Secrets Behind Famous Retail Success! Two Customers: Human + AI, 6% Checkout Lift, 21k Weekly Signal
November 25, 2025 • 24 mins
Julia Paulsen, Director of Ecommerce Nordics at Elkjøp Nordic (part of Currys plc), unpacks how to win when your store has two customers: the human and the AI assistant. We cover data quality, MACH, omnichannel execution, and the culture that turns OKRs into commercial outcomes.
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⏱️ Timestamps
00:00 Intro
00:23 Welcome Julia Paulsen (Elkjøp Nordic / Currys)
00:40 What Elkjøp is + Nordic footprint
01:05 Market share + MediaMarkt history
01:49 Norway’s biggest e-commerce revolution
02:32 Two customers: human and AI assistant
05:26 “Menneske og maskin”: human + machine
06:54 How to make PDPs readable for virtual assistants
07:22 Agent vs human shopping missions
08:33 Last mile & omnichannel performance
09:42 Multi-market ecommerce + ContentSquare
12:13 Nordic stores as a strategic advantage
14:22 Culture, OKRs and performance
17:21 Leadership during pressure
19:33 The next 2–3 years of digital retail
20:52 Why structured product data is the battlefield
22:26 21,000 signals → +6% checkout completion
23:42 Closing thoughts
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#TheRetailPodcast #Retail #Ecommerce #AI #AgenticAI #Elkjop #Currys #FutureOfRetail #MACHAlliance #DigitalLeadership #CustomerExperience
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello and welcome back to another fantastic episode of The
Retail Podcast. And this week we're going into
the wonderful world of Actually.To be fair, rather than spoil
it, I always love the guests that talk about what they did
because I'll do a hash job of describing what you do, Julie.
I've read about what you do, whoyou do it for, and I think once
(00:20):
you start talking, everyone willrecognise the brand and
obviously you have a pivotal role in helping that brand grow
across the region. So, Julia, welcome to the show.
Yes. So I think El Shep, if I say El
(00:44):
Shep, that will probably not saytoo much to your podcast
listeners, but you will probablyknow our owner's curries.
So we are basically curries, butbased in the Nordics.
So we are the Vikings of the curries based in Norway, Sweden,
Denmark and Finland, selling thebest electronics to our nation.
(01:05):
So we have the company with the biggest market share and I'm
director of e-commerce, so I'm trying to keep it there.
That's fantastic. This is Curiosity.
There's medium art Saturn come into your region.
You know, they tried Alex, but we actually pushed them away.
They were in Sweden for eight years.
They tried to kick us out, but El Giganten, they just pushed
(01:28):
too hard. So Media Mart had to leave the
market. All right.
Well, OK, interesting. Because they've just been
acquired or gone into a partnership with jd.com.
Anyway, we're not going to talk about them.
OK, not spend time on that but. Yeah, I've noticed.
I've, I've been reading about your profile.
I've been reading about some of the things that you've said.
(01:49):
And one of the things that I read about it, you said that
Norway is about to undergo its biggest e-commerce revolution
since the dawn of the Internet, but the you're not worried of
that because of your people. So what I'm really curious about
what are the specific, if you like, mindsets, qualities that
you feel that you have from a people perspective, Like if we
(02:11):
start with the people and then we can sort of take it from
there. But yeah, I'm curious on your
opinion. Yes, not because you know, AI is
everywhere. I don't think you can go to any
discussion about technology or what is going around in
e-commerce without being scared by virtual assistants taking
over our websites, becoming obsolete and of course AI taking
also our jobs period. But when you look into this in
(02:35):
more detail, the AI assistant, they will also need to shop
somewhere, they need to find theinformation somewhere.
So you have to have that catalogue of product and
understand even more about who is the best, provide the service
for the end customer. Because also virtual assistant,
they have the end customer best interest in mind.
(02:55):
Otherwise, they have failed in their mission.
So when you have the people likeI have, luckily in my team who
are really both, you know, experts in the customer journey,
very passionate about data, always curious, never satisfied,
always curious, never satisfied.And who really want to make sure
(03:16):
that now we can cater also for these new virtual assistants,
which is basically a new type ofcustomer.
So how the team is, we will havein the future, we'll have two
types of customers. It will be Alex, the real
person, Alex with a pulse and itwill be your virtual assistant
who is sometimes helping you to make things work together.
And we need to cater for both ofyour needs.
(03:38):
And those needs are in the bottom line.
They're similar, they're data-driven, they're based on
your actually needing something.I'm quite aware that we are not
the most sexiest from brand and provider.
It's not like people are coming to our website just to have good
time. You because your washing machine
broke, because you need a new phone, because you're interested
(04:01):
in the new game. You have a need and we need to
fulfil it. So we already working with our
team, how can we fulfil the needs of virtual assistants?
