Internet Retailing Expo (IRX 2012), taking place at the NEC in Birmingham this week

Internet Retailing Expo (IRX 2012), taking place at the NEC in Birmingham, 21-22 March, is THE big event in the ecommerce and multichannel retail calendar.

Following the success of last year’s inaugural event, IRX 2012 has been enlarged for its second year to bring even more information, stimulus and capability together for an intense “Selling in the digital age” two-day event.

Over 2,600 visitors attended the first IRX in March 2011. Of those, 48% were etailers and 22% were multichannel retailers. More than 900 visitors took part in the learning programme, with standing room only for many of the presentations.

In 2012, over 4,000 visitors are projected to attend and 150 leading suppliers to ecommerce and multichannel retailers – marketing, operations, technology, payments, checkout, mobile, logistics, marketplaces, display, store and more – will come together under one roof. Title sponsor for 2012 is PayPal and Intershop, Ciao! from bing and LivePerson are silver sponsors.

Conferences:

New for the 2012 learning programme is a dedicated M-Retailing conference track. On Day 2, the “Mobile and Social Commerce”, sponsored by Reevoo, will offer sessions for late adopters looking to jump to the front of the queue, and for those early adopters looking further to integrate and extend their offering. From customer behaviour and research, to industry trends and triggers to selling on the mobile, via social, apps, integration and data, this track will provide insight into the world of mobile and how it can be exploited.  Presenting companies include PayPal, Reevoo, Mothercare, Javelin Group, www.whatusersdo.com, Headsdcape, Sponge, nToklo, Eagle Eye Solutions and Virgin Business Media.

 

The other track running on Day 2 is “Customer Experience”, sponsored by Certona, which will consider how to create a rounded, integrated view of the customers’ experience, how to shape and to exploit this. Design, interaction, experience planning, usability, service management, customer touchpoints – and of course the data and analytical systems to collect, analyse and give insight – will form the basis of this new stream, focused on the customer’s experience. Presenting companies include John Lewis, Asda, Blue Inc, FACT-Finder, Certona, LCP Consulting and JD Sports.

 

The “Fast Track” and Enterprise” conference tracks will run on Day 1. “Fast track”, sponsored by Amazon Services Europe, will be an ideal learning and inspiration opportunity for people looking to make their first step (or first major commitment) to digital channels. It will focus on getting businesses up and running quickly across all channels, learning from entrepreneurs who’ve made the leap and from people who can help businesses go from a standing start to success in the shortest possible time. Among the presenting companies are PayPal, Stinkyink.com, eSellerPro and Towequipe, Barnsley Football Club, Field Fisher Waterhouse LLP, ActivInstinct and Amazon.

The “Enterprise” conference track, sponsored by Efficient Frontier, is for people already selling online and the larger enterprise who are already very capable and successful, but who want even more. In this channel we’ll learn from the very best retailers on how to extract evermore revenue from an increasing customer base – by uniting channels, increasing relevance and coherence, and differentiating ourselves profitably. Presenting companies include Hitwise, De Vere, CBS Interactive and Shop Direct, Shutl, Jacques Vert, wehkamp.nl and eCommera.

Innovation Pavilion

This new feature for IRX 2012 provides an opportunity for suppliers to present their latest and greatest offeringsin front ofeditors from Internet Retailing magazine and visitors on the IRX floor. Visitors will have the opportunity to meet and quiz the suppliers and each presentation will be filmed for posting online after the show.

 

Day 1 presentations:

Alastair Stewart, Sales Director, PEER 1 Hosting EMEA

Tim Gulson, Strategic Business Development Manager, PayPal

Sean Duffy, Principal Email Marketing Consultant, Emailcenter

Camilla Ley Valentin CCO and Co-founder, Queue-it

Heikki Haldre, CEO and co-founder of Fits.me Virtual Fitting Room

Fred Lill, Mainline flatpack

John Tuohy, CEO, Nightline

Jack Panayi, Director, Sales EMEA, CNET – Content Solutions

 

Day 2 presentations:

Greg Chapman, Principal, Amazon Payments

Tim Gulson, Strategic Business Development Manager, PayPal

Matt Ball: Head of Sales; UK & Ireland. Intershop Communications

Bernard Dominici, Sales Director UK & US – Partner, B+ Equipment

Tom Allason, Founder &CEO, Shutl

Dominic Keen, Chief Executive Officer, (MoPowered) The MoBank Group

Jonathan Murphy, Account Director, OBAN
Joe Doveton, Head of Client Services, GlobalMixer

 

Workshops

Tom AllasonFounder & CEO, Shutl, “Putting the rocket into your business”, March 21st – 10:30-11:20 & 11:40-12:30 – Room A

 

James Brooke, CEO and Co-founder,Rory Dennis, Client Services Director, and Troy Pratley, Sales Engineer,10CMS,“Winning the battle for consumer attention”, March 21st – 10.30am – Room B

 

Susan Meriwether, Global Retail Marketing Director at RightNow “Connected Interactions: Delivering Great Experiences across the Customer Journey”, March 21st – 1.30pm – Room A

David Kohn, Head of Multichannel at Snow + Rock, Chris Edge, Customer Success Manager at SLI Systems and Steve Groenier, a seasoned ecommerce executive, “Site Search and the User Experience“, March 21st – 1.30pm – Room B

Marc Kenigsberg, VP Marketing at ClickTale“Beyond Web Analytics: How Behavioural Analytics are Changing the Game,” March 22nd – 10.30am – Room A

 

Stefan Hull, Insight Director, Propellernet, “Putting retail into search and social – from how people search to how customers shop”, March 22nd – 10.30am – Room B

 

Ángel Maldonado, Founder and head of Colbenson, and John Tomlinson,Head of communications at Colbenson, “The Empathy Project: using social media to predict the future,” March 22nd – 1.30pm – Room A

 

Pete Doyle, Founder & Director of SocialRetail.co.uk, “Integrated Social Media Strategies for Retailers”, March 22nd – 1.30pm – Room B

 

Exhibitor News Round-up:

Avail (F1)

Avail will be showing its new personalised advertising solution, “Avail for Advertising”, built on its proprietary advertising and merchandising technology platform. The new solution enables retailers to tailor their online advertising to each individual shopper, based on what they know about their interests. Instead of displaying the same ad every time, Avail’s technology is able to select which of the retailer’s products are most likely to interest an individual consumer and create a personalised advertising banner accordingly, in real-time. The benefit is higher click-through rates, conversion rates, and average order values, compared to unpersonalised advertising. As the shopper clicks through to the site, Avail’s on-site personalized merchandising continues to guide the shopper to the most relevant products, creating a seamless personalised shopping experience.

 

bemoko (F7)

Leading multi-channel optimisation specialist bemoko will be offering a 50% discount on their exclusive ‘Mobile Insight’ report to companies visiting their stand at this years’ expo.  Bemoko’s ‘Mobile Insight’ is a comprehensive, review of businesses current technology and their overall readiness for mobile and multi-channel delivery and delivers a detailed report providing invaluable insight for organisations reviewing their technical and commercial roadmaps for mobile and multi-channel integration.

 

Bronto Software (P33)

Bronto Software provides a marketing platform for retailers and other commerce-focused companies to drive revenue through email and cross-channel campaigns. At the expo, the company will be giving away a Totes gift package to a lucky winner that visits the booth.

 

CeeWhy Vancouver (P9)

Specialists in Warehousing and Storage, Fulfillment, Distribution, IT Management, Contract Packing and On-line Processing, CeeWhy Vancouver will be launching its new expresso on-line processing systems for retailers and online sellers.

 

Charapak (D1)

Leading corrugated packaging and display manufacturer Charapak, will be headlining its newly-launched There & Back Pack®. The second-life packaging solution has been specifically designed for online fashion sales consumers to return goods quickly, efficiently and in a good condition, combining user convenience with a range of branding opportunities, cost savings and environmental benefits to online retailers.

 

Repak, a bespoke wine packaging and distribution operation, is a service devised by Charapak for online wine retailer WineSimplicity.com, and was set-up as a direct result of a meeting at Internet Retailing Expo 2011. Repak has established a storage facility for around 6,000 bottles of wine along with a pick and packing service that prepares all orders ready to meet WineSimplicity.com’s next-day delivery promise.

