Quote. “With the electric vehicle market accelerating, investors may want to pay close attention to the graphite market,' Andrew Miller, chief operating officer at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, (is) quoted by InvestingNews.com (as saying). ‘We're now projecting that by the end of next year, batteries will be the number one leading market for graphite.'… In addition, to meet rising demand, Benchmark Mineral Intelligence estimates that up to 150 new operations across natural and synthetic graphite are needed by 2035. That's creating big opportunity for natural graphite companies… (and) beneficial for (some) vehicle stocks. 1. Infinity Stone Ventures Corp. (CSE: GEMS) (OTC: GEMSF) Announced the formation of a new wholly-owned subsidiary, AirCarbon Technology Corp., to develop the Rockstone Graphite Project. The Company has also entered into a partnership with R&D Innovation Inc. to use their patent-pending and proprietary air classification separation technology to process samples from the Rockstone Graphite Project. The Air Classification System eliminates the need for flotation, chemicals and drying in the graphite milling process and greatly reduces the capital costs for a traditional graphite mill. It has also been designed to eliminate the need for tailing ponds and greatly lessen the need for significant infrastructure at a mine site… ‘We firmly believe that graphite is being overlooked in the market, considering its critical position in the battery metal supply chain… said Zayn Kalyan, CEO and Director of Infinity Stone. 2. Volkswagen (VWAGY) Just announced that it is stepping up its activities in North America in a bid to take a strong position in this important growth market for battery electric vehicles. The Group and its battery company PowerCo have selected St. Thomas in Ontario, Canada, to establish Volkswagen's first overseas gigafactory for cell manufacturing, which will produce sustainable unified cells, start of production is planned for 2027… 3. Graphite One Inc. (GPHOF) Is planning a complete domestic U.S. supply chain for advanced graphite materials, is pleased to announce drill results from its 2022 Field Program at its Graphite Creek Property (in Alaska) … Graphite Creek is living up to its designation by the US Geological Survey as the largest and highest grade graphite resource in the United States. 4. NextSource Materials Inc. (NEXT.TO) (Has) announced that construction of the processing plant and mining camp for the Company's Molo Graphite Mine in Madagascar is now complete, and that the entire mining fleet is at site. President and CEO, Craig Scherba, commented: ‘We are now entering the final stages of development of Phase 1 and are fast approaching first production.' 5. Tesla (TSLA) In the fourth quarter, it produced over 439,000 vehicles and delivered over 405,000 vehicles. In 2022, vehicle deliveries grew 40% YoY to 1.31 million while production grew 47% YoY to 1.37 million. The company also continued to transition towards a more even regional mix of vehicle builds which again led to a further increase in cars in transit at the end of the quarter.” End quotes. It seems a little strange having Tesla here but I guess Tesla must have some relationship with its battery production. ------------------------------------------------------------- Now one Other Honorable Mention 1. Title: Texas Instruments a Top Socially Responsible Dividend Stock With 2.8% Yield (TXN) on nasdaq.com. By BNK Invest. One article from Outside the US 1. UK Title: Top 10 ethical financial advisers in 2023 on good-with-money.com. By Lori Campbell. ------------------------------------------------------------- Ending Comment Well, these are my top news stories with their stock and fund tips -- for this podcast titled: “Best ESG Funds and Stocks.” Now, please be sure to click the like and subscribe buttons on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, or wherever you download or listen to this podcast. That helps bring these podcasts to others like you. And please click the share buttons to share this podcast with your friends and family. Let's promote ethical and sustainable investing as a force for hope and prosperity in these terribly troubled times! Contact me if you have any questions. Thank you for listening. Talk to you next on April 21st. Bye for now. © 2023 Ron Robins, Investing for the Soul

Crónicas de Salesforce con Sara Hernandez #ENESPAÑOL
EP#47 ¿Qué es Commerce Cloud B2B?

