Brad_strothkamp [Posted by Brad Strothkamp}

There is a great article in the Las Vegas Journal based on a speech by Macy's CEO, Terry Lundgren, at this year's Shop.org retail conference.

The gist of the speech is that he went from non-believer to a believer in the power of eBusiness as their online sales went from $30,000 in 1996 to over $1 billion today.

Everybody involved with eBusiness in financial services should read this article as it speaks to many of the questions financial service execs have about eBusiness including:

  • Understanding a changing customer – "It's clear to me the customer has evolved and changed the way they shop and we have to change with them. There's no going back,"
  • Online influenced sales– :"Every dollar spent online influences $5.77 spent in the store over the next 10 days"
  • Role of ratings and reviews – "We were worried about what customers would say on product reviews. We realized that if you start getting bad reviews on a product, get rid of that product. Stop doing business with that particular product."
  • Channel conflict– "He never worried about someone shopping online and not going into a store. What he did worry about was people shopping online with another company."

I fully hope and expect the CEO of a major financial institution to be giving this type of speech four years from now.

Brad