Overview
Technology
Deployment
About the Company
Overview
- Q: What problem does Vibe solve?
- Today's online shoppers are faced with an overload of product information presented in increasingly smaller retail environments. VibeTM Modules solve this problem by personalizing merchandising presentations to make shopping more efficient, fun and truly all about the shopper.
VibeTM Solutions address the following:
- Solves Too Many Products in Too Little Space: VibeTM Modules reduce online clutter while optimizing the number of relevant products presented. Vibe can increase the effective size and potency of e-tail environments for websites, kiosks and cell phones.
- Makes "Browse" or e-Window-Shopping Possible: While existing e-tail technologies are generally great at drill-down or "search shopping" (i.e., when a shopper already has a pre-defined notion of what she is looking for), true "browse" or window-shopping (where a shopper is exploring or seeking inspiration - i.e., "window-shopping") remains an under-developed area on the Internet. The potential value of e-window-shopping should be evident through traditional bricks & mortar case studies that illustrate the importance of window-shopping as a means of stimulating trial of new brands and styles, facilitating the merchandising of up-sell products and extending the shopping experience.
- Opens New Promotional and Partnering Opportunities: VibeTM Technology generates customer profiles that are truly ubiquitous which means that profiles can be associated with product profiles of unrelated brands, categories and even across cultures.
Top
- Q: What applications are best for Vibe?
- As a personal branding system, Vibe works best for image-enhancing and self-improvement products. Example categories include apparel, accessories, jewelry, watches, shoes, makeup, fragrances, home furnishings, house wares, homes, cars, travel destinations, restaurants, drinks, entertainment, music, movies, books, tapes and seminars: in short, Vibe is well-suited to merchandising any offering that is purchased in whole or in part to enhance a person's story. Further, VibeTM Solutions are particularly appropriate to e-tailers with inventories that are difficult to navigate or access.
Top
- Q: What market data does Vibe offer?
- VibeTM Solutions include a dynamic reporting module that allows retailers to monitor key performance metrics and study consumer behavior. Such analytics can be used to perfect promotional strategies, re-engineer products and understand consumer behavior.
Top
- Q: How is Vibe priced?
- VibeTM Modules are available by annual license and maintenance/support fees plus Cost Per Click (CPC) fees that vary depending upon product category and quality of referral. For a Licensing Package and Rate Sheet, Contact Us.
Top
- Q: What is Vibe's Privacy Policy?
- Vibe does not spam or sell email addresses. And while retailers can dynamically mine customer behavior on a statistically aggregated basis, individual profiles and user information are not disclosed. See our Privacy Policy.
Top
- Q: What makes Vibe better?
- Vibe is based on the philosophy that predictive marketing is best accomplished by looking to the future rather than the past. Thus, unlike Collaborative Filtering models that look to buying histories to second-guess product relevancy, Vibe defines individual shopper aspirations (goals), then recommends products that help them achieve such aspirations. Through this view to the future, Vibe ensures that a shopper's personal motivations and interests will be accurately measured and met
Vibe's unique approach to predictive retailing results in a merchandising solution capable of delivering the following benefits:
- Optimizes Product Exposure: VibeTM Modules optimize product exposure by dynamically presenting personally relevant products to each shopper. With Vibe, you can also match and present high relevancy up-sell and cross-sell products.
- Increases Sales & Reduces Returns: As a participatory process, Vibe offers shoppers profiling control and insight on how matches are generated, thereby creating trust in product recommendations. Thus shoppers buy more quickly, with greater confidence and are less likely to return purchases.
- Improves the Customer Experience: Vibe makes shopping more fun, relevant and efficient - all of which increase length, depth and quality of customer visitation. Vibe makes the retail experience all about the shopper which is the surest way to keep customers coming back.
- Gathers Unique Insight Data: In addition to common demographic data, Vibe allows you to collect and study unique customer aspiration psychographics. VibeTM Aspiration Metrics are particularly useful toward defining the needs and desires of groups like teens who are hard to track by demographics and buying history. Further, VibeTM Aspiration Metrics are ubiquitous which means that data can be measured and compared across brands, categories and even cross-culturally.
- Offers Unprecedented Accuracy: Unlike other predictive retail systems that second-guess consumer preferences, VibeTM Solutions simply ask customers to define the future they want. The result is a more meaningful and accurate profile to match to, particularly for groups such as pre-career groups (teenagers) where demographic and buying history data is shallow.
Top
Technology
- Q: What is VibeTM Technology?
- Vibe is a patent-pending predictive merchandising solution that recommends relevant products to help shoppers achieve personal aspirations. As an interactive tool, Vibe promises unprecedented product-matching accuracy in a fun and customer-centric shopping experience. VibeTM Technology is embodied in the form of merchandising modules of varying sizes that can be embedded into retail websites, on-site kiosks, and small-screen e-tail formats including cell phones.
Top
- Q: How does Vibe match products to shoppers?
- The VibeTM System is a personal branding system that maps a shopper's aspirations then utilizes a matching algorithm to recommend pre-rated image-enhancing and self-improvement products to the shopper.
