It means one company sells its products utilizing multiple sales channels.  The customer can purchase those products through a website, catalog, or – in some cases – a brick & mortar store.

Why is this beneficial?

For the retailer, it provides a way to reach “all” customers…and a synergy that can result in incremental sales.

For the customer, it makes the shopping experience convenient.  Some people prefer to order online; some prefer to flip through the pages of a catalog, and some prefer to go to the mall and touch the products before making a purchase.

So why do some multichannel retailers (you know who you are, Brookstone!) allow you to buy through any channel, but only return through certain channels? I recently encountered this issue when I was trying to return some items. This holiday season I spent close to $1,000 at this particular retailer, purchasing items through both the website and at the retail store. But when I wanted to return an item purchased online at the store, I was told they would “have to check” to see if that particular item was sold in the store. Otherwise, I’d have to pack it up and ship it back.

This is nonsense! I, the customer, do not care about your internal accounting – or channel conflict. If you accept the synergy of having the multichannel name recognition then you have to accept the inconvenience of customers purchasing through one channel and returning through another. If, while I happen to be in the store making a return of an item originally purchased online, I happen to notice an item that I decide to purchase on impulse…I very much doubt that you would tell me that I really ought to purchase that product online. So let’s not be silly.

As it turns out, I was lucky. Since the items I wanted to return were also sold in the store, they “permitted” the return. Thank you, but I do not consider that a favor.

Confidence among executive recruiters edged up slightly in January as they projected that one in five companies will be adding executive level positions and almost six in 10 companies will selectively “trade up” their management bench strength by recruiting replacements for existing roles over the next six months. Only 1 percent of employers were expected to eliminate executive positions during the same period.

Confidence in the Executive Employment Market — Next 6 Months

In January, ExecuNet’s benchmark Recruiter Confidence Index revealed that 57 percent of 157 responding executive recruiters indicated they were “confident” or “very confident” the executive employment market would improve in the next six months. That was up two points from December and marked a second consecutive month in which recruiter confidence crossed the important 50 percent level that historically indicates optimism for a broader expansion of the jobs market.

“The hiring environment from an executive-level perspective has improved marginally and some sectors of the economy aren’t contributing to job growth, but these numbers do reflect some optimism for continued business expansion and the kind of white-collar hiring required to sustain it in the coming months,” said Mark M. Anderson, president and chief economist of ExecuNet.

“The search for improved business performance is already translating in the senior-management job market, with recruiters expecting some companies to seek replacements for underperforming managers,” Anderson added. “This clandestine recruiting activity underscores the existence of a hidden executive job market.”

Introduced in May 2003, ExecuNet’s Recruiter Confidence Index is based on a monthly survey of executive search firms and recognized as a leading indicator for the economy and the executive job market.

Most brands are trying really hard to succeed with their social media initiatives. They are trying new ways to engage – from receipts at checkout to advertisements in newspapers; brands are trying their best to connect with consumers on social networks.

In the pursuit of trying to get things done, some “top” brands have made mistakes. Here are some things to avoid, with no exceptions – things that I hope are rarely repeated.

1. Run specials all the time. In a struggle to keep the consumer engaged, brands tend to keep offering consumers special deals. This all-out effort to discount and lure tends to have a negative impact by devaluing the brand and devaluing the relationship.

2. Wait for people to come. Brands set up shop on social media sites and simply wait for the consumer to come and find them. They do little to engage via dialogue or by trying to market along other channels. They have simply set up shop and expect that it is good enough to drive consumers in.

3. Run contests and games all the time. Gamification is the new buzzword for engagement with many brands investing significantly in games to engage their consumers. Additionally, brands tend to run multiple contests, which results in severely diluting their engagement to conversion metrics.

4. Block negative feedback. Many top brands tend to either block or ignore negative feedback. If you put up a comment on their site they either take it down or have a defined strategy to push the bad comments as far down as possible. This strategy diminishes the value of the positive comments.

5. Launch press releases on social media. Do you pay attention to more than 300 characters or watch long video clips? Brands tend to forget the conversational nature of engagement on social media sites – short, interesting stories are a much better way to engage.

6. Wait 24 hours to respond. Some brands take a long time to respond because they only check “social feedback” twice a week. Other brands take a long time to respond because they have to get approval before they can respond. The problem is that if you take too long, the consumer will probably call your brand for an answer or move over to someone else.

7. Not connecting your channels. Always a classic with the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. Just two weeks ago, a major travel company sent two types of incentives – a gas discount card by email that shaved 10 cents off each gallon and a gas discount offer via social media that offered a five cent discount. It took a direct mail piece to fix the issue.

