دیدگاه توسعه فناوری و کشش تقاضا در نوآوری های فناوری محور در مراکز فروش: ارزیابی خرده فروشان

Despite the consumers' increasing demand of technology-based innovations for making stores more appealing and the huge availability of advanced technologies, there is still a lack of research on the retailers' and employees' points of views towards the introduction of these systems. In fact, an efficient innovation should take care of both the final users/consumers' and the retailers/employees' needs and expectations. Hence, the aim of this study is to advance our knowledge on retailers' pull of new technologies for improving their job in accordance with the most recent systems, as well as on the main characteristics of these innovations for defining a new integrative framework of analysis and development.

The innovation issue is acquiring importance also for marketing science studies, by providing new practices and standards for developing new tools able to (i) increase consumers' experience, (ii) reply to environmental changes in market trends fast, (iii) develop new strategies for increasing market share, and (iv) exploit successfully the extant resources (Hauser et al., 2006 and Pantano and Viassone, 2012). In particular, the current advances in technologies are able to enhance both consumers' shopping activity and retailers' job (Pantano and Di Pietro, 2012 and Zhu et al., 2013). For instance, new interactive systems (such as touch screen displays) are able to provide more customized information on available products, as well as applications for clients' mobile devices that can support consumers in product searching inside the stores. Similarly, other mobile applications may provide automatic payment modalities for allowing consumers to save time and reducing the lines at the cash desks. Hence, the huge availability of advanced technologies that could be introduced in points of sale and consumers' interests towards new systems which are able to support and enhance shopping experience (Chiu et al., 2010 and Oh et al., 2012) forces retail-oriented firms to innovate for maintaining and increasing the business profitability. For this reason, understanding what consumers and retailers expect acquires importance for the successful adoption and diffusion of innovations. Despite the large number of technologies for points of sale and the potential benefits emerging from the introduction of these advanced systems, still only a limited number of retailers adopted them with different strategies (Pantano and Viassone, 2012). A justification might rely on the uncertainty, risks, huge monetary investments and late returns on investment involved in the innovation process, with consequences for technology failure (Evans, 2011, Alkemade and Suurs, 2012 and Pantano et al., 2013), which could discourage retailers to afford the technology-based innovations adoption process. For instance, uncertainty for retailers would be related to the consumers' acceptance of the technology, and the level of system usage, as well as the risk of obsolescence (in terms of obsolescence of components, threats of substitution with newer technology, and damages by users; Pantano and Di Pietro, 2012, Pantano et al., 2013 and Zhu et al., 2013). Hence, the diffusion and utilization may be affected by several externalities able to reduce the exploitation of all benefits of the innovation. Retailers are only adopters of the technology, that has been developed by other R&D firms; thus their decision concerns only the introduction/adoption and according to a certain strategy. Although past studies identified consumers' needs as the driver of product innovation (Von Hippel and Katz, 2002 and Bonner, 2010), while identifying what consumers expect to find in the stores concerning new technologies for supporting their experience and helping retailers to identify the best innovation, there is still a lack of research on what retailers expect and need from a new technology, with emphasis on the extent to which the new technology could improve the quality of employees' job and to the extent to whichthey should use it for the business profitability. Past studies considered the research question related to the influence of demand in generating innovation in addition to selecting it (Di Stefano et al., 2012). To achieve this task, efficient measurements of retailers' needs are required for understanding the retail innovation process and how technology providers can capitalize the innovation development. The aim of this paper is to advance our knowledge on the demand of technology-based innovations for stores based on the retailers' perspective, and on how these ones start from the firm's internal characteristics. To achieve this goal, the study focuses on a qualitative investigation involving 47 small-size retail-oriented firms, based on a content analysis. The first part of the paper is devoted to the definition of expectations and to the role of these ones on the technology-based innovation adoption process, whereas the second one investigates retailers' perspective in terms of needs and expectation through a qualitative analysis by highlighting the main consequences for the innovating process in retailing in order to define a new integrative framework of analysis and development.

Integrating ideas from innovation management, technology management, and marketing research, this explorative research shows how the diffusion of technology-based innovations is influenced by retailers' expectations and their propensity to invest, providing useful results on retailers' perspective that could integrate the current studies mainly focusing on consumers' point of view. Although from our analysis the role of a retailer aware of the importance of technology-based innovations for making stores more appealing and for attracting new customers emerges, the retailers' scarce preparedness in putting this in practice characterizes the current innovation strategies in the retail domain. Furthermore, the scarce correspondence between the motivations driving retailers to adopt these technologies and customers' expectations emphasized by the results of this paper confirms the difficulty in deeply understanding customers' expectation and in developing services able to fit these expectations. Thus, the current usage of advanced technologies in points of sale does not totally satisfy consumers' expectations, as anticipated by Pantano and Viassone (2012). Many innovations fail to diffuse through the market without retailers' strong preparedness and the support of critical players in their adoption, such as end-users, who would show positive attitude towards innovations (Chiu et al., 2010, Oh et al., 2012 and Pantano and Di Pietro, 2012). In fact, customers could be reluctant to use certain technologies if information about them is not readily and widely accessible. Thus, consumers are reluctant to adopt those innovations that lack support from retailers and other consumers. On the other hand, retailers do not invest in supporting the innovation until it has sufficiently diffused and been adopted. Hence, technology-based innovations need the support of an adoption network for enhancing their diffusion and meeting consumers' needs. For this reason, government should support their implementation through incentives, especially in a period that asks for a recovery of consumers. Starting from these results, it is possible to draw paths of action both for the potential retailers interested in adopting new technologies in their points of sale and for those who have already adopted them. First of all, retailers who have to decide whether to apply these technologies should spend time on advancing their knowledge on consumers' preferences and their attitude towards a certain typology of innovation, as well as possible advantages emerging from the subsequent technology adoption, whereas retailers who already adopted these technologies should make their clients be aware of the emerging benefits, according to their expectations. For instance, the communications might focus on time saving, by pushing on the most influencing motivational factors for consumers; at the same time the communication might stress all functionalities and characteristics of the innovations in order to attract housewives and children/families who might spend more time inside the store. A correct application and communication of the technology-based innovations can further elicit an increase in sales (due to the higher information provided that can affect purchase decisions), customer's satisfaction and loyalty (these technologies can improve personalization, thus allowing meeting consumers' needs effectively) and add value to physical products and in-store experience for clients. The future diffusion of technology among retailers will dramatically change the concept of the point of sale. This does not mean that the traditional point of sale will disappear. Almost certainly, traditional terminals of points of sale will remain dominant with many retailers, but new technologies and especially mobile points of sale will grow to complement the traditional terminals in specific segments. They will be able to address peculiar needs to generate new customer experience and further value for retailers, by offering a more integrated store solution. Although this work offers important issues and enriches existent literature, there are some limitations which should be taken into account. In fact, our research is an exploratory study mostly based on a limited size sample and our model finds application only in Northern Italy. It is possible to further develop this research by analyzing, on a wider sample, the real motivations that prevent retailers from adopting new technologies and by investigating how they have communicated with customers in successful case studies, in order to predict the innovations diffusion for retailer-based firms and the new store concept emerging by the adoption of advanced technologies.