Top
- Q: How are products entered into the VibeTM System?
- Products profiles can be created and entered into the VibeTM System by your designers, buyers, marketers and/or Vibe staff. To make initial profiling fast and easy, a shortcut arch-type based rating process called the Vibe(tm) One-Click Rating System can be used. Once products are entered, the Vibe(tm) Automated Profile Learning System quantitatively integrates consumer opinion and behavior to evolve product profiles over time.
Top
- Q: How does Vibe entice shoppers to open membership accounts?
- Vibe(tm) Modules feature two ways to gather customer profile information: 1. Vibe(tm) Click-Shopping Profiling in which a shopper's profile is created as product images are clicked, and; 2. a language-based Vibe(tm) Personality Test. Once a shopper creates a profile, a free Vibe Membership Account is offered which allows the shopper to save and perfect the profile with a variety of profile-enhancing features.
Top
- Q: Can VibeTM Modules use other matching formulas?
- Yes. While we believe the VibeTM Matching Algorithm is the best approach to matching, VibeTM Merchandising Modules are designed to recommend products using any predictive matching algorithm. Further, the VibeTM Matching Algorithm can be used in a complimentary fashion with any Collaborative Filtering (CF) formula to create a more holistic view of shopper interest and motivation. CF and Vibe formulas differ in that CF is based on manipulating historical data while Vibe looks to future aspirations.
More specifically, CF formulas are typically: 'people who like X also tend to like Y', or; 'you purchased X in the past so Y might be interesting to you too.' Typical failures? Under CF, if Steve buys a book on kite flying for his nephew, Steve gets recommendations to other kite flying books in the future irrespective of whether he personally cares about kite flying. The VibeTM Matching Algorithm differs as follows:
- Vibe Looks to the Future, Not the Past: The Vibe method defines individual motivation and interest by mapping one's personal aspirations or future goals. Vibe theory is premised on the concept that knowing a shopper's goals is the key to generating relevant product recommendations.
- Vibe Doesn't Second-Guess - It Simply Asks: Rather than speculate, Vibe simply asks customers to define the future they want. There's only one person who can define your aspirations: you.
- Vibe Predicts From The First Click: Vibe requires less data than CF formulas because CF is a pattern recognition methodology that requires a significant amount of transactional data before meaningful patterns can be detected. Vibe on the other hand, can make meaningful and accurate recommendations from the very first shopper action.
- Vibe(tm) Profiles are Ubiquitous: Vibe cuts to the very core of what it is to be human. By mapping the drivers that shape one's personal brand, Vibe(tm) Profiles can predict product relevancies across retailers, product categories and even cross-culturally.
Top
- Q: Can Vibe gather customized metrics?
- Yes. The VibeTM System anticipates that retailers have divergent demographic tracking and product defining needs thus is designed to accommodate customized data points.
Top
- Q: Does the VibeTM System work across product categories or cross-culturally?
- Yes. The VibeTM System is a truly ubiquitous solution that can recommend product selections across brands, product categories and even cross-culturally. This means that no matter where originally profiled, Vibe Members can login at any participating Vibe Retailer to have relevant products matched to them.
Top
Deployment
- Q: How is Vibe integrated into retail environments?
- VibeTM Modules are designed to be embedded into existing e-tail environments. Such Modules are offered in a variety of sizes to meet the needs of any e-tailer. As shoppers browse, product information is called from VibeTM Servers. When shoppers are ready to enter the checkout process, they are referred directly to retailer shopping cart systems for order uptake, payment processing and product fulfillment.
Top
- Q: What implementation assistance does Vibe offer?
- Vibe offers a range of development and integration services including: strategic development, application planning, UI design, brand skinning, rollout planning, testing, debugging, on-going maintenance and system support. Select services are included in licensing packages while others are available on an as-needed basis.
Top
About the Company
- Q: What is Vibe's organizational format?
- Vibe Retail Systems, LLC is an early-stage technology development enterprise focused on the perfection and implementation of e-merchandising tools. Like many technology companies, Vibe utilizes a virtually-managed out-source production model.
Top
- Q: Who are Vibe's competitors?
- Vibe competitors are primarily Collaborative Filtering (CF) technologies that manipulate historical buying patterns to define purchasing patterns and thereby make product recommendations. While we believe the VibeTM Matching Algorithm to be the best approach to matching, VibeTM Merchandising Modules are designed to recommend products using any predictive matching formula. Further, the VibeTM Matching Algorithm can be used in a complimentary fashion with any Collaborative Filtering (CF) formula to garner a more holistic view of shopper interest and motivation.
Top
- Q: What resources is Vibe seeking?
- While Vibe Retail Systems, LLC is not currently hiring employees, we do engage out-source talent in the areas of e-tail development, UI design and DB implementation on an as-needed basis. Further, while not seeking venture funding at this time, we are open to exploring partnering opportunities with retailers and other enterprises well-positioned to leveraging the value of VibeTM Technology.
Top