Several of our clients have made substantial bets recently on strategies that merge mutually supporting bricks and mortar and Internet retail approaches. The synergy argument has the added benefit of making it easier to track results when you can integrate f2f retail with the electronic variety. The impact on the customer experience discussion continues.

It used to be quite a contest to recount your worst “in person” retail experience vs. your worst Web-based debacle. We’re noticing more and more in client conversations that the certainty of Web interactions increases the quality of the customer experience over time. This is no accident.

On the Web, every click and page view is tracked. All this analytics data drives an ongoing process of shopping optimization. Amazon is a case in point, where on any given day a team of people is testing dozens of new features on live customers – millions of live customers – whose shopping carts paint a picture of what works.

In the f2f world, the quality of your shopping experience depends on the maturity, mood, local management, etc of the person on the other side of the counter. I’m not suggesting for a minute that you should execute every transaction on the Web; the value of a high-quality f2f experience cements the brand (particularly for old guys like me).

After a 20-year relationship with the local John Deere dealer with lots of positive f2f interaction, I filed for a quick divorce after receiving the latest misdiagnosis of a problem with a piece of equipment – and request for a large check.

Spending about 15 minutes online took me to a forum of tractor enthusiasts (really…) where three or four folks immediately weighed-in with ideas. A link to an online John Deere resource provided me with parts for about 50% of what I would have paid the local dealer. The impact of a bad f2f experience lingers.

Developing and maintaining a high-performing information architecture on the site continues to be key to building and retaining large traffic volumes from site visitors. The same applies to infrastructure and security. If it all works, site visitors will be back. If not, they’ll look for another site. It looks less likely that they’ll be back at the local John Deere parts counter though; it’s just too easy on the Web.