So we're already thinking how can we enhance the product page
so that it's also a readable by virtual assistants as normal
person. And that's why I say Alex, like
it's like when search became a really a thing and people were
(04:25):
like, Oh no, the Google crawlersare coming in and what are we
going to do that because we are not the destination people are
searching. This is exactly the same.
Again, you need to make sure that they find their relevant
information why you are the best.
We don't. It's my observation that you
know, when, when catalogues usedto exist, all that happened with
(04:46):
e-commerce was that those catalogues were digitised into
product pages. And some of these big platforms,
you know these, everyone knows the, the company I'm talking
about, they end up just becominga massive catalogue of product
with 0 human. And that's why people have been
when you're on a shopping mission, you're looking for
something chat makes so much sense, right, Because you just
(05:10):
described that element. Yes.
And when you, when you think about data and AI, you have a,
and I'm not going to say it in, in local language, but you,
maybe you can. But you have this wonderful
saying about human and machine working together.
Can you? Explain the machine We are
teaching all your podcast listeners from Norwegian.
(05:31):
Yeah. Tell me.
Tell me again. Say again.
Miniska. Miniska machine.
That's easy. Machine is machine OK.
And that and that's separate from human in the loop or is it
the same or is that what what you're talking about?
No, this is basically that you have to have both because
exactly the scenario that you are describing where we would
become a catalogue where there'sno feelings, emotions and
(05:53):
journey involved, that's not where we want to go.
That's why I say we have to cater for two customers.
We do need to make sure that if you actually want to go and see
and also be inspired and let's be honest here, when we talk
about especially technology and electronics, there's a lot of
things that people want to find out more about.
They want to be inspired. What is the best product for me?
(06:13):
How could it work? I need to have some guidance and
you have to just see how can youmake that journey also visually
and emotionally adaptable and something that you kind of be
like, oh, I'm intrigued as a person.
As well as the machines who are called and they just need the
data. And there's a fine balance
because we see now that the product pages really need to be
(06:35):
enhanced so that virtual assistants can find all the
information that they need also about the service, maybe about
returns, maybe about how overalljourneys that normally we would
not put at that stage of the customer journey.
So how to make that happen without overwhelming the
information flow on that page for normal reader.
(06:56):
So it's a it's a fine balance, but we see that the common
dominator is data, data quality and data structure.
So there's in the end, we are quite similar, right?
We need to have be relevant. I find it very unique as in like
you're one of the few people whotalk about that because from,
from what I do, I, I talk about retail at the speed of culture
(07:18):
and there's retail at the speed of there's culture and
relevance, but this new world ofretail at the speed of
intelligence. And I think people often get
wrong who the customer is and the fact that you've split it
into who am I serving? Am I serving an agent that just
wants script and, you know, product page detail?
(07:41):
Or am I serving human? And I think I don't know if
people have got there yet, to behonest.
I I don't know if they're able to separate the two, an agent
shopping mission versus a human shopping mission.
Yeah, because I think it's a lotof work, right?
You have to also understand how are they reading your pages,
what you need to technically prepare to be actually relevant
and being seen. So you have to kind of go
(08:03):
through again, this journey and giving your feeds to Ochachi PT
and the other players out there.They need to be able to
understand where you're coming from.
Why are you the one who would give the best solution?
And there again, it all goes down to the people because in
the end, the virtual assistant is looking for, OK, who has the
(08:23):
best price? That's hygiene.
You cannot even that is nothing anymore.
If you don't have the best price, you're out who the best
price? Who has the best product
reviews? What's the best service reviews?
And I think that is kind of alsothat you should not ignore when
you're looking into where you should focus your strength now,
because the racial assistance have put really high value in
terms of how you serve your customer.
(08:46):
And this is also in the physicalstore because you know, online
journey doesn't end when you press the buy button.
That's when you know the first part is done, then you have the
whole last mile. And if you deliver there, I can
tell you the virtual assistant will not want to get you reroute
other customers to that experience.
So it really, you know, it forces us to be good as Omni
(09:09):
channel player and with full supply chamber they have nothing
and nowhere to hide basically. You mentioned that the beginning
of the interview you oversee e-commerce across multiple
markets and I guess each of themwith different maturity levels,
different customer requirements.How do you build that sort of
(09:30):
unified shopping experience thatso depending on the maturity or
or the way that each market has come, I'm curious what tools or
how have you gone about addressing?
Yes, you know, actually we know this.
We are quite similar. So we have of course
differences, you know, Swedish people that like to talk a lot
and we in Finland, we don't liketo talk a lot at all.
(09:53):
But in the essence, we look moreinto not how we are different as
nations, but more how we are different as users of what kind
of needs we now have in that. So we are looking into more into
segments, right? Because you are always on a
shopping mission, you're either looking into something that you
(10:15):
want to be inspired potentially by or you have a crisis.
You need something now, right? And it's very important to have
the right signals. So we're always looking into
what our customers doing on our website.
