What’s killing the High Street and how to revive it.

I read with interest Rob Brown’s piece for the Huffington Post about how the social features of mobile phones have helped kill of the British High Street. Earlier the same week retail sales figures had shown how shops had been hit by the Olympics — with shoppers choosing to stay at home to watch the Games instead of going out to buy stuff. Even online sales had taken a hit.
While mobile and events may be the latest things to hit the High Street, they’re far from the only or decisive factors, though they do remind us of one which has emerged over the last 40 years — non-food shopping is increasingly competing with other activities in the attention economy: fighting for our time as we have so many other alternatives.
Other factors which contributed to the decline of the High Street include:

• The rise in working mums since the 1960s — reducing the daily, part-social shopping Rob refers to.
• Sunday trading, mainly by another factor — supermarkets, which have increased their non-food offerings massively partly through using their massive marketing power, partly gained from loyalty card data.
• The emergence of out-of-town retail parks and shopping centres.
• E-commerce and m-commerce.
• The disappearance of the RRP and NET book agreement, which opened up price competition.
• Rising town centre parking restrictions and costs.
• The ‘Clone Town’ factor created by High Streets dominated by chains.
• Complacency.

So how can the High Street fight back?
Using the power of social is part of the answer — like the music industry fight against piracy, the High Street needs to create sustainable competitive advantage by creating things that can’t be copied or pirated and which you can enjoy with your friends.
Music’s answer was to change its business model to making music sales the taster or loss leader for unpirateable live tours, for which fans will pay way more than for a CD.
The High Street’s answer will partly be about live exclusive events with an X-factor, like the launch of a new product with one-night-only discounts and incentives to bring friends.
Another fightback factor has to be customer service. As much as websites can get you stuff quickly and cheapest, there’s room for the High Street to outcompete on personal service. It’s one of the things John Lewis and Apple have used to keep their High Street stores.
That’s part of a final fightback factor — proper CRM. We all know the power of the shop owner who not only remembers you, but remembers your previous purchases and taste. And is prepared to go the extra mile when necessary.
Things like that will be core to reviving the High Street.

Spec application replies policy: a PR litmus test

Roy Greenslade’s post on a blogger’s delight at actually getting a rejection letter after applying for a journalism job brings to mind an important point about managing an organisation’s reputation — it’s not just down to its PRs, whether in-house or outsourced.
Most organisations get spec applications or enquiries all the time. But how they deal with them makes a difference to what PR is about — how stakeholders feel about the brand.
Many, for reasons of time, cost or process efficiency reply only to those they’re interested in and don’t bother replying to the rest. But what impression of the organization does that give to the sender and all those he or she will tell of their disappointment? Not a good one. Probably of being faceless and uncaring. And not likely to give good service.
So the short-term expediency of cost/time advantage inherent in the transactional marketing approach will have the opportunity cost of potential future referral value to friends, family and colleagues who may have a significant customer value to the organization.
Also, who knows where or what that applicant may go on to. The potentially beneficial relationship with the brand will possibly be lost for good. All for the cost of a quick, even standard, reply.
Ok, you’re busy. We’re all busy, but how long does it take to create a standard “thanks, but” reply and save it as a signature in your email program to insert after clicking the Reply button? Or if you’re REALLY busy, delegate replying to a colleague or subordinate? Not as long as you may think.
Why bother? Because brands’ reputations are being judged 24/7 and in this age of Internet-enabled complainers, Jeff Jarvis’s Dell Hell story tells us that every communication has to be taken seriously and dealt with properly or the brand will suffer the consequences.
The benefit is the referral value of simply courtesy. Manners, sadly, aren’t universal, so there’s a competitive advantage to those brands who can ensure really good, polite service is something everyone experiences when interacting with it. Look at John Lewis.
On a personal note, while contacting leading PR firms over the last year I’ve been saddened at how many don’t reply at all.
If you’re a PR, ask yourself what does that say about how well you’re managing your own reputation. Those that take the time to reply, even just to say ‘sorry’, show themselves to be better than those who don’t. And they’re the ones I want to work with.