 

ChannelAdvisor (E17)

Returning to the expo this year is ChannelAdvisor, a global e-commerce platform provider. Booth E17 will be staffed by e-commerce experts who will be available to share how ChannelAdvisor can help online retailers increase eBay and Amazon sales, drive traffic to their website with PPC and shopping feed campaigns, or how to take their business global.

 

ChannelAdvisor already helps more than 3,000 retailers, including renowned brands such as House of Fraser, B&Q, New Look and Joules, sell more online with leading software and services solutions. The team will be announcing a very exciting competition during the Internet Retailing Expo; visit stand E17 for details and a chance to enter.

 

Colony Commerce (C17)

3663, one of the leading foodservice wholesale distributors in the UK, has partnered with social commerce platform Colony Commerce to develop a unique mCommerce service for its wholesale customers. A one-stop-shop for caterers of all sizes, 3663 commissioned Colony Commerce to develop an iPhone-based mCommerce platform to reflect feedback from its customers who are looking for more choice in how they can place orders. This is also to make the most of new opportunities with customers moving towards smartphone technology and self-service, as well as take advantage of its cost benefits as a channel to the SME market and enterprise clients.

 

eDigital Research (E12)

Derek Eccleston, Head of Research, eDigitalResearch, will be presenting in the Customer Experience Conference at 2.30pm on 22 March: “Delivering a consistently high customer experience across multiple brands and geographies.”Key learnings will include: how to ensure the customer experience is comprehensively and effectively measured across a business with a complex footprint; gaining stakeholder commitment so the business moves forward as one; leverage the latest feedback techniques but in a smart way; driving tangible business improvement; reducing cost and adding value to a customer feedback programme.

eGain Communications Corporation (G9)

eGain recently unveiled its cross-industry benchmarking report. Social reviews prove increasingly influential in consumer buying decisions, according to an independent survey of 3,000 European consumers. The findings, published in the eGain 2012 cross-industry benchmarking report for multichannel customer experience, comprehensively charts influences on consumer buying behaviour and service preferences in seven European economies, and ranks Internet Retail, Telecoms, Utilities, Travel & Leisure, Finance and Manufacturing sectors based on the quality of consumer experiences. The survey was undertaken online by Vision Critical and commissioned by eGain.

 

GlobalBay (E24)

Verifone GlobalBay will be demonstrating their mobile retail solutions including Mobile Point of Sale, Clienteling, iPad Retailing and Inventory Management. Verifone GlobalBay’s Mobile Point of Sale extends the current point of sale system to mobile devices. Boosting sales and increasing revenue by accelerating checkout and eliminating line abandonment while improving the overall buying experience with personalised customer service. Verifone GlobalBay’s Retailing application enables retailers to scale interactions with customers without the need to add additional store associates. It also provides an additional channel to deliver information to the customer. Verifone GlobalBay’s Clienteling allows retailers to access key customer information to provide enhanced customer service to their most loyal customers. Know the customer, make the sale. Verifone GlobalBay’s Inventory Management extends existing inventory system functionality to mobile devices. This powerful capability will enable retailers to better manage routine inventory management tasks from the shop floor.

InventCommerce Ltd (A23)

InventCommerce, the leading UK eCommerce consulting and solutions company, will be showcasing Google Commerce Search and offering live demos on stand A23 throughout the expo.Google Commerce Search is the powerful search solution designed specifically for online and multi-channel retailers. Designed to maximise sales, satisfaction, and usability by allowing customers to find exactly what they’re looking for quickly with no unnecessary navigation, Google Commerce Search delivers an optimal search experience which engages visitors.

 

For retailers, the innovative new merchandising dashboard enables retailers to manage targeted promotions and ranking rules.  Its user-friendly analytic and tracking components, and enterprise- class support enable retailers to optimise their online product search experience quickly and easily.

 

JUNGO Fulfilment Solutions (F23)

JUNGO derives from the Latin word ‘adjungo’ which means ‘to connect’ or to ‘integrate’ and this is what the company does for major high street brands or a startup e-tailer – integrate a fulfilment solution that provides an innovative premium service, which is visible throughout the process and delivers outstanding value. JUNGO’s parent company has been providing solutions for businesses for nearly 22 years and has given JUNGO the go-ahead to launch a new, dynamic and exciting company in the world of Internet Retailing Fulfilment.