Crónicas de Salesforce con Sara Hernandez #ENESPAÑOL

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 25, 2023 52:28


✨ Nuevo episodio en Crónicas de Salesforce con Sara HernándezHoy día tenemos como invitado especial a Jonathan Wiesel, nos acompaña desde España, pero el es nativo Caracas - Venezuela, Actualmente desempeña el rol de Arquitecto Técnico En este episodio estaremos conversando sobre Salesforce Commerce Cloud B2B, conoceremos qué es, cómo trabaja y se mencionarán algunos casos de uso, pero primero entender que es un commerce e incluso que es un B2B. Podrás encontrarnos en Spotify, Apple Podcast y Google Podcast✨¡Nuestro principal objetivo es impulsar el contenido en español!

Retail Podcast
NRF 2023 Salesforce Kelly Haut Thacker, Salesforce Senior VP, Marketing, Commerce Cloud & CMO of Retail and Consumer Goods

Retail Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 23, 2023 8:55


A super insightful conversation with Kelly Haut Thacker, Salesforce Senior VP, Marketing, Commerce Cloud & CMO of Retail and Consumer Goods (RCG). Discussing their new "New Salesforce data* which shows that a disconnected experience is a top frustration customers have with retailers. What's more, 79% of consumers surveyed plan to reassess their retail spending over the next 12 months. However, 65% of consumers will remain loyal to companies that offer a more personalized experience". I found Kelly´s perspective on Increasing Loyalty & Revenue while decreasing costs through #cleandata to improve profitability while delivering hyper personalisation music to any retailer's ears in today´s high inflation and interest operating environment.About Kelly Kelly Thacker, Senior VP, Marketing, Commerce Cloud & CMO of Retail and Consumer Goods (RCG) at SalesforceKelly Thacker leads marketing for Commerce Cloud and the Retail and Consumer Goods business at Salesforce and is responsible for marketing strategy, operations and execution across the full spectrum of the Commerce Cloud portfolio and RCG business globally.As a ten year veteran of Salesforce, Kelly has held other senior marketing roles centered around bringing the cloud to enterprises around the world. She served as chief marketing officer for the Customer Success Group, responsible for the positioning and go-to-market strategy for Salesforce's Support and Professional services business. She was also instrumental as an early marketing leader of the Salesforce small and medium business unit, where she worked with thousands of small businesses on developing the tools and technology required to grow sustainability.Kelly came to Salesforce from a series of non-profit initiatives focused on using technology to solve challenges that humanity faces globally. Kelly was the founder and CEO of The James Project, a nonprofit venture in India, and Banau, a non-profit venture in Nepal.#retail #commercecloud #salesforce#RETAIL https://www.theretailpod.com/ --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/theretailpodcast/message

Data Protection Breakfast Club
"The 3D GC" w/ Shirley Paley, General Counsel @ Formlabs

Data Protection Breakfast Club

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 18, 2023 32:41


Shirley Paley sees the big picture. She's a strategic GC and leader covering companies with varied legal needs. While her background is in IP she has a multifaceted legal leadership approach having served as GC at 2 very different companies. Prior to those GC roles she was instrumental in the growth and eventual acquisition of Demandware by Salesforce which became Commerce Cloud. Currently she's leading legal at Formlabs, one of the largest 3D printing companies. The DPBC podcast is a TechGC production. Learn more about the TechGC's thriving in-house legal community at https://www.techgc.co/ Follow Andy on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-dale-7705b83/ Follow TechGC on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/techgc

The ERP Advisor
The ERP Minute Episode 72 - January 17, 2023

The ERP Advisor

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 18, 2023 3:28 Transcription Available


