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Customer feedback reinvented with actionable data with RaterBee…
Stuart Silverman, Founder/CEO of RaterBee (a company recreating customer feedback using technology in brick and mortar stores – bio) joins Pavan Bahl, Marc Raco , and guest host Brian Laney (VP of Retail at Alert Tech) at the Alert Tech booth at NRF Big Show.
A retail family, associate-centric feedback, and survey challenges
Silverman reveals a background as a third generation professional retailer, growing up remembering his dad’s Sunday 
mornings’ supermarket news. He focused on disinterested associates, not getting trained, people coming into store and leaving without being attended to, how it bothered him that customers felt unfulfilled, associates were unfulfilled. How he created a gamification platform creating challenges, expectations, measuring performance, and rewarding performance. Currently no effective way to measure interactions between associates and customers, Silverman says RaterBee solves this. Like Uber, the ability to rate service while emotion is fresh, and great that it is associate-centric. Current challenges are the delay between receipt-based surveys, customers don’t care, perceive no value, customers don’t feel that their feedback will be heard. Transactional surveys must be person to person in the moment, and are not scalable.
Beacon-based feedback, rating associates, and getting a range of store data
How Raterbee is going for real time, contextual surveys for this time, this situation, answering 3-4 questions quickly in and out, done. Customers fill it out on their phones, using beacon technology, via alerts without an app, opting in/out to the alert, and how it is prompted at checkout at end of experience. Stores will attach beacons to individual associates to identify them as good/bad associates, or to set performance goals for associates, produces data on associates, layout, store sound, store ambiance, and anything about consumer experience. How feedback is moving away from single question responses in surveys to get more dynamic responses, and discussion about the kind of stores that will and won’t see benefit from this feedback (some stores don’t care about customer service).
Creating an industry standard, voting with dollars, and Rent-a-Kids
The idea of associates having a RaterBee ranking as achievement and part of an industry standard, the fact that solving a problem means you need a great associate, and the ability to vote with your dollars. Are we excited because we want a voice, and are there too many stores? Off the Grid Questions covers needing caffeine needs, Silverman’s grandfather’s Swiss cheese, and Rent-a Kid.
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