And for that we have fantastic tool with Content Square where
we can actually see based on their behaviour, what is it that
(10:36):
drives our customers, What is it, what frustrates them, what
makes them bounce. And here again then I don't care
if it's, you know, you Alex or the me, Julie are shopping.
I just care about what is happening on the website,
behaviour overall, so we can improve experience for all our
four markets. And then at the same time, to be
(10:57):
more relevant, we are looking into data.
What is the differences because there are is for example in
payment preferences, how you communicate about for example,
the last mile options, how you communicate with product
reviews. There are some differences
between the markets, what peoplekind of find trustworthy and
that is something that we also then see also based on CCC data,
(11:20):
we are doing a lot of surveys aswell.
We are gathering a lot of data on the NPS feedback to find out
how we can then be also more relevant locally.
And that's why I'm very lucky tohave local teams in each market
who are closer to customer pulseand they can then use our tools
and make it more flavoured what is happening in their market.
(11:41):
Whilst we make sure from the Nordic side and the headquarters
that overall that they have the tools and they have the data to
make those decisions. Yeah, I agree.
I haven't sent you this question.
So it's I'm, I'm curious, just listening to you, how do you
feel then? How do you compare that to
physical in the sense of you have all of this data coming in,
(12:05):
Are you the signal? Are you the radar for your
stores? How do you translate that into,
into physical? I'm curious if you have thoughts
on that. Yeah, we have and of course we
have over 400 stores in the Nordics and we were very closely
with stores. We see it also in the last mile
customers really prefer collecting at store.
One thing is now to you know, maybe getting free fright, but
(12:27):
that is not really that the maindriver, Alex, actually the main
driver is convenience having also help and we have the best
stuff. Even though I speak from the
brand, it's really true. These guys are really an expert.
So people want to come and meet them and ask them extra cash
questions. So we see that of course for our
stores and there is a blind spotbecause you will not collect
(12:50):
that kind of data on that person.
But luckily, we have a very strong customer club and we have
over 8.9 million people who are in our customer club in our
market. So a very strong presence.
And that also helps us when customers are coming.
We have very good offers for them.
So then they identify also in the store.
(13:11):
So then we can also help enhancing that store experience.
But this area, Alex, is very difficult.
It's not really easy because youcannot really identify the
customer when they come in and how to actually be able to
stitch identities together so that you can provide a better
experience without adding hurdles like hey, can you scan
(13:33):
AQR code or can you log into? You don't want the customer
doesn't want to do that. They just came to complete the
purchase. So we are working very much on
to how can we make it more relevant for the customer to
also identify themselves in the store to get more help that is
needed at that moment. So there, but that takes time.
(13:54):
That is not really an easy pieceof the puzzle to solve.
Sure. OK.
One of the other things obviously I love quite a few
things you you say, but another thing I've seen you say is how
you focus in on community culture and celebration.
Yes. And I guess whether or not
they're soft elements or not, but how do you see that driving
(14:16):
hard commercial results? That's crucial because you know,
in the end it's all about peopleand people have to.
Retail is not for weak minded. Retail has become really tough.
The retail I think always has been tough, but I think it's
harder than ever than get any kind of margin from hardware or
your main products. People are pushed and we really
(14:40):
feel that. It's important that you build a
culture where people feel that. OK, I know what I'm contributing
to and how. So for me it's very important
every single team member they are doing, they're using
objectives and key results in myteam.
So it's very clear for people what is the company's strategy
and how we as an e-commerce teamare contributing to that
(15:01):
strategy through work yours and we are also making the
objectives and key results we are making together with my with
my E com manager. So it's not only me coming from
the top and saying now we're going to do this.
No, no, quite contrary. We, when we understand the
strategy, then we together make a plan.
How do we actually answer to it?And when people understand,
because we go to individual levels, every single team member
(15:24):
knows how are they contributing to the full picture.
And I can tell you, Alex, that is extremely motivating because
people want to bring value and people want to see.
So first when you have a target,then you have to measure it.
So then we are measuring every single target is very
measurable. So you can really see, am I
doing the right things, are we doing the right things?
(15:45):
How well should that improve andhow am I contributing to overall
success? So you know that you matter and
your work matters. And then we'll be have those
fantastic results. For example, in Black Friday is
coming up soon. We celebrate, yes, and then we
have some beers and that's pretty nice.
(16:06):
I don't know if you get relaxed.To be fair, it feels like this
must be the most stressful time of the year.
No, but you know, I tell you I love peak.
We call this whole period in black weeks.
I I absolutely love it. It's adrenaline rush, it's
stress, but it's positive stressbecause it kind of showcase all
the hard work, the whole team, the grind and like the grind we
(16:28):
have put together during the year, it finally pays off.
We can see have all the efforts,all the tests, all the
improvements that we have done to decide have they paid off,
are they actually working? So it's a stress test not only
for the systems but for people. And it's very important that on
the Black Friday night when it'sa 000 on the clock and Black
(16:50):
Friday is over, we do celebrate.There will be some bad songs and
warm beer, but there will be a celebration.