Salesforce unveiled new innovations in commerce and retail, delivering new features to their Commerce Cloud and Salesforce for Retail Media. Oracle extended its comprehensive retail cloud platform to include the Oracle Retail Payments Cloud Service. This will allow retailers to now accept Apple, Google, and Samsung Pay, without the hidden fees and unpredictable costs that erode the bottom line. This service also runs on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), ensuring it has high-security standards, end-to-end encryption, and is PCI/DSS compliant. Workday announced its continued momentum within the retail industry, with more than 50% of the retail organizations in the Fortune 500 having selected Workday. Along with this announcement, Workday introduced new demand forecasting to Workday Scheduling and Labor Optimization. The new feature leverages AI and machine learning technology to enable retailers to forecast business demand based on external data, such as sales and foot traffic history. On a similar note, AI continues to grow in the market with new advancements emerging across the industry. NICE announced new RPA (Robotic Process Automation) capabilities in its latest release, using AI to identify focused opportunities for automation, then Pr3vent and webAI have partnered to train Pr3vents AI model and remove bias to accurately screen eyes, all on top of the ChatGPT momentum, a product which millions of people are trying. Connect with us!https://www.erpadvisorsgroup.com866-499-8550LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/erp-advisors-groupTwitter:https://twitter.com/erpadvisorsgrpFacebook:https://www.facebook.com/erpadvisorsInstagram:https://www.instagram.com/erpadvisorsgroupPinterest:https://www.pinterest.com/erpadvisorsgroupMedium:https://medium.com/@erpadvisorsgroup

The ERP Advisor
The ERP Minute Episode 70 - January 3, 2023

The ERP Advisor

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 5, 2023 3:09 Transcription Available


Oracle announced the opening of an Oracle Cloud Region in Chicago, Illinois. Continuing their extensive cloud expansion, Oracle's 41st global region and fourth in the U.S. offers customers and partners a new option to locate their infrastructure, applications, and data for optimal performance and latency. Aneel Bhusri, Co-CEO, Co-Founder, and Chair of Workday is to remain Co-CEO through January 2024 with the newly appointed Co-CEO Carl Eschenbach, replacing Chano Fernandez. In 2024, Eschenbach will assume CEO responsibilities and Bhusri will assume a full-time role as executive chair and will remain as Chair of the Board of Directors. Salesforce unveiled new Commerce Cloud solutions, available this spring, that will enable automakers and dealers to reimagine online sales, bringing together complete driver and vehicle profiles for more connected experiences at every stage of the customer journey. Register for "2023 ERP Trends & Predictions": https://www.erpadvisorsgroup.com/events/2023-erp-trends-and-predictionsConnect with us!https://www.erpadvisorsgroup.com866-499-8550LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/erp-advisors-groupTwitter:https://twitter.com/erpadvisorsgrpFacebook:https://www.facebook.com/erpadvisorsInstagram:https://www.instagram.com/erpadvisorsgroupPinterest:https://www.pinterest.com/erpadvisorsgroupMedium:https://medium.com/@erpadvisorsgroup

The Audio Project with Deena Tearney
Deena talks with Kingston Lee-Young, CEO of The Digital Mavens

The Audio Project with Deena Tearney

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 19, 2022 41:40


Kingston Lee-Young, CEO of Australian-based The Digital Mavens, shares thoughts on going from “walk” to “run” leveraging digital solutions.Deena White Tearney is the Founder and CEO of Pacific Point, a Salesforce Consulting firm. Her passion is mentoring youth to pursue careers in tech. Connect with Deena on Instagram or Linkedin and find out more about Pacific Point .

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations
Welcome to Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations!

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Innovations

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 16, 2022 2:40


What if you could hang out with eCommerce experts at Salesforce, as well as our customers and partners, ask them about their experiences and be inspired by innovative ideas and live use cases; then take an insight or two to guide your own Commerce Cloud journey? Hosted by Natalija Pavic ––Innovation Leader on the Business Strategy & Growth team at Salesforce Commerce Cloud. –– every episode is a deep dive into topics that will impact your digital business from new trends like metaverse and NFTs to the evolution of the online customer experience and its impact. We hope to expand your mind with solutions available today and explore their impact on the future. Our goal is to give inspire you with ideas, solutions, and visions of the future in eCommerce.

