NRF Interview Series

Brian: [00:00:24] Welcome to Future Commerce, the podcast about cutting edge commerce. I'm Brian Lange. I'm here live at NRF with Bryan Eisenberg. How are you?

Bryan: [00:00:33] It's a pleasure to be here.

Brian: [00:00:34] Thanks. Thanks, Bryan. I'm super excited to be interviewing you. You're part of the IBM futurist team and influencers. Maybe give us a little bit of information about yourself, where you're from, where you got your start, who you are. Just the history.

Bryan: [00:00:50] How long do we have on the podcast?

Brian: [00:00:52] Well, I mean, we've got as long as you want.

Bryan: [00:00:56] Well, so I've been in this industry since the mid 90s. Actually, I first started optimizing my first online experience in 1983 when I was hacking my bulletin board program to change where people would go inside the bulletin board. So I guess I've always been a little motivated at seeing how obviously these interfaces make people respond. Why people do the things they do. By 1998, my brother Jeffrey and I started the first agency focusing on conversion rate optimization called Future Now. During those years, and we have been the agency now for almost eight years, we published several books, Persuasive Online Copywriting, Call to Action, Waiting for Your Cat to Bark, and a couple of those were New York Times best sellers.

Brian: [00:01:45] Nice.

Bryan: [00:01:45] I was the founder of the Digital Analytics Association. And I mean, basically, I've been focused on trying to get companies to really understand that what digital has done is given companies an edge by giving us data tied to individuals so that we can understand them and create better experiences for them using the interfaces at our disposal.

Brian: [00:02:10] That's unbelievable. Yeah. It was a hot topic when you started and it's still a hot topic now.

Bryan: [00:02:17] Yeah, well, it's interesting. You know, when we first saw in 1998, everybody really was worried about, as an agency, was really focused about traffic. Right?

Brian: [00:02:24] Sure.

Bryan: [00:02:24] Those were the days still of boo dot com and stuff like that. You know, you had pure flash sites and stuff. I mean, it was a real mess.

Brian: [00:02:32] Ugh. Don't make me think about that.

Bryan: [00:02:33] Yeah. But back then it was so easy to optimize Web sites. Back then it was just as easy as putting a continued shopping button because they didn't exist.

Brian: [00:02:41] Right.

Bryan: [00:02:41] Or making the button above the fold. They couldn't find the button. And retailers were resistant back then. I mean, you know, obviously Jakob Nielsen was around and start to look a little bit about usability in some of the companies then started following importance of usability online. Definitely made it through that dot bomb crash. Right? And several of our clients I mean, we have a classic example of a small magazine retailer back in the day who's one of our first paid clients who was part of an incubator here in New York City. Never forget that. And do you remember was it eMAG or something like that? They were funny. They were like 18 million dollars.

Brian: [00:03:21] Yeah, I vaguely remember that.

Bryan: [00:03:22] And they crashed and burned. And he went on to continue, you know, because we quadrupled his conversion rate.

Brian: [00:03:28] Nice. Wow that's amazing.

Bryan: [00:03:28] Right. Yeah. And it's still surprises me today that, you know, as hot as it is and as many solutions that are out there today that companies aren't taking advantage of. And there's a number of reasons why that's still happening.

Brian: [00:03:42] Yeah, no, that's actually... Why don't you tell us why. I'd be curious to hear your take on that, because I agree with you. I think that there are a lot of really quality solutions out there. But in my experience, it's been kind of difficult to get people to actually utilize what's available.

Bryan: [00:03:58] So when we first started, you know, my brother and I always thought that conversion rate was a measure of your customer satisfaction. And for you to succeed, your customers need to succeed first. That was our principle... In today's age of social media, I don't think anybody would argue with that principle.

Brian: [00:04:15] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:04:15] Back then that kind of novel. And we always felt that conversion rate optimization really needed to be a C level problem. And today, it's delegated really to managers at best, maybe a couple of directors.

Brian: [00:04:27] Oh, yeah.

Bryan: [00:04:28] And it's not viewed as a strategic thing. Customer experience is strategic. It was a Bain study that found a few years ago when they asked the executive corporation, did they feel that they were customer centric, 80% of executives felt they were customer centric. Yet when they asked those same customers of those companies, and it was like two hundred sixty three companies, only 8% of those customers felt that the organizations were customer centric.

Brian: [00:04:53] Wow.

Bryan: [00:04:54] So huge gap. You know, there's been studies on the stock market showing how companies that invest in customer experience outperform by 70% in customer expense. And this is over a six year period. And conversion rate optimization is just one piece.