8. Snoop on and shock your customers. While it’s OK for a brand to leverage “widgets” to track consumer behavior on social media sites, it’s scary when the brand surprises these consumers with offers. A click on a social link led to a phone call by a cruise representative who unabashedly told me that he observed my behavior online.

9. Just roll along. Some brands feel that it’s OK to reach a certain critical mass in social media after which their sites can just “roll along.” The snowball can roll the wrong way and hurt brands.

10. Focus on “likes.” A blind focus on driving up “likes” has led to the “like” button being devalued and resulted in significantly lower ROI.

11. “Wait” to get started. Believe it or not there are still brands, especially in the financial services area, that are waiting for the social media “fad” to end.

Social media can make a positive impact. Do not wait, do not focus on “likes,” and please do not tell your fans that you know what link they clicked on at 11:33 a.m. Good luck with your social endeavors.

Amazon Has Tried Everything to Make Shopping Easier. Except This.
By DAVID STREITFELD
| February 3, 2012

Much of the discussion about Amazon is focused on its digital side, yet the company is relentlessly expanding into the physical.

It has announced five new United States warehouses since late December, all with more than a million square feet. It is testing out delivery lockers in New York and Seattle for those who cannot receive their goods at home. It has been experimenting with a grocery delivery service in Seattle for several years. It has expanded its Prime $79 annual shipping fee program, hoping members will order more of everything. In all sorts of ways Amazon is trying to remove the obstacles from home delivery. Does anyone remember how mail order once meant getting things a month later? Now Amazon thinks two days is too long.

One major reason the retailer seems to be giving up its hard-line position on charging customers sales taxes is that it wants to build its warehouses close to major population centers. If it does that, it cannot argue that it is exempt from collecting state taxes because it lacks a physical presence in a state. But the increased business from faster delivery might be a worthwhile trade-off to charging the tax.

Still, until we achieve the teleportation of objects, there is only one way to immediately get physical goods. It is called a store. For years, there has been speculation that Amazon will open its own outlets, presumably to sell Amazon-label products. The idea seems farfetched, but before 2001 so was the idea of Apple operating its own stores. “I give them two years before they’re turning out the lights on a very painful and expensive mistake,” a consultant told BusinessWeek about Apple’s plans in what has become one of the most celebrated bad guesses of the era.

So maybe that is where we’re going with Amazon. Instead of using everyone else’s store as a showroom for e-commerce, the retailer could control the process and operate its own showroom. “There wouldn’t have to be any inventory, you would simply play with the stuff, talk to a professional and swipe your Amazon Prime credit card (or Amazon phone) and have it at your house in the next 24 to 48 hours,” Jason Calacanis wrote in a recent blog post headlined: “Rumor: Amazon Retail Stores Coming.”

Amazon does not comment on rumors (or on much of anything, really.) But analysts do not think highly of the notion. The company wants to get closer to its customers to bridge the last mile of distribution, but not that close. “I don’t think the idea of Amazon getting more physical and adding more bricks would improve their return on invested capital,” said Brian Nowak of Nomura Securities.

Another problem: Apple, he noted, was focused on one category. Amazon ranges all over the map. Its stores might be pretty big.

I liked this piece by Timothy Hawthorne about the damage done by counterfeiters: click here.

In this difficult economy, many job seekers have negative credit histories, not necessarily because they are not responsible with their finances, but due to other factors. A trend is emerging in which a number of states are banning companies from conducting credit checks on prospective employees.

It has traditionally been assumed that a bad credit report is an indication of poor work habits and decision-making, and general untrustworthiness. Though this may be true in some cases, many otherwise responsible people have suffered financial setbacks due to circumstances beyond their control. And credit checks can turn a bad situation worse, preventing someone who genuinely wants to pay their bills from securing employment.

According to Persis Yu, staff attorney at the National consumer Law Center, the movement to ban credit checks would be “a game changer for people negatively affected by this economy.”

A piece by David Streitfeld which appeared in last week’s New York Times, (click here), exposes the practice of offering a refund for a positive online review. “Hundreds of reviewers proclaimed the case a marvel, a delight, exactly what they needed to achieve bliss. And definitely worth five stars.”

Customers who purchased protective tablet cases from Amazon merchant VIP Deals received along with their purchase a letter extending an invitation “to write a product review for the Amazon community.”

“In return for writing the review, we will refund your order so you will have received the product for free,” it said.

Through the use of this product review campaign, “VIP pushed its product far above the competition, none of which had so much enthusiasm with so little dissent.”

“Asked why Amazon did not seem to notice that at least a few consumers called into question the VIP deal on its own site, a spokeswoman declined to comment.” Hmmn!

I attended my first Tweet Up last night. Held at a local mall, it was very well attended, and the crowd was welcoming.

