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The old adage that "If you fail to PLAN, you're planning to fail" has never been truer than in today's competitive marketplace. Today's gourmet retailer needs all the planning tools he/she can lay their hands on to maximize the big fourth-quarter business. I've got three "hot" bits of planning data to clue you in on:
1. Super Crunchers by Ian Ayres.
2. www.shop.org/soro07, the Web site where you can purchase "The State of Retailing 2007" compiled by Forrester Research for shop.org, the national retail federation.
3. www.forrester.com for forward-thinking advice based on expert research.
Super Cruncher is a new book by Ian Ayres, an econometrician and law professor at Yale. His idea in a nutshell is that intuition (you entrepreneurs all have good intuition) is losing ground to data mining. I suspect most of you have run your businesses successfully using your intuition for many years. Why change now? Well, a lot of entrepreneurs have limited resources and that's why they started wearing lots of hats to run their business. They've covered sales counts and they've dabbled with focus groups but that was costly and was a cumbersome way to assess the tastes of their customers.

Ayres' new book claims that the replacement of expertise and intuition by objective, data-based decision-making is now made possible by a virtually inexhaustible supply of inexpensive information.

If you Google phrases like "data mining," you'll be amazed at all the information you come up with. How about the phrase "retail sales data mining?" Choose your own phrases depending on what information you would like to have to plan your fourth-quarter strategy to entice your customers to buy more.

Amazon.com's computers know what we like even before we figure it out for ourselves. Netflix customers like movies that the service recommends better than the ones they choose on their own. Baseball managers increasingly judge prospects by quantifiable statistics, not their "drive" or "hustle."

No one wants to throw away a lifetime of specialized training and experience, but after you read Super Crunchers, I'll bet you'll benefit from some of the powerful new tools that can help you create a better plan.

I've surveyed lots of independent retailers and here are their top priorities for the fourth quarter:
1. Fixing Web site design.
2. Correcting performance issues.
3. Improving the efficiency of online marketing.
4. Enhancing cross-channel integration.

Focus on the Basics of Your Web Site
1. Improve the content presented.
2. Add alternative images.
3. Incorporate lifestyle photography.
4. Integrate customer ratings and reviews.
5. Focus on your home page.
6. Integrate top sellers and "what's new" sections.
7. Make your Web site more sophisticated with dropdown menus and rollover lists in navigation areas.
8. Make customer service a priority.
9. Enhance your checkout process.
10. Consider a live chat room.

Where Should Your Marketing Dollars Go?
1. New customer acquisition tactics.
2. New customer retention programs using e-mail marketing. My research shows that e-mails about new products are more successful than simple transactional and sales messages.

Align Your Online and Offline Channels:
1. Operating in multiple channels is valuable to growing your business. Catalog customers purchase from online stores and online customers have also purchased from catalogs and from brick-and-mortar stores.
2. Direct-mail initiatives such as catalogs and e-mail programs drive customers to local stores.
3. Leverage your direct print mail as a way to increase online and retail store sales.

Is the Web Bubble Bursting?
My research shows that some buyers have grown Web-weary and some online sales are losing steam. Since the inception of the Web, online commerce has enjoyed hyper-growth, with annual sales increasing more than 25 percent over all, and far more rapidly in many categories. But in the last year, growth has slowed sharply in major sectors like books, tickets and office supplies.
Sales on the Internet are expected to reach $116 billion this year, or 5 percent of all retail sales (source: The New York Times, June 17, 2007).

Forrester Research, a market research company, projects that online book sales will rise 11 percent this year, compared with nearly 40 percent last year. Growth rates for online sales are slowing down in numerous other segments as well, including appliances, sporting goods, auto parts, computer peripherals, and even music and videos.

A powerful new strategy to generate sales growth is being used by the bookseller Borders. They recently revamped their Web site to allow users to reserve books online and pick them up in the store. Similar services were started by Best Buy and Sears. Is this a new strategy that the independent retailer can test successfully? Barnes & Noble recently upgraded its site to include online book clubs, reader forums and interviews with authors.
You now have lots of new ideas to think about while you wrestle with putting together your plan to handle last-minute orders, planning your sales promotions, and scheduling your staffing for the fourth quarter.

I hope you have your most phenomenal holiday season ever!
Marshall Marcovitz is the founder and former CEO of the CHEF'S CATALOG, a leading Internet shopping site. Currently, he is a lecturer, a university professor and a marketing consultant. He may be contacted at mmmellow9@yahoo.com.