Brian: [00:05:13] Right.

Bryan: [00:05:13] If you think about it, one piece...

Brian: [00:05:16] A very measurable piece.

Bryan: [00:05:17] Very measured, very easy to test, very quick to see results because it's just on one channel and digital and you can control the environment like a scientist.

Brian: [00:05:25] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:05:25] And if you can really see, and I think this is where, Amazon, who Jeff Bezos, in his letter to stockholders, talks about how last year they performed over nineteen hundred tests. On the Amazon product page you can't test anything above the fold without Jeff Bezos' permission. Right. That a CEO who cares and understands the value. And there's a reason why they've dominated eCommerce. They understand this conversion rate optimization and this culture of innovation. And tying that to being so customer centric is the ultimate competitive advantage. And they've leveraged that to to dominate eCommerce. And I think the real opportunity today is not to think about conversion rate optimization of your Web channel, but now that we're seeing so much like... I mean, I was walking the trade floor at the show, and we saw technology that let people put little chips like that in the soles of people's sneakers today.

Brian: [00:06:23] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:06:24] And they can track if it's on the shelf. And if people take it off and the person wears a sneaker to the stadium and you paid it opens up the club for them. If not it doesn't.

Brian: [00:06:31] That is amazing.

Bryan: [00:06:34] So when you think you can now track to that level, which is the same thing we were able to track on digital.

Brian: [00:06:37] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:06:37] Online. The opportunity to optimize the offline experience is really the Holy Grail. Because that is where 90% of the dollars are.

Brian: [00:06:47] Well, not only that, but I mean, the reality is we have not been able to do that. It's just in recent years where certain technologies have been enabled us to.

Bryan: [00:06:56] Yeah you've got the Retail Next and you got some of the cameras that are out there. Google's working on one with Lider. Yeah, they're trying to measure where people are standing. But it's primitive. But when you can take it down to the product level.

Brian: [00:07:08] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:07:09] Right.

Brian: [00:07:09] Yes.

Bryan: [00:07:09] Moving off of shelf. Moving from the background. And people hold it. It's like now you can optimize that whole customer journey from when they start on their mobile device till they get to your store, till they pick up the product till they try it, till they buy it. And they become a loyalist. And I think the opportunities are endless.

Brian: [00:07:27] Have you talked with any customers? To go on a little bit of a bunny trail. About sort of the feeling that they're being monitored? I mean, we already know that when we're online we know, right? But the idea of having a chip in my shoe is a little bit unsettling. I mean, I'm on a blog or a podcast that focuses on the future of commerce. But it's still just a little bit... My co-host and I have talked a ton about consumers and the choices that we make around what kind of data we give. And in this case, a lot of people may or may not even know that they've got a chip in their shoe.

Bryan: [00:08:04] So when the first telephone book was published with the first 50 names in it, people were freaking out that their numbers were listed.

Brian: [00:08:13] {laughter} Yeah.

Bryan: [00:08:15] This privacy debate has gone on, going for a hundred plus years. Right. This is nothing new. And the reality and what we know over time, it's you know, it's been tested. People will forsake their privacy for convenience over time.

Brian: [00:08:31] Yes.

Bryan: [00:08:31] And the biggest problem and the biggest problem that beacons have had in terms of their adoption and their use is that very few customers saw an added value to it.

Brian: [00:08:41] Yep.

Bryan: [00:08:41] Right? And so what I love about this example that these folks from Smart Trek actually gave me is, you know, Nike has embedded this into one particular shoe. And so only if you're wearing that, can gain access to that club. Now, that's an exclusive club.

Brian: [00:08:57] That is exclusive. That's amazing.

Bryan: [00:08:57] If you want access to that club, you don't care that you're being tracked. You actually want to be tracked. You want to get in there.

Brian: [00:09:04] Yeah. Totally.

Bryan: [00:09:05] And I think when you start figuring out how the tracking aids the customer, gives them that personalized... Look, we all know any time we want to do anything on Amazon, you have to log in with your phone number or with your email address. This is the competitive advantage they started off with. They knew that to be Earth's most customer centric company they didn't need to be all warm and fuzzy men. I knew everything about the customer. I could use that data and build it as opposed to Walmart, which was the largest retail beforehand that knew everything about products and stores and the logistics between it, but doesn't know anything about who walked in and who walked out.

Brian: [00:09:39] Well, the crazy thing is, with Amazon they have built that in such a way. And this is, I think, the key. I trust Amazon.

