If you know me, or have ever listened to The Commerce Marketer Podcast, you know I am not a Prime member.

Until now.

I know, right? I spend my life analyzing the ecommerce world, ordering my products online, and yet I rebuffed all of Amazon’s attempts to draw me in. But the scale finally tipped. It was slow and gradual. I saw the writing on the wall. I finally got to the point I could no longer rationalize not subscribing. This was years in the making. But in all of this, there is a lesson for retailers to learn from my journey.

So, what took me so long to sign-up, and what changed? Let’s explore.

Whatever the reason, the season, or the screen, let’s take a look at how online shoppers kicked off this holiday season. How did Gray November play out from a consumer spending standpoint? On which devices did consumers shop? What were some high volume email send times? Here are a few key highlights.

On a recent trip to New York, I took the lovely ten-minute stroll from my hotel to Amazon’s newly opened SoHo neighborhood retail store, Amazon 4-star. Let me take a moment to call out some of my own observations and what they could be signaling for the future for Amazon’s brick-and-mortar retail business.

Customer service is important – possibly more important than ever. Here is how your customer-first policies can make an impact on your business.

Believe it or not, the holiday season is right around the corner. This year’s holiday season is projected to rake in $123 billion in online sales, a 15.3% growth over last year. Here are several trends that are expected to continue for holiday 2018.

In today’s competitive retail environment, differentiation is more important than ever. Yet, very few retailers effectively communicate what makes them different from the next guy. Here is how brands can set themselves apart from the pack.

Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, email marketing, website images – we live in an image-rich online world. And now that everyone has a camera on hand 24/7, brands can no longer get by with boring, same-old-same-old photos. Thanks to a rise in social influencers and user-generated content (UGC), those old images are losing their effectiveness. Consumers expect more authenticity. Here are several ways you can offer customers more authenticity within your brand.

Have a question about a product? Need help with an order? Trying to find an item in your local store? Where do you turn? Customer service. Here are four tips that will help your customer service team enhance the brand loyalty.

My fellow Gen Xers and I are growing older with each passing day. And aging right along with us are two of the most talked-about cohorts – millennials and Generation Z. Here is how to market to both these demographics effectively.

When you see a red and white can of soda or a Peter Pan silhouette on a jar, you see a brand. You know the product. But what happens when you don’t have those visual cues to draw you to certain items when you shop?

Brands used to rely on traditional advertising to embed their brand imagery in our minds and remain visible and relevant to their audience. But in today’s digital-first world, consumer attention is more fragmented. Television screen time is declining, while time spent on smartphones and other mediums is increasing. This has created challenges for brands trying to stay in front of consumers.