I'm surprised it's warm beer given the temperature locally,
but anyway. Locally, you know it's.
Yeah, I love a lot of things that you say really resonate
because as I've sort of travelled the world this year
(17:14):
listening to different digital experts or e-commerce experts
speak, sometimes they miss some of the big blocks that you're
talking about. I'm just curious, as someone who
does do a lot of public speaking, you yourself are on
that sort of circuit of thought leadership.
What's the one question that people ask you that I've not
asked you? I think how one manages to
(17:36):
balance it all. Basically, how do you make sure
that the you know, because now it's tough to be a leader and
you have to make constant choices on how do you make sure
that you both are, you know, there with the team.
How you are actually making surethat you see everyone lead
people from different generations and bring them
(17:59):
together as a team, especially in tough times.
And I think that is extremely important for people to know
that the leadership is tough. Will you sign up for this is not
for everyone. Again, like retail leadership
also it's a choice and it's a job.
And for me it's important to be a coach leader.
So I'm very much focusing on thecollaborative collaboration
(18:21):
between IT and the business, bringing in business together,
being quite operational myself. So which is a.
Long time job in itself. Yes, but you know, it's like
because you bring people together, you need to know about
the operation because you have to then make the decisions as
assertive leader. In the end, someone has to make
a decision and you cannot make adecision if you're not on top of
your things. For me, it's very important not
(18:43):
to micromanage, but be that the support person that I can
actually bring something to the table.
So my role isn't to just report upwards what is going on.
For me, very important that my team knows that I can help them
to do their job even better and be that supporter, that door
opener and also politically the one who also closes certain
(19:05):
discussions and protects them. I'll send you a copy of my CV if
there's any room for an ex digital guy.
Final question, final question. And I want to, I want to give
you sort of the, so if we think about you don't work for the
company that you currently work,but I'm just want to tap into
(19:25):
your vision of the future, right?
And and not, and I don't want five years out because, you
know, who knows where we'll be in five years.
But where do you see the next two to three years in the sense
of what the world in, in what would the digital landscape look
like in the next two to three years?
And again, whether or not you want to answer that locally, you
(19:47):
know, in terms of what you see within the region or as a global
theme, what whatever you feel, whatever however you want to
answer. No, I think we will have to just
really redefine these two customer journeys because you
will have customers will understand that the convenience
because convenience in the end is everything.
So if they under see that OK Co pilot and the different apps,
(20:09):
different virtual assistants that will actually come and be
able to based on data give more than.
One solution, because normally you know, if you have a problem,
you want to maybe buy a new washing machine, not just buying
washing machine, how does it fitto interior?
Maybe you need to do it, maybe want to rethink the whole
bathroom. It's like having that dialogue
(20:30):
and obviously tapping into that dialogue then gives us an
opportunity to be able to be more relevant.
So I think the future looks likethis.
The ones who have not structuredthe data haven't fixed where we
don't have understanding of their products, who don't
understand their service, who don't have the relevant
information on their website that is appealing customer.
(20:55):
They will lose. And I think you know, I love how
people come and they talk about a lot of fancy things about the
technology AI revolution, how weare going to be all you know,
everything is going to be personalised, everything is
going to be smooth and you just you probably don't even need to
log into anywhere. You just smoothly just buy
everything and then you know, stuff will just appear at your
(21:18):
door. When you think about it, to
actually get there, even close to there, you have to fix your
data. And that is a tough job.
And you know, fixing product data especially, that's nothing.
Not many are like, hey, volunteering.
So I think the more analysis, the more insight you can get on
your customer, the better for the future, the more you
(21:41):
understand why customers should choose you, be good on the
things that you actually promised to the customers.
Like I say, sometimes people canhave a conflict.
They think that if custom, if you are driving business value,
there's some kind of conflict with customer value.
I could not disagree more. If you drive customer value and
(22:01):
you listen to the customers, like for example for us, we take
NPS feedback and we are actuallyprioritising our backlog based
on what are the issues that customers are actually having.
Do you think that will work on conversion?
Of course, the example we had last year when we changed our
whole front end, we saw we had 21,000 feedbacks coming every
(22:25):
week and we with a eyes help, see here Mendisca machine with a
eyes help, we actually managed to understand what are the
biggest pain points and they were in checkout.
So what we did when, you know, when we changed platform, we
didn't change things that peoplealready liked.
Why students so stupid? No, we took things that were
good and we really changed the checkout based on the feedback
(22:46):
we got and we saw immediately first week 6% more checkout
completion. So then again, you have to have
the tools in place to be able tomeasure the success, understand
the KP is you have understand how success looks like for you
and listen to the customer. And you know, online, they're
talking to us all the time, Alex, they're clicking, they're
bouncing. You just need to listen.