Bryan: [00:09:47] You trust them.

Brian: [00:09:47] I trust them as a consumer, I know when I hand over my information Amazon, that if they betray my trust, there's going to be an outcry of epic proportions.

Bryan: [00:10:00] Absolutely. And I think another great example because you know what? They could likely be hacked. Everybody gets hacked. Everybody loses data. But it's how you respond to it.

Brian: [00:10:11] That too.

Bryan: [00:10:11] You know what's really impressed me in the last year with Amazon... And, you know, they're like a snowball. It's growing and growing faster, faster and bigger and bigger. There was this whole big uproar about the employees and how they were being treated. And Jeff Bezos took it straight on and then he went out talked to employees. And you he said this doesn't sound like the Amazon I know, but we're gonna find out.

Brian: [00:10:40] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:10:40] And they made a whole bunch of changes.

Brian: [00:10:42] They did.

Bryan: [00:10:42] Because of it.

Brian: [00:10:43] Actually, we talked about this on the show. Shortly thereafter, they started piloting a 30 hour workweek.

Bryan: [00:10:49] Yeah.

Brian: [00:10:49] In their H.R. department. Which I thought was a great idea. This is tangible change.

Bryan: [00:10:55] And so the same thing. Right? They are at some point probably going to make a mistake with some customer data. But they are going to react to it. We all are going to fail, but it's how we respond to it, how we own up to it that matters. And as long as they can say, hey, we did this with the proper intention.

Brian: [00:11:17] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:11:17] I think it's what his intent was in that statement of being Earth's most customer centric company. That's what they meant. They're focused in on always being at the cutting edge and understanding the future customer. And not worrying about what's changing.

Brian: [00:11:35] So true.

Bryan: [00:11:35] Just keeping up with customers, not their competitors.

Brian: [00:11:38] Right.

Bryan: [00:11:41] They're not packaging everything with chips today, but they will as people get ready.

Brian: [00:11:45] They will. We talked about this quite a bit as well. Essentially, once utility outmatches concern...

Bryan: [00:11:52] That's right.

Brian: [00:11:53] And then it will.

Bryan: [00:11:54] And it's a seesaw.

Brian: [00:11:55] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:11:56] That's exactly it.

Brian: [00:11:57] Yeah. There's a few other things at the show where, as a consumer I can see why people might be a little bit hesitant. Like for instance... We talked about this back on episode eight. There's actually a company called Thursday's Finest, or something like that, that's doing body scanning. And then they're doing bespoke printing of clothes.

Bryan: [00:12:26] Right.

Brian: [00:12:26] In store. And they're like, yeah, we can't go after anyone over 30. No one over 30 is going to get their body scanned. People under 30...

Bryan: [00:12:35] Yeah, they're totally comfortable.

Brian: [00:12:36] They're ready.

Bryan: [00:12:37] And it's also like... We're here at the New York Hilton Midtown. And this is actually the first time I'm using the Hilton app in a hotel that has a digital key. I think it's been great. I mean, I love not having to worry about carrying that extra key because, you know, you always leave it somewhere. It's not like your regular keys. My phone. I'm always gonna have on me. And I can imagine next evolution of the app. I actually have the built in concierge. They know my location. They know where I am.

Brian: [00:13:02] For sure. Absolutely.

Bryan: [00:13:04] Did you see how amazing could it be? It's like, OK, you're getting to your floor. We're having a cocktail hour. They can do so much with that, with that look, giving us context or location. Because that is what a hotel is about. Same thing with retailers. As we give them permission for the convenience, and you keep giving me benefits, keep tracking away.

Brian: [00:13:25] That's another thing that I think's coming up here. I feel like, take this for what it is, but there was a little bit of a move away from the word at least "efficiency." Like we kind of went through a period in the sort of mid-2000s or probably 2000s where it was like, you know, people that are focused on efficiency are bean counters. And I think that was a very silly trend. But in all reality, I think coming up here, I actually think we're gonna have an entire set of commerce, strategic commerce based around personal efficiency.

Bryan: [00:14:04] Well and we see that with what Under Armour has been doing with older data collection, right?

Brian: [00:14:10] Yeah. Yeah.

Bryan: [00:14:11] And the personal health tracking.

Brian: [00:14:11] Yeah. Yes.

Bryan: [00:14:13] Absolutely. I think, you know, we know so little about the body as an example. We know so little about actually our workforce. I wear an Apple Watch. The number one reason I wear it can nudge me every hour to get up.

