Market Disruption Framework

There is no way to avoid the disruption in the marketplace and this means that both retailers and partners must face the forces driving the disruption and meet the demands head on. The good news is that it is not necessary to meet all of the demands, however you must meet the demands focused on your market segment and product mix. This means that really all demands and changes must be evaluated to determine the impact to the particular market segment in order to identify what is required to in order to be successful. This task is overwhelming without the framework to provide an early warning system directed by a robust analytics capability. There is a robust disruption sense and respond framework that is required for participants in the marketplace that will allow them to sense the change based on the data analytics and then help to define the necessary response to the change.




This disruption framework truly comes down to a foundation of robust and flexible integration, analytics and communication platforms that supports a culture and focus on change and continuous improvement. The retailers and partners in the marketplace must focus on sensing and responding to the demands and market changes through the process of continuous improvements rather than any newly minted functionality or software. This is good news is that this will allow the partners to focus on the foundational framework required to support the changes so they can focus on responding to the changes rather than developing all new functionality for every change. The bad news is that there is no silver bullet to solve the demands as there were in during other times of disruption.




The current disruption activities in fact require a focus on culture and social networking rather than software, although to be fair software plays a very large role in identification of the market demands. The actual reaction to the change is based on the means that the partners either integrate new partners or put together existing functionality with a new integration or social communication connection. These changes are related to identification more than brand new functionality. Don’t get me wrong, there is some level of new functionality being introduced as a matter of improvements to efficiencies for instance such as robotics or new delivery capabilities, however the vast majority are changes in relationships and interactions between partners and existing functionality.




The most important ingredient to this equation is the analytics capabilities that are required to sense the change in the market in a timeframe that allows the most time for the partners in the market to react. This is the single tool that will provide the greatest impact to the abilities of the partners to adjust to the disruption market actions This must be a key foundational capability to the disruption framework. The analytics capabilities are key ingredient to the continuous improvement process and must be a key focus in order for the continuous improvement evaluation and direction process to be successful.

Conversational Commerce

Omni channel commerce is growing and morphing now into new capabilities bring into reality a conversational commerce capability that will bringhe the next wave of disruption into the market. Consumers are continuing to drive the change through embrace and experimentation with technology. The tools available to consumers have been growing and expanding in capabilities and the Internet of Things is providing the type of capabilities that produce conversational commerce capabilities that can and will be pervasive across the market. I see these capabilities in the early stages now and experimentation from early adopters from both consumers and retailers are coming togehter with these experiments drive the changes to produce a new conversational market that encourages and allows the smooth blend and transition of shopping and purchasing across all attitudes.





These can be unnerving times for the market partners because of the level and velocity of the disruption. There is an almost overwhelming urge to focus on the change, however it is important during the early stages of this increased disruption on the basics. This is why partners must focus on the foundational framework that will allow them to react and change and experiment with the market to develop and support the new capabilities. Experimentation is the key trait and action required to respond to the change in the market begin driven by consumers and technology. The foundation framework though supports the velocity of change in a manner that is sustainable and robust.





Recently it seems that the focus of partners in the retail market has been operational capabilities such as pick up in the store. This was a requirement to the current stage of the market and I would even call this a type of founcational development because of the way that the operational functions support the retail demands across the shopping methods. The change from conversational commerce adds onto the operational capabilities and the integration capabilities to drive change into the shopping marketplace. This is now the time where data and analytics really shows value in providing a means to sense and respond to the changes. The focus must be the give and take between partners and consumers in a conversational mode that supports reactions to change more efficiently and also provides a means to sense change.





The challenge is that there is no roadmap for the capabilities and the direction that will be demanded for the conversational commerce marketplace and the market partners must focus on the capabilities to sense and respond to the changes. Operational processes focus on efficiencies and capabilities while shopping focuses on communication across platforms, partners and consumers. Shopping capabilities are taking the forefront now because the operational capabilities have already been put into place. There are two requirements to supporting the shopping demands and developing conversational commerce capabilities; interaction between partners and consumers and data analytics to sense and measure the demands and response to the demands.

Market Obsolescence

Obsolescence is a by product of the market experimentation that must be recognized, accepted and reconciled by the participants as a real an looming outcome of the drive to experiment within the market and especially the supply chain. Experimentation produces both new features and functionality to push the market forward and also elimination or obsolescence of existing or previous capabilities that are not longer necessary or relevant. This obsolescence must be accounted for in the process in order to ensure that the portfolio of services and capabilities remain current and provide value. This effort to specifically identify obsolescence is important to the vitality and support requirements for the market participants to eliminate the support for obsolete services and functionality. The continued support of obsolete services and capabilities will place a drag on the ability to experiment and move forward.





Every experiment will potentially create an obsolete process or function and this must be recognized and taken into account and planned as part of the process. The effort and impact to the business increases with each obsolete process or function that is not retired and eliminated. Elimination of the obsolete functions and services must be a key part of the experimentation process because of the overhead required for ongoing maintenance and support. Planned obsolescence is an important practice in the market from a maintenance and value perspective. The value of the improvements realized from experiments will be quickly overwhelmed if the obsolete functions and processes are not retired.





Planning and executing obsolete service retirement is not the fun, or sexy, part of the experimental improvements proces, however it is an important part of the process to ensure the function and service catalog is appropriately maintained and services and functions are bringing value. The costs of maintaining obsolete functions and services will quickly escalate to overwhelm benefits of the improvements realized from improvements realized through experimentation.





In addition to the increased maintenance and support costs, the obsolete functions and services also impact and delay the realization of improvements from experiments, in other words, working around obsolete functions impacts the complexity and delays the delivery of experiments because of the effort to work around the obsolete functions. Eliminating the obsolete functions improves the velocity of change through experimentation. Google is a great example of eliminating obsolete services and functions. They regularly announce the retirement of functions and services that have outlived their useful lifespan and the value added capabilities are provided through new services or functions that have been created as a result of experiments.





The challenge for many of the partners is recognizing and accepting the obsolescence of services, features and functionality and most importantly eliminating the obsolete items. This can be especially challenging when you are focused on responding to change in the market. This challenge must be rationalized and prioritized through the realization of the potential impact to the partner in the event that the obsolescence is ignored. The weight of obsolete services, features and functionality will become overwhelming in the event that they are not retired and this challenge comes down to the focus; it is too easy to walk away and ignore because of the demands of the changing market.