(23:07):
And how we listen is with data. I think the future will be that
we will be more, you need to be more data literate.
So we're going to have the data literacy as a as a school topic
that everyone has to understand.What is data telling you?
And we will be working more withvirtual assistants.
We will, but it will still in the end be based on how well you
(23:30):
know yourself, your products, your customer.
Yeah, no, love it. I think that's I have lots more
questions, but I'm going to, I'mgoing to, I'm going to stop it
there because otherwise you'll never get to to go and see your
family because I'll be asking you more and more questions.
Julia, thank you so much for giving up the time to come and
talk to us. And I look forward to hopefully
seeing you on stage. You're one of the many
(23:51):
conferences around the world. Thank you, Alex, it has been a
pleasure. Thank you.
Hello and welcome back to another fantastic episode of The
Retail Podcast. And this week we're going into
the wonderful world of Actually.To be fair, rather than spoil
it, I always love the guests that talk about what they did
because I'll do a hash job of describing what you do, Julie.
I've read about what you do, whoyou do it for, and I think once
(00:20):
you start talking, everyone willrecognise the brand and
obviously you have a pivotal role in helping that brand grow
across the region. So, Julia, welcome to the show.
Yes. So I think El Shep, if I say El
(00:44):
Shep, that will probably not saytoo much to your podcast
listeners, but you will probablyknow our owner's curries.
So we are basically curries, butbased in the Nordics.
So we are the Vikings of the curries based in Norway, Sweden,
Denmark and Finland, selling thebest electronics to our nation.
(01:05):
So we have the company with the biggest market share and I'm
director of e-commerce, so I'm trying to keep it there.
That's fantastic. This is Curiosity.
There's medium art Saturn come into your region.
You know, they tried Alex, but we actually pushed them away.
They were in Sweden for eight years.
They tried to kick us out, but El Giganten, they just pushed
(01:28):
too hard. So Media Mart had to leave the
market. All right.
Well, OK, interesting. Because they've just been
acquired or gone into a partnership with jd.com.
Anyway, we're not going to talk about them.
OK, not spend time on that but. Yeah, I've noticed.
I've, I've been reading about your profile.
I've been reading about some of the things that you've said.
(01:49):
And one of the things that I read about it, you said that
Norway is about to undergo its biggest e-commerce revolution
since the dawn of the Internet, but the you're not worried of
that because of your people. So what I'm really curious about
what are the specific, if you like, mindsets, qualities that
you feel that you have from a people perspective, Like if we
(02:11):
start with the people and then we can sort of take it from
there. But yeah, I'm curious on your
opinion. Yes, not because you know, AI is
everywhere. I don't think you can go to any
discussion about technology or what is going around in
e-commerce without being scared by virtual assistants taking
over our websites, becoming obsolete and of course AI taking
also our jobs period. But when you look into this in
(02:35):
more detail, the AI assistant, they will also need to shop
somewhere, they need to find theinformation somewhere.
So you have to have that catalogue of product and
understand even more about who is the best, provide the service
for the end customer. Because also virtual assistant,
they have the end customer best interest in mind.
(02:55):
Otherwise, they have failed in their mission.
So when you have the people likeI have, luckily in my team who
are really both, you know, experts in the customer journey,
very passionate about data, always curious, never satisfied,
always curious, never satisfied.And who really want to make sure
(03:16):
that now we can cater also for these new virtual assistants,
which is basically a new type ofcustomer.
So how the team is, we will havein the future, we'll have two
types of customers. It will be Alex, the real
person, Alex with a pulse and itwill be your virtual assistant
who is sometimes helping you to make things work together.
And we need to cater for both ofyour needs.
(03:38):
And those needs are in the bottom line.
They're similar, they're data-driven, they're based on
your actually needing something.I'm quite aware that we are not
the most sexiest from brand and provider.
It's not like people are coming to our website just to have good
time. You because your washing machine
broke, because you need a new phone, because you're interested
(04:01):
in the new game. You have a need and we need to
fulfil it. So we already working with our
team, how can we fulfil the needs of virtual assistants?
So we're already thinking how can we enhance the product page
so that it's also a readable by virtual assistants as normal
person. And that's why I say Alex, like
it's like when search became a really a thing and people were
(04:25):
like, Oh no, the Google crawlersare coming in and what are we
going to do that because we are not the destination people are
searching. This is exactly the same.
Again, you need to make sure that they find their relevant
information why you are the best.
We don't. It's my observation that you
know, when, when catalogues usedto exist, all that happened with
(04:46):
e-commerce was that those catalogues were digitised into
product pages. And some of these big platforms,
you know these, everyone knows the, the company I'm talking
about, they end up just becominga massive catalogue of product
with 0 human. And that's why people have been
when you're on a shopping mission, you're looking for
something chat makes so much sense, right, Because you just
(05:10):
described that element. Yes.