Brian: [00:14:27] Get up. Yeah. Exactly.

Bryan: [00:14:28] And that's the efficiency to help improve my body. Right. Because it's a terrible thing sitting hours upon hours upon hours.

Brian: [00:14:33] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:14:34] And so yeah, I know. I agree. You know, I actually wanted to pull more data and now I'm absolutely comfortable. And I also want it to get to the point... I'm in my mid 40s. And you know, again, I'm probably pushing the limit, but it's like I have no problem with insurance company leveraging that data and using it to give me a better premium than the average forty six year old in my age group.

Brian: [00:14:57] Exactly. Absolutely. You know, it's crazy. I think eventually, actually, I think body scanning and body monitoring will probably be covered by insurance.

Bryan: [00:15:07] Oh absolutely.

Brian: [00:15:07] Yeah. In which case, eventually, instead of us having to go reach out to our health care systems and schedule appointments because we feel bad, the doctors...

Bryan: [00:15:17] They'll to be able to do detect... And that's what Watson Health is doing.

Brian: [00:15:20] Watson Health. Yes. Right. It's great.

Bryan: [00:15:22] It'll go through all the data. Go on. It says, OK, you know what? We're starting to see epidemic type things, precursors of epidemic of flu. Your stress levels have been going up. Either find a way to relax or get away from the germs or you're going to end up with the flu.

Brian: [00:15:38] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:15:39] Yes, please.

Brian: [00:15:40] I want that info. Absolutely.

Bryan: [00:15:40] I want that info.

Brian: [00:15:42] Yeah. Another good example of this is the IBM Watson operation with OnStar and General Motors, where they're including Watson in the Dash.

Bryan: [00:15:53] Yep.

Brian: [00:15:53] And they're providing like, basically, hey, you should stop here because it's actually going to be more efficient for you to pick this thing up on your route, instead of waiting till later.

Bryan: [00:16:05] And that's assuming that we're driving and not being driven by a car.

Brian: [00:16:09] Right. That's right. Yeah. So true. So true. Good point. So I know you're about to release a book. I've already got a little bit of a sneak preview of it. It is fantastic. Very easy read. Very conversational. Very insightful. But maybe you could tell us just a little bit more about it. Without giving it away yet. Give it a quick summary.

Bryan: [00:16:32] So, you know, as you can already hear the podcast I've been fascinated with Amazon over the last number of years. And what's made them work? What about their culture is duplicatable by other businesses? I think what they've done, especially with Prime, they've created such a loyal tribe of customers and against old traditional branding efforts. One of the strongest brands in the world today.

Brian: [00:16:58] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:17:00] And so we've written a book. And I believe it's for all types of businesses, both from service businesses, because obviously they do B2B and they do B2C. And they build strong brands and all of them. It work with your mom and pop store to the Walmarts of the world. It'll work for anybody. The tentative title of the book is Even a Lemonade Stand Can Brand Like Amazon.

Brian: [00:17:25] Yeah, I like it.

Bryan: [00:17:26] So it's obviously entrepreneurial. And there's a couple of key things that I think we focus on that you have that have as your faith based initiative, as my friend of Avinash Kaushik would say. And actually, Jeff Bazos talks about it, too. One of the elements of faith you have to have when you join Amazon is they don't worry about stock price, for example.

Brian: [00:17:48] Right.

Bryan: [00:17:48] Why? Because they know over the long term that will take care of it. I think one of the things that plagued retail in the last quarter century has been a lot of the retailers who are public companies, the ones who've been bought up by public equity firms. And there's been such a focus on short term deliverable results.

Brian: [00:18:09] Yeah, quarterly results.

Bryan: [00:18:10] Quarterly results that it's been hard to keep up with all the change. We are living in the most destructive period, other than the industrial revolution. That happened over a long cycle.

Brian: [00:18:22] It's insane.

Bryan: [00:18:22] It's insane the amount of change. I mean I think about I have three kids, fifteen to seven. And just what's changed within their lifetimes.

Brian: [00:18:33] Yes. I've got a bugaboo. I want to interject it really quickly.

Bryan: [00:18:36] OK. We'll get there.

Brian: [00:18:38] Ok, yeah. We'll get there.

Bryan: [00:18:38] But it's like, you need to find a way. And I think Amazon using what I call their four pillars playbook. And we give you the four pillars in the story. And it's written in the form of a grandfather talking to his grandson along the journey.

Brian: [00:18:55] Nice.

Bryan: [00:18:55] And they start off in a Starbucks, of course, because where else would you do it if you're on a road trip?