Ad Victoriam Salesforce Simplified
Highlights from the Salesforce Winter '23 Release

Ad Victoriam Salesforce Simplified

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 7, 2022 18:16


Episode Notes/Resources: On this episode of Ad Victoriam's “Salesforce Simplified” podcast, we're taking a look at six new standout features in the Salesforce Winter ‘23 Release, which includes updates to Einstein Analytics, Commerce Cloud, Dynamic Forms, Workflow Rules and more. Resources: Highlights from the Salesforce Winter '23 Release (Blog): https://bit.ly/3wHDLoF Salesforce Winter ‘23 Release Notes: https://sforce.co/3PzWcST

release notes commerce cloud einstein analytics dynamic forms salesforce winter
WBSRocks: Business Growth with ERP and Digital Transformation
WBSP371: Grow Your Business by Understanding SAP Commerce Cloud's Capabilities, an Objective Panel Discussion

WBSRocks: Business Growth with ERP and Digital Transformation

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 24, 2022 58:02


When people think of SAP Hybris, they are definitely not thinking of the modern stack such as React, headless, or PWA. But SAP Commerce has come a long way in its capabilities and stack. While it might not be as headless as some of the newer breeds of the tools, not many tools can match the enterprise-grade infrastructure capabilities of SAP Commerce Cloud. SAP Commerce Cloud has one of the most robust B2B features that other platforms can hardly match. And it is also a nice blend of headless with enterprise security in mind.In today's episode, we invited a panel of cross-functional experts for a live interview on LinkedIn who brings significant expertise to discuss SAP Commerce Cloud, SAP Hybris, Detailed Independent Review. We discussed their strengths and weaknesses and where they might fit in the eCommerce architecture for both B2B and B2C business models. Finally, we discussed their different approach to headless and why that may be slightly more sensible way of approaching headless due to the cybersecurity concerns of the modern stack, as well as for the regulated industries.For more information on growth strategies for SMBs using ERP and digital transformation, visit our community at wbs.rocks or elevatiq.com. To ensure that you never miss an episode of the WBS podcast, subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform.

Startup Insider
Social-Shopping-Lösung Lisa sammelt Millionen für Social Commerce Cloud ein (Live Streaming • TVF)