And when you, when you think about data and AI, you have a,
and I'm not going to say it in, in local language, but you,
maybe you can. But you have this wonderful
saying about human and machine working together.
Can you? Explain the machine We are
teaching all your podcast listeners from Norwegian.
(05:31):
Yeah. Tell me.
Tell me again. Say again.
Miniska. Miniska machine.
That's easy. Machine is machine OK.
And that and that's separate from human in the loop or is it
the same or is that what what you're talking about?
No, this is basically that you have to have both because
exactly the scenario that you are describing where we would
become a catalogue where there'sno feelings, emotions and
(05:53):
journey involved, that's not where we want to go.
That's why I say we have to cater for two customers.
We do need to make sure that if you actually want to go and see
and also be inspired and let's be honest here, when we talk
about especially technology and electronics, there's a lot of
things that people want to find out more about.
They want to be inspired. What is the best product for me?
(06:13):
How could it work? I need to have some guidance and
you have to just see how can youmake that journey also visually
and emotionally adaptable and something that you kind of be
like, oh, I'm intrigued as a person.
As well as the machines who are called and they just need the
data. And there's a fine balance
because we see now that the product pages really need to be
(06:35):
enhanced so that virtual assistants can find all the
information that they need also about the service, maybe about
returns, maybe about how overalljourneys that normally we would
not put at that stage of the customer journey.
So how to make that happen without overwhelming the
information flow on that page for normal reader.
(06:56):
So it's a it's a fine balance, but we see that the common
dominator is data, data quality and data structure.
So there's in the end, we are quite similar, right?
We need to have be relevant. I find it very unique as in like
you're one of the few people whotalk about that because from,
from what I do, I, I talk about retail at the speed of culture
(07:18):
and there's retail at the speed of there's culture and
relevance, but this new world ofretail at the speed of
intelligence. And I think people often get
wrong who the customer is and the fact that you've split it
into who am I serving? Am I serving an agent that just
wants script and, you know, product page detail?
(07:41):
Or am I serving human? And I think I don't know if
people have got there yet, to behonest.
I I don't know if they're able to separate the two, an agent
shopping mission versus a human shopping mission.
Yeah, because I think it's a lotof work, right?
You have to also understand how are they reading your pages,
what you need to technically prepare to be actually relevant
and being seen. So you have to kind of go
(08:03):
through again, this journey and giving your feeds to Ochachi PT
and the other players out there.They need to be able to
understand where you're coming from.
Why are you the one who would give the best solution?
And there again, it all goes down to the people because in
the end, the virtual assistant is looking for, OK, who has the
(08:23):
best price? That's hygiene.
You cannot even that is nothing anymore.
If you don't have the best price, you're out who the best
price? Who has the best product
reviews? What's the best service reviews?
And I think that is kind of alsothat you should not ignore when
you're looking into where you should focus your strength now,
because the racial assistance have put really high value in
terms of how you serve your customer.
(08:46):
And this is also in the physicalstore because you know, online
journey doesn't end when you press the buy button.
That's when you know the first part is done, then you have the
whole last mile. And if you deliver there, I can
tell you the virtual assistant will not want to get you reroute
other customers to that experience.
So it really, you know, it forces us to be good as Omni
(09:09):
channel player and with full supply chamber they have nothing
and nowhere to hide basically. You mentioned that the beginning
of the interview you oversee e-commerce across multiple
markets and I guess each of themwith different maturity levels,
different customer requirements.How do you build that sort of
(09:30):
unified shopping experience thatso depending on the maturity or
or the way that each market has come, I'm curious what tools or
how have you gone about addressing?
Yes, you know, actually we know this.
We are quite similar. So we have of course
differences, you know, Swedish people that like to talk a lot
and we in Finland, we don't liketo talk a lot at all.
(09:53):
But in the essence, we look moreinto not how we are different as
nations, but more how we are different as users of what kind
of needs we now have in that. So we are looking into more into
segments, right? Because you are always on a
shopping mission, you're either looking into something that you
(10:15):
want to be inspired potentially by or you have a crisis.
You need something now, right? And it's very important to have
the right signals. So we're always looking into
what our customers doing on our website.
And for that we have fantastic tool with Content Square where
we can actually see based on their behaviour, what is it that
(10:36):
drives our customers, What is it, what frustrates them, what
makes them bounce. And here again then I don't care
if it's, you know, you Alex or the me, Julie are shopping.
I just care about what is happening on the website,
behaviour overall, so we can improve experience for all our
four markets. And then at the same time, to be
(10:57):
more relevant, we are looking into data.
What is the differences because there are is for example in
payment preferences, how you communicate about for example,
the last mile options, how you communicate with product
reviews. There are some differences
between the markets, what peoplekind of find trustworthy and
that is something that we also then see also based on CCC data,
(11:20):
we are doing a lot of surveys aswell.
We are gathering a lot of data on the NPS feedback to find out
how we can then be also more relevant locally.