 

Keenpac (C41)

Keenpac will use the event as a platform to show Internet retailers its integrated Internet packaging range, and the options to tailor designs to suit individual retailer’s products and brand.

 

Mainline (C23)

Mainline has launched its online shop www.mainlineshop.com which means that internet retailers can buy five units to five million units of the company’s Lil’® envelopes and Bulkwrap® products FREE to any UK mainland delivery address. Mainline is also offering a FREE pack of 8x Lil’ A1 envelopes bu clicking the link: http://www.mainlineshop.com/app/site/backend/additemtocart.nl?c=649677&buyid=264&qty=1&showcart=T&promocode=free-a1

Mainline celebrates its position of being Europe’s largest manufacturer of cardboard Postal Packaging and producer of Lil’ cardboard envelopes which have been hailed by the press of being “The 21st century equivalent of a jiffy bag.”The Lil’ envelope is the lowest cost method of mailing CDs DVDs and Books by a combination of 5 results : 1) Reduced postal costs 2) Faster Packing Speed 3) Reduced Postage Returns 4) Lower Unit price 5) pallet space optimisation. Similar results are also achieved using Mainlines other star product called the ‘Bukwrap’ which have been historically produced for the world’s largest book distributors and e-commerce companies.

 

MoPowered (Coffee shop)

The MoBank Group has launched their MoPowered mCommerce service, which it believes will significantly improve accessibility to mobile retailing for all merchants. MoPowered is a managed service that enables merchants to integrate a mobile retailing platform with minimal disruption to their everyday business. Dominic Keen, Chief Executive of The MoBank Group says: “We estimate that 80% of UK merchants aren’t currently on mobile. MoPowered will stimulate a significant change in the retail world as it makes mCommerce readily available to merchants of all sizes.” MoPowered enables sophisticated, highly functional mCommerce sites to go live within weeks, compared to the industry average which is typically many months.

 

Ogone Payment Services (F15)

Ogone, specialists in online payment services has opened its US office this week, and appointed James Byler as the regional head for North America. Byler’s first and top priority will be to open the European e-commerce markets to US companies and secondly to establish local partnerships to further Ogone’s distribution network in the US.  With Europe, Asia and Latin America experiencing continued growth in e-commerce, Ogone is offering US-based companies an opportunity to maximise their revenue streams by selling online, or via mobile device, through local payments in these markets.

 

Open Rage (G13)

Open Range has announced the availability of the UK’s first, ecommerce Product Data Service with fully searchable product attributes, for the office products industry, Get-the-Spec/Office™.  For the first time, high quality product data and images for the products distributed by Spicers and VOW is available to UK office dealers in a single database format.

 

PayPal (B17)

Tim Gulson, Strategic Business Development Manager,will showcase PayPal’s latest payments innovations at 11am on 21and 22 March in The Innovation Pavilion. He will demonstrate some recent projects including in-store and in-restaurant payments, web payments without login, payments on set top boxes and other devices. He’ll also talk about PayPal’s mobile, digital goods and identity strategies, and introduce X.commerce – eBay Inc’s newest venture driving technology powered commerce to the next level and beyond.

 

Parker Software(P25)

Parker Software will lift the lid on their latest edition of Email2DB which will include a number of service enhancements increasing the popular software’s capabilities. Email2DB is used to automate business processes that occur when a business receives incoming messages and dynamically responds to things happening on the web. It is used worldwide and customers include the likes of Xerox, Cisco, Adobe, Dell, BT, DHL and more.

 

Email2DB Version 3 will include further integration options with popular applications to include Microsoft SharePoint, Azure, Exchange, Dynamics CRM, Salesforce, Dropbox, Facebook and Twitter, and further enhancements will include greater processing capabilities and scalability options, and a datacentre edition aimed at enterprise accounts to provide high levels of redundancy, failover and increased processing capabilities.

 

Peerius (B13)

Peerius was awarded the ECMOD award for best supplier in 2011in relation to website optimisation tools. This means that Peerius has a wealth of knowledge and expertise on how to improve websites’ performance specifically through optimising merchandising practices.  Peerius is offering every visitor to their stand the opportunity to register for a free merchandising review on their website.

