Imagine being able to lay out a store to suit each shopper as they come in, creating a bespoke offer for unique individuals.

That is what Shop Direct is increasingly doing through its reinvention as a pure-play retailer following abandonment of the traditional catalogue 18 months ago.

Personalisation, the focus of our special features this week, is at the heart of Shop Direct’s success and helped the retailer report an impressive rise in annual earnings.

All retailers talk about knowing their customers, but the capabilities of new technology have allowed Shop Direct to take that insight to new heights, from marketing to what consumers see when they visit the sites to how they are communicated with afterwards.

“The future is likely to be more reliant on fields such as artificial intelligence and machine learning – terms that might once have seemed more at home in an Isaac Asimov sci-fi novel than shopkeeping”

Valuable as old-fashioned retail disciplines and trading instinct may be, the future is likely to be more reliant on the opportunities thrown up by developments in fields such as artificial intelligence and machine learning – terms that might once have seemed more at home in an Isaac Asimov sci-fi novel than shopkeeping.

Data, ‘predictive models’ and similar tools are enabling Shop Direct to create ‘a programmatic and automated customer management engine’ to better understand customers and hone its relationship with them.

From real-time special offers to better-tailored emails and effective use of social media, Shop Direct is making the most of every consumer touchpoint.

There is more to come in a similar vein, which not so long ago might have seemed impossibly futuristic.

The retailer is working with data insight system IBM Watson on ventures such as interfaces which will allow the sort of personal communication that someone might have with a pal on WhatsApp.

Following suit

Other retailers are undertaking similar initiatives to get personal with shoppers. Halfords, which also updated this week, can now match a quarter of its retail sales to particular customers – up from just 3% a year ago. It’s easy to imagine how such insight can be deployed to the mutual advantage of consumer and retailer alike.

“Mind-boggling change is going on in retail at breakneck speed, change that often demands serious investment and so puts pressure on traditional retail models and their profitability”

And perhaps Marks & Spencer, as new chief executive Steve Rowe bids to turn the famous name around, will be better able to restore its relationship with shoppers through its Sparks membership programme, which brings personalised benefits and now has four million members. (The fact that their ages span from 16 to 103 shows in itself how much individual difference personalisation initiatives have to address.)

Mind-boggling change is going on in retail at breakneck speed, change that often demands serious investment and so puts pressure on traditional retail models and their profitability.

We hope that our special coverage of personalisation, whether it’s creating the right business structure, artificial intelligence or inspiring examples from around the world, will help you successfully navigate that change.