And that's why I'm very lucky tohave local teams in each market
who are closer to customer pulseand they can then use our tools
and make it more flavoured what is happening in their market.
(11:41):
Whilst we make sure from the Nordic side and the headquarters
that overall that they have the tools and they have the data to
make those decisions. Yeah, I agree.
I haven't sent you this question.
So it's I'm, I'm curious, just listening to you, how do you
feel then? How do you compare that to
physical in the sense of you have all of this data coming in,
(12:05):
Are you the signal? Are you the radar for your
stores? How do you translate that into,
into physical? I'm curious if you have thoughts
on that. Yeah, we have and of course we
have over 400 stores in the Nordics and we were very closely
with stores. We see it also in the last mile
customers really prefer collecting at store.
One thing is now to you know, maybe getting free fright, but
(12:27):
that is not really that the maindriver, Alex, actually the main
driver is convenience having also help and we have the best
stuff. Even though I speak from the
brand, it's really true. These guys are really an expert.
So people want to come and meet them and ask them extra cash
questions. So we see that of course for our
stores and there is a blind spotbecause you will not collect
(12:50):
that kind of data on that person.
But luckily, we have a very strong customer club and we have
over 8.9 million people who are in our customer club in our
market. So a very strong presence.
And that also helps us when customers are coming.
We have very good offers for them.
So then they identify also in the store.
(13:11):
So then we can also help enhancing that store experience.
But this area, Alex, is very difficult.
It's not really easy because youcannot really identify the
customer when they come in and how to actually be able to
stitch identities together so that you can provide a better
experience without adding hurdles like hey, can you scan
(13:33):
AQR code or can you log into? You don't want the customer
doesn't want to do that. They just came to complete the
purchase. So we are working very much on
to how can we make it more relevant for the customer to
also identify themselves in the store to get more help that is
needed at that moment. So there, but that takes time.
(13:54):
That is not really an easy pieceof the puzzle to solve.
Sure. OK.
One of the other things obviously I love quite a few
things you you say, but another thing I've seen you say is how
you focus in on community culture and celebration.
Yes. And I guess whether or not
they're soft elements or not, but how do you see that driving
(14:16):
hard commercial results? That's crucial because you know,
in the end it's all about peopleand people have to.
Retail is not for weak minded. Retail has become really tough.
The retail I think always has been tough, but I think it's
harder than ever than get any kind of margin from hardware or
your main products. People are pushed and we really
(14:40):
feel that. It's important that you build a
culture where people feel that. OK, I know what I'm contributing
to and how. So for me it's very important
every single team member they are doing, they're using
objectives and key results in myteam.
So it's very clear for people what is the company's strategy
and how we as an e-commerce teamare contributing to that
(15:01):
strategy through work yours and we are also making the
objectives and key results we are making together with my with
my E com manager. So it's not only me coming from
the top and saying now we're going to do this.
No, no, quite contrary. We, when we understand the
strategy, then we together make a plan.
How do we actually answer to it?And when people understand,
because we go to individual levels, every single team member
(15:24):
knows how are they contributing to the full picture.
And I can tell you, Alex, that is extremely motivating because
people want to bring value and people want to see.
So first when you have a target,then you have to measure it.
So then we are measuring every single target is very
measurable. So you can really see, am I
doing the right things, are we doing the right things?
(15:45):
How well should that improve andhow am I contributing to overall
success? So you know that you matter and
your work matters. And then we'll be have those
fantastic results. For example, in Black Friday is
coming up soon. We celebrate, yes, and then we
have some beers and that's pretty nice.
(16:06):
I don't know if you get relaxed.To be fair, it feels like this
must be the most stressful time of the year.
No, but you know, I tell you I love peak.
We call this whole period in black weeks.
I I absolutely love it. It's adrenaline rush, it's
stress, but it's positive stressbecause it kind of showcase all
the hard work, the whole team, the grind and like the grind we
(16:28):
have put together during the year, it finally pays off.
We can see have all the efforts,all the tests, all the
improvements that we have done to decide have they paid off,
are they actually working? So it's a stress test not only
for the systems but for people. And it's very important that on
the Black Friday night when it'sa 000 on the clock and Black
(16:50):
Friday is over, we do celebrate.There will be some bad songs and
warm beer, but there will be a celebration.
I'm surprised it's warm beer given the temperature locally,
but anyway. Locally, you know it's.
Yeah, I love a lot of things that you say really resonate
because as I've sort of travelled the world this year
(17:14):
listening to different digital experts or e-commerce experts
speak, sometimes they miss some of the big blocks that you're
talking about. I'm just curious, as someone who
does do a lot of public speaking, you yourself are on
that sort of circuit of thought leadership.
What's the one question that people ask you that I've not
asked you? I think how one manages to
(17:36):
balance it all. Basically, how do you make sure
that the you know, because now it's tough to be a leader and
you have to make constant choices on how do you make sure
that you both are, you know, there with the team.