This review gives an objective assessment of current merchandising strategies and offers actionable suggestions which retailers can implement straight away.

 

Reevo (P35)

Richard Anson, Founder and CEO, Reevoo, will present “The Social and Mobile Purchase Journey” at the Mobile and Social Commerce Conference on March 22 at 10.30am. Anson will look in depth at the new social and mobile purchase journey and how retailers can rise to this new challenge to build trust and drive sales uplifts of 18%. He will also share real world case studies of how Reevoo partners are utilising social content as a key conversion driver across all channels, including mobile, in-store, social and online.

 

Red Ant (C17)

Red Ant and Topshop deliver true multichannel engagement on the iPhone with the release of a new app. The mobile experts at Red Ant and the in-house digital team at Topshop have created a best of breed multichannel iPhone app. The fully transactional mobile app brings the entire Topshop product catalogue to customers and actively engages with them in-store, at home and online.

 

SellerExpress (G17)

Marketplace Management Software company SellerExpress will be using the expo to showcase its recently launched eBay integration module, offering improved performance as well as huge potential for increased sales and profits though integration with the world’s largest marketplace. SellerExpress’ Marketplace Management Software enables both new and current customers to use all of their existing features including integrating stock control, order processing and listing services across Amazon (UK, US, FR, DE, CA, JP), Play.com and now eBay.

 

Shutl (F37)

Shutl has launched its new look delivery service with Maplin, enabling customers across the UK to get their online purchases within 90 minutes. Also, Tom Allason (Founder & CEO, Shutl) will be presenting on the Enterprise stage: “Rocket science: using delivery to shape the future of retail.”Tom will take a look at the new role that delivery and solutions like Shutl can now play, both as a means of attracting and converting online customers and in driving greater profitability for retailers.  He’ll discuss how delivery is a battlefield with the capacity to shape the future of e-retail and unveil fresh research into the impact it’s having on consumer perception of major retail brands. Shutl will also be holding a hands on workshop entitled “Putting the rocket into your business” on March 21^st at 10.30, Room A.

 

UK Mail, ipostparcels.com (F6)

ipostparcels.com, UK Mail’s consumer parcel delivery service, offers an innovative online parcel collection and delivery solution at times and locations to suit their customers. In a recent announcement, ipostparcels.com has lowered all prices as part of their efforts to become one of the most competitively priced parcel delivery couriers in the UK.

 

 

Ukash (A27)

Ukash® is the Global e-Money Network and internationally recognised e-commerce cash payment method that enables consumers from anywhere in the world to shop, pay and play online safely, using cash. This secure payment method was developed to protect personal identity and financial information when making online transactions; reducing the threat of credit and debit card fraud for consumers and repudiations and charge-backs for retailers. Ukash® has no age limit, so consumers of all ages can make the most of safe payment online.

 

VendorShop social (G23)

VendorShop social powers thousands of Facebook stores worldwide via its VendorShop Facebook shop application and has over 170,000 active Facebook users.

 

The Facebook commerce software is free to install and enables merchants the opportunity to sell and customers to buy on Facebook without customers being redirected away from the social networking site. All stores also carry the McAfee Secure and VeriSign Trust marks of security and have powerful promotion tools to maximise social selling opportunities. The types of products sold via VendorShop stores cover a range of sectors including fashion, food, event ticketing, charity and arts and crafts in markets such as the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and Asia.

 

WorldAddresses.com (F8)

WorldAddresses.comwill be showcasing its latest plug-in technology – the Magento Address Lookup Plug-in. WorldAddresses.com’s latest address lookup plug-in has been developed for Magento, an e-commerce platform that is designed to help e-tailers build online checkouts and customer registration forms into their websites. With the development of WorldAddresses.com’s plug-in, e-tailers aiming to provide their customers with a seamless transaction process can do so via the implementation of automatic address lookup functions within the checkout forms. The technology can also be adapted to support m-commerce, a fast growing shopping preference for consumers on the go.

 

PR Contact

For all media enquiries, please contact Beky Cann or Kerry Marsh on the Internet RetailingExpo PR Team.

 

Neesham Public Relations

Tel: + 44 (0) 1296 628 180

Email:bekyc@neesham.co.uk or kerrym@neesham.co.uk