Left to Right, Jason Holland - CBO Firework, Antonio Gagliardi - SVP Amex, Kevin Miller - CMO Fresh Market
You might be reading this story on your phone right now. You might do just about everything on your phone: conversation, work, entertainment, news and shopping, among other things. And every business owner wants to grab your attention while you are there. A new player is entering the chat: video commerce.
Video commerce is one of the “Big Ideas” featured on stage at the 2023 National Retail Federation Big Show Conference in New York. Antonio Gagliardi, Senior Vice President of Acquiring Partners, Product & Strategy for Merchant Services at American Express, was a host of a panel on the topic.
When American Express merchants look to evolve their relationship with consumers by exploring innovative solutions, the company can introduce them to resources like Firework, a leading video commerce solution, that can help.
Gagliardi says video commerce is transforming the shopping experience in real-time. “Imagine yourself looking at videos about a recipe. Right from there, you can click on the video and buy all the ingredients to make that dish at once. That’s the link between the video and the e-commerce purchase.”
To show it’s changing the game for retailers of all sizes, American Express brings key partners and industry experts to the table at this year’s NRF Big Show, including Firework and The Fresh Market, a boutique specialty grocery store.
The Fresh Market teamed up with Firework to bring next-generation customer experiences to their platform. Within the first year of their partnership, Firework reports The Fresh Market saw double-digit growth across different performance pillars.
The secret sauce, says Gagliardi, is that while video commerce is a relatively new trend, merchants connecting with consumers on a more personal level is an age-old success tactic. Combining the technology with a genuine understanding of customers’ needs is a pathway for merchants to reach new levels of authenticity – and they can do it on demand. He thinks this is a formula that can work for companies of all sizes, and Amex’s referral partnership with Firework helps make this more accessible to Amex’s merchants.
“When we think about American Express cards and the idea of membership, everybody gets it, right? You get points, you get perks, you get all these things. But as a merchant, what can we bring to the table that’s more than just letting you accept the card? This work with Firework to provide our merchants with the tools they need to create video commerce is one of those great examples of a partnership,” says Gagliardi.
The Big Ideas session was Sunday, January 15, 2023, at the Javits Center. For more information on the NRF conference, click here.