How you are actually making surethat you see everyone lead
people from different generations and bring them
(17:59):
together as a team, especially in tough times.
And I think that is extremely important for people to know
that the leadership is tough. Will you sign up for this is not
for everyone. Again, like retail leadership
also it's a choice and it's a job.
And for me it's important to be a coach leader.
So I'm very much focusing on thecollaborative collaboration
(18:21):
between IT and the business, bringing in business together,
being quite operational myself. So which is a.
Long time job in itself. Yes, but you know, it's like
because you bring people together, you need to know about
the operation because you have to then make the decisions as
assertive leader. In the end, someone has to make
a decision and you cannot make adecision if you're not on top of
your things. For me, it's very important not
(18:43):
to micromanage, but be that the support person that I can
actually bring something to the table.
So my role isn't to just report upwards what is going on.
For me, very important that my team knows that I can help them
to do their job even better and be that supporter, that door
opener and also politically the one who also closes certain
(19:05):
discussions and protects them. I'll send you a copy of my CV if
there's any room for an ex digital guy.
Final question, final question. And I want to, I want to give
you sort of the, so if we think about you don't work for the
company that you currently work,but I'm just want to tap into
(19:25):
your vision of the future, right?
And and not, and I don't want five years out because, you
know, who knows where we'll be in five years.
But where do you see the next two to three years in the sense
of what the world in, in what would the digital landscape look
like in the next two to three years?
And again, whether or not you want to answer that locally, you
(19:47):
know, in terms of what you see within the region or as a global
theme, what whatever you feel, whatever however you want to
answer. No, I think we will have to just
really redefine these two customer journeys because you
will have customers will understand that the convenience
because convenience in the end is everything.
So if they under see that OK Co pilot and the different apps,
(20:09):
different virtual assistants that will actually come and be
able to based on data give more than.
One solution, because normally you know, if you have a problem,
you want to maybe buy a new washing machine, not just buying
washing machine, how does it fitto interior?
Maybe you need to do it, maybe want to rethink the whole
bathroom. It's like having that dialogue
(20:30):
and obviously tapping into that dialogue then gives us an
opportunity to be able to be more relevant.
So I think the future looks likethis.
The ones who have not structuredthe data haven't fixed where we
don't have understanding of their products, who don't
understand their service, who don't have the relevant
information on their website that is appealing customer.
(20:55):
They will lose. And I think you know, I love how
people come and they talk about a lot of fancy things about the
technology AI revolution, how weare going to be all you know,
everything is going to be personalised, everything is
going to be smooth and you just you probably don't even need to
log into anywhere. You just smoothly just buy
everything and then you know, stuff will just appear at your
(21:18):
door. When you think about it, to
actually get there, even close to there, you have to fix your
data. And that is a tough job.
And you know, fixing product data especially, that's nothing.
Not many are like, hey, volunteering.
So I think the more analysis, the more insight you can get on
your customer, the better for the future, the more you
(21:41):
understand why customers should choose you, be good on the
things that you actually promised to the customers.
Like I say, sometimes people canhave a conflict.
They think that if custom, if you are driving business value,
there's some kind of conflict with customer value.
I could not disagree more. If you drive customer value and
(22:01):
you listen to the customers, like for example for us, we take
NPS feedback and we are actuallyprioritising our backlog based
on what are the issues that customers are actually having.
Do you think that will work on conversion?
Of course, the example we had last year when we changed our
whole front end, we saw we had 21,000 feedbacks coming every
(22:25):
week and we with a eyes help, see here Mendisca machine with a
eyes help, we actually managed to understand what are the
biggest pain points and they were in checkout.
So what we did when, you know, when we changed platform, we
didn't change things that peoplealready liked.
Why students so stupid? No, we took things that were
good and we really changed the checkout based on the feedback
(22:46):
we got and we saw immediately first week 6% more checkout
completion. So then again, you have to have
the tools in place to be able tomeasure the success, understand
the KP is you have understand how success looks like for you
and listen to the customer. And you know, online, they're
talking to us all the time, Alex, they're clicking, they're
bouncing. You just need to listen.
(23:07):
And how we listen is with data. I think the future will be that
we will be more, you need to be more data literate.
So we're going to have the data literacy as a as a school topic
that everyone has to understand.What is data telling you?
And we will be working more withvirtual assistants.
We will, but it will still in the end be based on how well you
(23:30):
know yourself, your products, your customer.
Yeah, no, love it. I think that's I have lots more
questions, but I'm going to, I'mgoing to, I'm going to stop it
there because otherwise you'll never get to to go and see your
family because I'll be asking you more and more questions.
Julia, thank you so much for giving up the time to come and
talk to us. And I look forward to hopefully
seeing you on stage. You're one of the many
(23:51):
conferences around the world. Thank you, Alex, it has been a
pleasure. Thank you.
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