Brian: [00:18:58] Of course. Especially being from Seattle. I appreciate that.

Bryan: [00:19:02] You can appreciate that. Exactly. And we talk about how these companies can obviously brand like Amazon.

Brian: [00:19:09] Yeah, it's great.

Bryan: [00:19:10] So what's the bugaboo? I gotta know.

Brian: [00:19:11] You've mentioned how quickly the pace of change is happening and how the experience between even your oldest child to your youngest child is so drastically different. And I cannot stand the term millennial because I feel like the pace of change is actually creating much smaller generational gaps.

Bryan: [00:19:35] It's not only that. Let's remove the term together. My coauthor for this new book is Roy H. William. His last book was called Pendulum's. And he talked about how the world basically since I mean, you know, again, depending on your religious persuasion, has been going through these 40 year pendulum gaps. 20 years up, 20 years down for thousands of years. Right? I mean, in the Bible, they talk about cycles of 40 years and 40 years.

Brian: [00:20:04] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:20:04] And so I don't think they're changing. I think what's happening is that the leaders of the generation are adapting so quickly to the changes.

Brian: [00:20:16] Interesting.

Bryan: [00:20:16] OK?

Brian: [00:20:17] Interesting. I like this.

Bryan: [00:20:18] Yeah. That the line is working and they're bringing just everybody along with them. And well, what it really is, is just a tribe. It's a tribe who've used a world in a particular way. And, you know, we were talking about it today with a bunch of futurists as well. It's not that millennials are technological savvy. They're technologically dependent.

Brian: [00:20:44] Yes.

Bryan: [00:20:46] They're attached to technology at their hip.

Brian: [00:20:48] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:20:48] I mean, my daughter does... She doesn't want a TV screen or a room because she's just as comfortable watching Netflix and Amazon Prime videos on her phone.

Brian: [00:20:57] On her phone. Absolutely. Yeah.

Bryan: [00:20:58] And it's like I mean, with my eyes today, I don't want to look at the tiny screen the whole time.

Brian: [00:21:04] Just get a Note 7. I'm just kidding.

Bryan: [00:21:06] But that's the way she's been brought up. My little one has been on a computer since basically he can move his finger.

Brian: [00:21:12] Yes. Yes. Tablets, phones, voice. I mean, my children, some of their first words were Alexa.

Bryan: [00:21:25] And I think the lesson to learn for a lot of retailers and this is what I love about folks like 1-800-Flowers. You know, they built these triggers into Alexa. Seventy thousand devices that created triggers for Alexa. Amazon wasn't even there. I mean, that's what's so amazing. It's like, you know, they're building on this platform and they're still in an early generations. You know, Google Home also developed a great product, which is actually a little bit more contextually aware in terms of conversation. But Amazon iterates extremely quickly.

Brian: [00:22:02] Yes, they do.

Bryan: [00:22:04] And they will be there because they're not going to let somebody be ahead of it.

Brian: [00:22:08] Oh, no. Yeah. They also have a huge jump start in terms of ecosystem.

Bryan: [00:22:12] Well, they said they've improved the voice recognition by like for 4X this past year alone.

Brian: [00:22:17] It's mind blowing, I signed up for an echo the first day they released.

Bryan: [00:22:24] Yeah. Same thing.

Brian: [00:22:24] And it's just continually gotten better.

Bryan: [00:22:27] I think that people miss in the retailing world is, I believe and I've been saying this for years, there will be an Alexa in refrigerators in next number of years. It's not going to be an Amazon refrigerator, but they're going to partner with the Samsungs and LG. They're going to be an ecosystem just like one click, just like Amazon Web Services. Just like they're talking about with Amazon Go in their check out. These will all be part of their services that they'll be able to apply. So if you're a grocery store you're going to be want it tied into Alexa so I can say, hey, you know what? I just ran out of milk. And the next thing I know is that at some point in the afternoon, you know, it'll detect by my mobile phone that I'm almost coming home and deliver it.

Brian: [00:23:06] So I actually expect something that I've been recently kind of thinking about quite a bit. And it's a term I don't know if anyone's even using it, probably are. I think of things and then I find out that people are thinking of them.

Bryan: [00:23:17] Great minds. Great minds.

Brian: [00:23:17] But the idea of personal inventory. Have you thought about personal inventory? Idea of having, like, something that you might not even be fully aware of. But the idea that technology sort of tracking what you have. Clothes in your closet, the stuff in your fridge or your pantry. And it's going to be alerting or actually restocking you without you even having to think about it.