It was an eclectic group, interested in “all things social”. I expected it to be an extremely youthful group…and was pleasantly surprised to see a mix of all ages. People were anxious to become acquainted, and introduce me around. And not because they needed jobs…truly in the spirit of sharing.

Since the event took place at 6pm, a nice aside was that the mall restaurants donated food, so there were lots of good things to eat! Soups, sandwiches, snacks and beverages.

Before the evening ended, I had received several new invites/follows on my social media accounts. I will certainly attend future events with this group!

“Recruiters and hiring managers are overwhelmed by the volume of resumes pouring in, thanks to the weak job market and new tools that let applicants apply for a job with as little as one mouse click. The professional networking website LinkedIn recently introduced an ‘apply now’ button on it s job postings that sends the data in a job seeker’s profile directly to a potential employer.”

To “cut through the clutter” many large and midsize companies have turned to applicant tracking systems to search resumes for the right skills and experience.

My frustration as a recruiter?

We have worked with some of these large companies, such as Citibank and Cablevision, who utilize tremendous tracking databases to store the resumes of everyone that has ever applied. Despite their tracking systems, they have engaged us to recruit talent for positions that are a challenge to fill. These systems are not foolproof; they don’t account for a candidate who may have added new skills and not included them on the resume, or who have not highlighted their responsibilities in a way that allows the system to identify them as viable. We take the time to become acquainted with a candidate before we present them, asking pertinent questions and delving deep into their experience and skills. But when we present a candidate that is “already in the system” we are cut out of the loop.

My feeling on this? Then don’t interview the candidate after we present them! If you already “knew” this candidate, and had not pursued them for the position, they must be treated as “new” in light of the introduction we make that highlights why they are relevant and appropriate for the role.

Perhaps for positions that do not require a specialized skill set this type of software is a convenience, but if you seek sophisticated direct and ecommerce marketers, there is no substitute for a trained eye and a live conversation.

To read the piece in its entirety, click here.

Wikipedia is the biggest name among the approximately 10,000 websites that pledged to go dark today in a broad Internet protest of the SOPA and PIPA (Protect IP Act) online anti-piracy bills.

This explanation of the issue is taken directly from Wikipedia:

“The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), also known as House Bill 3261 or H.R. 3261, is a bill that was introduced in the United States House of Representatives on October 26, 2011, by House Judiciary Committee Chair Representative Lamar S. Smith (R-TX) and a bipartisan group of 12 initial co-sponsors. The bill, if made law, would expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods.Presented to the House Judiciary Committee, it builds on the similar PRO-IP Act of 2008 and the corresponding Senate bill, the PROTECT IP Act.

The originally proposed bill would allow the U.S. Department of Justice, as well as copyright holders, to seek court orders against websites accused of enabling or facilitating copyright infringement. Depending on who makes the request, the court order could include barring online advertising networks and payment facilitators from doing business with the allegedly infringing website, barring search engines from linking to such sites, and requiring Internet service providers to block access to such sites. The bill would make unauthorized streaming of copyrighted content a crime, with a maximum penalty of five years in prison for ten such infringements within six months. The bill also gives immunity to Internet services that voluntarily take action against websites dedicated to infringement, while making liable for damages any copyright holder who knowingly misrepresents that a website is dedicated to infringement.

Proponents of the bill say it protects the intellectual property market and corresponding industry, jobs and revenue, and is necessary to bolster enforcement of copyright laws, especially against foreign websites. They cite examples such as Google’s $500 million settlement with the Department of Justice for its role in a scheme to target U.S. consumers with ads to illegally import prescription drugs from Canadian pharmacies.

Opponents say that it violates the First Amendment, is Internet censorship, will cripple the Internet, and will threaten whistle-blowing and other free speech actions.Opponents have initiated a number of protest actions, including petition drives, boycotts of companies that support the legislation, and planned service blackouts by English Wikipedia and major Internet companies scheduled to coincide with the next Congressional hearing on the matter.

The House Judiciary Committee held hearings on November 16 and December 15, 2011. The Committee was scheduled to continue debate in January 2012,but on January 17 Chairman Smith said that “[d]ue to the Republican and Democratic retreats taking place over the next two weeks, markup of the Stop Online Piracy Act is expected to resume in February.”"

At issue is the concept that SOPA provides the ability of intellectual property owners (such as movie studios and record labels) to have substantial control – some feel too much power – in order to protect their interests. For example, if Paramount Pictures says that a website is infringing on their copyrighted work, the studio could demand that Google remove that site from its search results, that PayPal no longer accept payments to or from that site, that ad services pull all ads and finances from it. On top of that, SOPA could allow that the site’s ISP prevent people from even going there.

Content creators have battled against piracy for years, but it’s hard for U.S. companies to take action against foreign sites.

I will follow this issue with interest.