Startup Insider

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 22, 2022 34:32


In der Mittagsfolge begrüßen wir heute Sophie Frères, Co-Founder und CEO von Lisa, und sprechen mit ihr über die erfolgreich abgeschlossene Seed-Finanzierungsrunde in Höhe von 2,7 Millionen Euro. Lisa hat eine SaaS-Plattform entwickelt, auf der Unternehmen Shopping-Angebote aufsetzen können. Die Lösungen der Plattform verbinden E-Commerce mit sozialen Komponenten wie Live-Streaming und Social Media Features. Damit befähigt das Startup weltweit führende E-Retailer, ihren Kundinnen und Kunden ein authentisches Shopping-Erlebnis zu bieten. Zu den Einzelhandelskunden von Lisa gehören u.a. Marks & Spencer, Avon und L'Oréal. Zum Produktportfolio gehört auch ein Headless Content Management System, welches flexibel anpassbar sowie einfach und schnell zu implementieren ist. Dadurch ermöglicht es Online-Händlern und -Marktplätzen, auf ihre Marke abgestimmte und gleichzeitig hoch skalierbare Live- und Social-E-Commerce-Erlebnisse anzubieten. Online-Händler können dabei Engagement-Raten von bis zu 90 Prozent, Online-Konversionsraten von bis zu 35 Prozent und organische Social-Sharing-Raten von bis zu 14 Prozent nachweisen. Lisa wurde im Jahr 2018 von Sophie Frères und Philippe Frères in Düsseldorf gegründet. Im Jahr 2019 hat das Startup am Accelerator-Programm Founders Factory von Brent Hoberman teilgenommen. In einer Seed-Finanzierungsrunde hat das Jungunternehmen nun 2,7 Millionen Euro unter der Führung des TechVision Fonds (TVF) eingesammelt. Der TVF ist ein Frühphasen VC-Fonds im westlichen Rheinland, der vom Team der S-UBG-Gruppe verwaltet wird und mit 55 Millionen Euro Fondsvolumen regional in Technologie-Startups investiert. Der TVF unterstützt Founder neben der Finanzierung auch mit einem großen Netzwerk und Expertise. Zum Netzwerk gehören über 150 Portfolio-Unternehmen aus 30 Jahren Beteiligungserfahrung. Der britische VC Venrex und die Angel-Investorin Georgie Smallwood haben sich ebenfalls an der Seed-Runde beteiligt. Das frische Kapital möchte Lisa dafür nutzen, um international zu expandieren und seine Live-Shopping-SaaS-Lösung zu einem One-Stop-Shop für Social-Commerce-Erlebnisse weiterzuentwickeln. Zudem ist die Entwicklung einer Social Commerce Cloud geplant. Diese soll Headless-Lösungen zur plattformübergreifenden Entdeckung für die User sowie ein API-basiertes Partnerschaftsnetzwerk umfassen. One more thing wird präsentiert von OMR Reviews – Finde die richtige Software für Dein Business. Wenn auch Du Dein Lieblingstool bewerten willst, schreibe eine Review auf OMR Reviews unter https://moin.omr.com/insider. Dafür erhältst du einen 15€ Amazon Gutschein.

The ERP Advisor
The ERP Minute Episode 50 - August 9, 2022

The ERP Advisor

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 9, 2022 3:43 Transcription Available


Blackbaud released its financial results for its second quarter ended June 30, 2022. Second quarter total revenue increased 15.5% year-over-year with the first half of 2022, while non-GAAP organic recurring revenue increased 5.1%. IFS reported its financial results for H1 as of June 30, 2022, with its share of recurring revenue reaching 71% of total revenues and H1 2022 software revenue grew 22% over H1 2021. Salesforce announced Composable Storefront, a fully customizable, headless digital storefront. Features include best-in-class integrations, pricing, and implementation accelerators from across the Salesforce ecosystem, all anchored by Commerce Cloud. QAD introduced the Elevate Program, which provides its ERP customers a simplified upgrade path to QAD adaptive ERP through a rapid, low-cost, automation-powered approach. QAD's program leverages knowledgeable QAD consultants to upgrade to the QAD Cloud in less than six months. ECI Software Solutions, a provider of cloud-based business management solutions, released M1 ITAR – a cloud-based platform for manufacturers who serve the U.S. government's aerospace and defense needs to assist in maintaining compliance with the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). Leveraging Microsoft Azure for U.S. Government and AWS GovCloud, M1 ITAR helps manufacturers grow their business capabilities and maintain data in a secure cloud environment.https://www.erpadvisorsgroup.com866-499-8550LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/erp-advisors-groupTwitter:https://twitter.com/erpadvisorsgrpFacebook:https://www.facebook.com/erpadvisorsInstagram:https://www.instagram.com/erpadvisorsgroupPinterest:https://www.pinterest.com/erpadvisorsgroupMedium:https://medium.com/@erpadvisorsgroup

government salesforce erp ifs gaap blackbaud commerce cloud qad international traffic elevate program arms regulations itar
Talent Hub Talk
Maxime Rebibo on Salesforce B2C Commerce

Talent Hub Talk

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 25, 2022 28:35


In today's episode we are joined by Maxime Rebibo, a Salesforce B2C Commerce Cloud Specialist based in France. We discuss what first attracted Maxime to working with Demandware, prior to their acquisition by Salesorce and then explore whether or not he saw the acquisition as a positive. We go over the differences between the B2C and B2B offerings by Salesforce as well as looking at the skills required to work on B2C and how the development on this platform differs from coding on the core Salesforce platform. Maxime explains the types of companies he regularly sees opting for Salesforce B2C Commerce, what makes a project complex and how Salesforce have built on and expanded the Demandware platform.  Finally, Maxime talks about the challenges people face with trying to gain Commerce Cloud experience, but offers some resources that people may find useful. Make sure you are following Maxime on Linkedin where he regularly shares Commerce Cloud related content. We hope you enjoy the episode.

