SUMMARIZE THE CASE STUDY AND ANSWER THE GIVEN QUESTIONS

Case 3:Enhancing the In-Store Experience through Facial Recognition Software*

The best way to understand what eyeQ is trying to do is to compare it to a conventional digital display. Unless it's a specialized store, that display can't show shoppers a significant portion of * Based on the material in Peter Johnston, "Eye Know You!"STORES Magazine,December 2015, pp. 58-60. Reprinted by permission. Copyright 2016. STORES Magazine. a store's assortment, so it might instead show a variety: lots of fastfadesanddissolves,andmaybesomepanningvideoofthe aisles or the escalators.The idea is to keep it moving, so if a shopper stands there long enough he or she will see something of interest The digital sign in EyeQ's system is connected to a camera, a lot of proprietary facial recognition software, andvia IBM's cloud serviceWatson.When a shopper stops to look at an eye Q digital sign, the sign looks back at him or her.Then, based on facial features and appearance, eyeQ tailors its content to the viewer's age and gender. Men between the ages of 35 and 45 might see suits, top-end cameras, or fly fishing rods; women between the ages of 18 and 30 might see jewelry or clothes. "When somebody approaches the screen," says Doug Bain, the chief revenue officer of eyeQ Insights, "the screen isalreadyawareofthebaselineinformationtheageand gender of the personand is ready to make product recommendations."There's more, though:Ifthe shopper givesthe systemhisorherTwitterusername,Watsoncancapturethe most recent 200 tweets, run them through its natural language processing capabilities, and slot him or her into one of a selection ofbasicpersonality types. Not onlycan the system change the products being recommended but it can also change the wholeexperiencebackgroundcolors,video,music, whatever it's got. The most recent version of EyeQ's system can even register emotion. "It's categorizing the person's expression as happy, sad, angry, surprisedand to what degree," says Bain. "Is theexpression changingdramatically when heorshe getsto a certain pointin the video or a certain page, or when heor she touches the screen? It's another data point to determine the effectiveness of the content." Asit develops,eyeQhasbeenworking closely withretail marketing agencyTPN. ManoloAlmagro,TPN's senior managing director for digital and retail technologies notes that the system,evenwithoutaconsumeroptinginorprovidingheror his own information, can identify a repeat visitor by the unique media access control address her or his mobile device sends out to findavailableWi-Fi. "We don't knowtheindividual'sname," he says, "but we know it's the same 40-year-old woman who was in onTuesday," Almagro adds that further development of technology requires some care. "I know you're interested in a certain type of product, I know your age and gender, and I know your personality type.This is a level of depth we've never had before, and we have to ask ourselves, 'How much personalization is too much?' I want to give enough to make the experience more convenient for you, but not so much that it becomes creepy.That's a kind of fine line we have to walk." At the moment, one retailer has a prototype in place, and several consumer package goods companies are experimenting with prototypes in the retail space. Shortly, EyesQs expects to have a prototype implementation robust enough to start to generate some real feedback. Bain says early signs are encouraging. "We have data that demonstrate that increased engagement with the system does indeed mean increased sales"

Questions 1.As an apparel retailer, would you be excited by utilizing eyeQ displays to tailor products to specific customers?

2.As a one-way systemno questions are asked of shoppershow accurate do you think eye Q would be in identifying customer characteristics and their desires?

3.What promotion mix would you use to let shoppers know about eye Q? Explain your answer. 4.Comment on the privacy issues involved with eye Q.