Bryan: [00:23:42] Yeah. And we see that, you know, customers are really becoming so accustomed to this with all the subscription fashion services that are out there. You know, there is that one that will send you... I know it was on Shark Tank recently. They send you the underwear or the socks. Sweat pants.

Brian: [00:24:04] Oh, yeah.

Bryan: [00:24:05] For like 60 bucks it sends you 17 items to replenish your thing. And then  you can do that every couple of months, and customers just... That concept of replenishment and managing the inventory.

Brian: [00:24:18] Yes.

Bryan: [00:24:18] And when the technology detects that your shoes are getting a little thin and not supporting you as well.

Brian: [00:24:23] Exactly.

Bryan: [00:24:23] Just let it send me a new shoe.

Brian: [00:24:25] Yeah. Or like they must tracking aggregate data of how long it takes that we're down their souls. And then actually they'll be able to put the life span of this shoe should be about three years and then when three years come along. Hey, we'll replace that for you.

Bryan: [00:24:41] Well, it's funny because I was in the innovation center on the NRF floor. There's a couple of technologies. One that let you take pictures of you shoe to kind of get the sizes. Yes, of course. I didn't get the height right. Then there's the 3D scanning of your feet. And I'm like, OK, why isn't Nike putting the chip in there? Because it can detect exactly how many miles I've done in those shoes. Because I track it on my phone. But I also switch switch running shoes every other day.

Brian: [00:25:08] Yeah.

Bryan: [00:25:08] But why couldn't they tell me exactly where...

Brian: [00:25:12] On that particular shoe...

Bryan: [00:25:12] Yeah. They can tell where the pressure is and if there are certain parts are doing more and then they can alert me when it's time to change before I actually have an injury.

Brian: [00:25:22] Exactly.

Bryan: [00:25:23] And would I be willing to pay more for that? Absolutely. Would I be willing to pay a subscription service to have it replenished on demand? Absolutely.

Brian: [00:25:31] Absolutely. And would you be willing to give up that data? Absolutely. Yeah. It really comes down to how much utility you are going to generate.

Bryan: [00:25:41] Right.

Brian: [00:25:41] So I wanted to get back to something, and I think we actually might be run out of time here shortly, which is unfortunate. We didn't even get close to... We might have to have another.

Bryan: [00:25:51] We might have to have another interview. That's fine.

Brian: [00:25:53] Yeah, because I really want to talk to you about brands, especially since your upcoming book is focused on brands. The future of brands fascinates me. With all this tech and all everything's coming on, a brand is going to look different now than they did over the past 10 years. How are people going to use them? What is a strong brand going to look like? What types of companies will need a strong brand and what kind of companies won't need a strong brand?

Bryan: [00:26:25] I think we've actually answered this in some ways throughout this conversation. Strong brands of brands that people trust. Strong brands of brands that we feel comfortable sharing our data with. We allow them into our lives and into our homes, into our personal space. And we do that because they deliver value to us consistently and through their actions, not their words. Words are cheap. Actions or where it matters. And I think when we're talking about the future of commerce, I think the key thing about this is all of this is being driven by data. And more and more and more and faster and faster data than we've ever dealt with before. And the companies are going to have the most competitive advantage. And this is something Jack Wall started. This is something that that Jeff Bezos understood when he started Amazon, that digital was going to give him this advantage.

Brian: [00:27:20] Yes.

Bryan: [00:27:21] Is that the company that can that has the ability to take that data, take action on that data, and execute has the ultimate competitive advantage.

Brian: [00:27:33] Love it.

Bryan: [00:27:33] And when we look at things like artificial intelligence and the algorithms that are going to be out there and how integrated all that data is throughout your whole channel, from supply chain to marketing to offline to content. Everything. And into customer, obviously. Now is when you're going to have this strongest brand. And you have to work at it every single day. And you're only as good as the weakest link in your company.

Brian: [00:28:03] Good advice.

Bryan: [00:28:03] And so everybody in your company has to be able to share the same story, have the same passion, and deliver it day in and day out because you're only as good as that last experience.

Brian: [00:28:13] Yes, that's amazing. I think with that, we actually do need to wrap up. But I would love to interview again because I wanted to dig into CRL and Watson. We didn't even get to Watson. I mean, that was half the reason we're going to talk. So let's continue this conversation soon.

Bryan: [00:28:30] Absolutely.

Brian: [00:28:31] Thank you so much for coming on the show, Bryan.

Bryan: [00:28:32] You're welcome.

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