Ad Victoriam Salesforce Simplified
Scale Quickly, Connect with Customers, Manage Multiple Brands with Salesforce Commerce

Ad Victoriam Salesforce Simplified

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 13, 2022 16:05


In this episode of "Salesforce Simplified," we take a deep dive inside Salesforce's Commerce Cloud™ with the help of AdVic's Senior Vice President of Commerce, Aaron Hutten. Episode Notes: Commerce Cloud - Unifying the Buying Experience Across All Channels: https://bit.ly/3dJ6nDD Grow Your Business Faster with Salesforce Commerce Cloud: https://sforce.co/3GlaDHC

Commersation Podcast
S6E6: קומרסיישן 106 עם נדב תמם- מנהל המכירות, flipkart commerce cloud

Commersation Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 9, 2022 38:03


פליפקארט ההודית היא תופעת איקום יוצאת דופן. ההצלחה שלה בהודו מול נסיון הכניסה של אמזון תיזכר לשנים. וכן, היא בבעלות של וולמארט.  מבולבלים? בשביל זה יש לנו את נדב תמם, מנהל המכירות ב-Flipkart Commerce Cloud  שבא לעשות לנו סדר. איך הוא קשור לעניין?  ההודים החרוצים מפרקים את הטכנולוגיה המצליחה שלהם ובונים ממנה מוצרים מתמחים לתעשיית האיקומרס ולכל דורש, באמצעות אותה FCC.  המוצרים הראשונים שנדב אחראי על קידומם באירופה הם מנוע התמחור הדינמי וכלי הפרסום הפנימי- המוניטיזציה, ולדבריו- דה בסט איז ייט טו קאם. ממשיכים בשיתוף הפעולה המדליק עם אתר Evrit  , במיוחד לחודש הספר, כולל קופון הנחה למאזיני קומרסיישן- timor2022- על כל הספרים הדיגיטליים והקוליים. המימוש באתר עברית, בחרו ספר דיגיטלי או קולי (הקוליים ב-25 ש״ח לפני קופון) והקלידו את הקוד בעמוד התשלום. זהו, הספר יחכה לכם באפליקציית "עברית". בפינה האחרונה במסגרת שיתוף הפעולה ״פרחי האיקומרס של ehouse״, מתארח רוני בורד מ׳פרו-פקטורי׳.  נמסטה ותיהנו כמוני. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Smash the Bug
Commerce Cloud: What You Need to Know - Yarik Voronyi, Russell Albin, Shane Herman

Smash the Bug

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 7, 2022 21:07


Your host: Joseph Maxwell, Founder and CEO of SwiftOtter, Inc. We're going to talk with Yarik Voronyi (Engineering Manager at Adobe), Russell Albin (Technical Principal Architect at Adobe), and Shane Herman (Senior Director of Customer Engineering). Today's topic is on  sticking points with Commerce Cloud, the challenges people bring upon themselves when they are deploying solutions out to Commerce Cloud and what we can due to avoid the problems.  0:00 Show starts.   1:40 Joseph asks his guests what the most common mistakes they see people making in Commerce Cloud.    1:58  Russell comes at the issue from the developer side. He sees a lot result from live inventory requests. He has cautioned people against it.  He encourages them to figure out what cadence is good enough (every 30 minutes, an hour, etc),and feed Commerce with the appropriate data. Otherwise, real time is always a problem.    4:51 Yarik sees a lot of customers not pay attention to full page caching. He shares a solution to that.   7:00 Shane tells about how some of their clients are using GraphicQL.    9:27 Joseph asks a question about GraphQL and caching. Shane says it doesn't natively cache but they can use Get.    10:33 Shane talks about how important it is todo so some self-help before you reach out to support. You can save yourself time and headaches.   12:38 Yarik describes the site analysis tool.    14:49 Shane addresses extensions from the marketplace and things to watch out for.   17:26 Russell discusses ideal configurations. In your config.PHP, it dumps some of the config values, to help with the compilation time. You can also add post deploy hook, all of this info is in the Dev Docs.    Google: Commerce Cloud Ideal State : for more info.   18:30 Yarik talks about indexers and index functionality. Extensions often invalidate indexers, and that causes issues in Commerce.    Connect with: Yarik Voronyi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yarik-voronoy/ Russell Albin LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/russellalbin/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/RussellAlbin Shane Herman LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shaneherman/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/robot_atx Joseph Maxwell LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxwelljoseph/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/swiftotter_joe This podcast exists to inspire, educate and entertain eCommerce developers who are serious about improving their skills and advancing their careers! Have you joined the free SwiftOtter Slack community? It's exploding and we don't want you to miss out. Go to SwiftOtter.com/Slack to join for free and get plugged into what might be the best group of collaborating developers around! Special thanks to TrendingAudio for our awesome theme music!

Ahead of the Curve
AOTC EP 36 - Salesforce Commerce Cloud: One-Stop Shopping For Both B2B and B2C Companies

Ahead of the Curve

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 24, 2021 20:42


In 2020, consumers spent 375 billion dollars in the U.S. shopping online – give or take a few million. Much of that was driven by the pandemic and major online companies like Amazon and one or two others absolutely killed it. Because of the pandemic, more and more brick and mortar retailers were forced to the online marketplace – with great results. Today, ecommerce is so routine that the vast majority of consumers use it every day. There is now a shift into the business realm as companies are beginning to see how they can benefit from an online marketplace for their customers: distributors, wholesalers, and suppliers and how companies can find new outlets for their products or services in untapped markets around the world. In this episode, we're going to look at Salesforce Commerce Cloud, a powerful product that has been designed to allow B2B as well as B2C commerce on the same platform and what's involved in implementing it. Guest Bio Liam Huston wears two hats – as Gerent's Practice Lead for Commerce Cloud and as a Solution Architect. Liam's experience with online commerce stretches back more than 20 years. He has been a CTO, CEO, and company founder in the ecommerce field. He was a Demandware developer for Guthy-Renker, the global direct marketing giant and has also created the means for ecommerce platforms to integrate with beacons to create an enriched proximity-based consumer experience – what we now refer to as geo-fencing. Key Ideas 01:39 – Reasons why B2B companies benefit enormously from an online commerce presence 04:10 – What do businesses need to consider if they want to move to a B2B platform of operation? 06:43 – Why Salesforce Commerce Cloud eliminates the need for two different platforms: one for B2B and one for B2C 09:19 – The strengths that Salesforce Commerce Cloud brings to the table to drive revenues higher 17:35 – How an experienced implementation partner like Gerent can help guide and shape the client's solution for optimal results

Commerce Connect Podcast
Salesforce’s Andy Peebler On His B2B Ecommerce Journey and How COVID-19 Could Change Business Moving Forward

Commerce Connect Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 8, 2020 38:28


Known throughout the industry as an expert in B2B ecommerce, Salesforce’s Andy Peebler now guides Product GTM for Commerce Cloud at Salesforce. Host Jason Nyhus explores Andy’s ecommerce journey, including his involvement with CloudCraze, which shaped Andy’s thinking today. Andy also shares his thoughts on how COVID-19 will change how we do business and where […]