Global Digital Marketing & Retail by Alex 62
Inspiration from across the world for retail enthusiasts, e-commerce professionals, marketing lovers and technology fans. Welcome back! I summarized some great links again, I stumbled upon this week.
🇳🇱 Coolblue presentation at Shopping Today: escape the triangle of death
On Shopping Tomorrow the other week, my favorite Dutch company (except the local Butcher in Bussum, a place near me), Coolblue, was presenting again. I wrote about them earlier, recently and even more recently, so I will not repeat that, just highlight a couple of things that are an addition to my earlier newsletters. Unfortunately I did not watch the whole presentation, I had to leave a bit earlier, but I did capture most of it. Here below your daily portion of customer friendlyness.








Coolblue: focuses solely on two things: NPS and EBITDA, nothing changed in all those years. They have the highest NPS in the Netherlands of any company.
Coolblue emphasizes that they are not "the everything store." Instead, they focus on being the company that "delivers a smile"—"everything for a smile." They only do this for a select few categories, but they aim to excel exceptionally well within these areas. By focusing on outstanding NPS, they dedicate themselves to deeply understanding customer and product journeys. Simply put, they don't want to be a marketplace because they want to be the champions in the categories they sell.
They continiue to expand their stores and they integrate all experiences through ALL channels, so it does not matter which one you use, app, web or store.
E-commerce is more then fancy terms like omnichannel or multichannel, it is also logistics, that is an essential part so Coolblue build their own logistical network.
They now use tailor made packaging, so no air in the parcels. It is easy for one product not to have air or space in a parcel, but not with multiple products, now they have achieved this milestone. Customers like it (NPS in the plus), no more superlarge boxes to open, and Coolblue likes it.
They also build their own delivery infrastructure. Their bike depots (they deliver products per bike), makes customers more happy. They know this, because they measure it, via NPS. It makes sense: the bike delivery is more customer friendly, the biker can easily bring a parcel near you if you are not at home, or they call you, to check at which neighbor they should deliver when you are not at home. It’s much more customer friendly then the tradational delivery companies. Besides that, the products that Coolblue delivers via bike, customers look forward to, so they want to be sure delivery goes exceptional, the bike deliveries have trust!
Customer service completely in house (of course) and with 5000 Coolblue-ers now a pretty large company.
This part I especially liked: all product pages on the web look the same, wherever you look. They want to avoid exactly that, break throught the triangle of death, how they call it. And they do this pretty well f.e. in the washingmachine category. Nobody knows anything on washing machines, coolblue wants to make sure you make the right choice. Therefore they do not have an “other customers bought this element” but they exactly match the recommendations, so if you buy a washing machine, they exactly match the upsell (f.e. a dryer) that fits this washing machine 100%.


They have built their own perfect washing machine ordering and buying product journey, a perfect one. The delivery is done by 2 people, who have been trained to be excepionally polite. They deliver and install the washing machine and take the old one with them.
Building the perfect washing machine journey also means innovating. They will soon sell a washing machine, that ONLY washes when the electricity pricing is negative.
Coolblue wants Germany to be have their largest market share in 2029. They are expanding heavily currently in Germany. That’s a good thing, they bring smiles and good retail to Germany! Supergut!
🇳🇱 Spotted in Bussum (NL) of all places: shopping streets asks public what shop it wants

Finally something I can share, from close to my home. I was walking in the main (tiny) shopping street in Bussum, NL, when I saw this sign. Translated:
Dear visitor
What kind of shop would you like to see here?
Tell us in 1 minute, via → https://www.survio.com/survey/d/bussum
When you land on that page you will get three questions:
What type of store would you like to see here?
What else do you miss in the city center?
What would be a reason to come more often to Bussum city center?
I think this is a great idea, ask the people who regularly walk there on what they need or want. Don’t leave it up to the large real eastate companies, but ask locally! Great initiative. Made me think 0.0001 second that if I was walking in Switzerland where they vote on everything.
🇨🇳 Pangdonglai, something different: sincere employees help customers
I you have been to China, you will for sure remember the extremely fast expanding and changing retail environment. The huge malls and bustling atmoshphere especially in the Tier-1 cities. Now, for me Pang Dong Lai is new, they were not in Shanghai or any Tier-1 citie, where I mostly frequented during my time in China, but they do have -especially for China- a special concept. And special concepts, I think, are always nice because they prove you can things differently and succeed.
With a total of nine malls in Xuchang (许昌) and Xinxiang (新乡), two small prefecture-level fourth-tier cities in Henan, Pangdonglai has gained a reputation in China for innovative retail strategies, and its exceptional customer-centric shopping experience.
Pangdonglai has become so popular in recent years that it has evolved into a tourist destination in its own right, with fans planning weekend breaks to Xuchang to visit the mall. Visitors from all over the country are making their way to Henan to pay homage to it. Some even describe it this way: 'There are only two types of supermarkets in China: Pangdonglai and the rest.'
"Because wherever you go, you can see the product information cards that Pangdonglai provides 'to prevent you from feeling confused and anxious due to lack of knowledge.'
This makes his mall more profitable than three of the biggest supermarket businesses in China
Pangdonglai is also praised as a good employer, taking care of its employees with policies such as restricting shifts to six hours, and closing its stores on Tuesdays, as one writer explains:
Details in this post:
And checkout also this video:
🇬🇧 Revolut: under criticism but keeps on innovating

Sometimes you have to take risks. I use Revolut, I am very happy with the card, but they are now again in the news on some security issues and poor customer care. So when you use Revolut, be aware of the possible scams.
NHS consultant who lost £39k among 100 Revolut customers contacting BBC over scams
But at the same time they constantly innovate, and they now have a cool new B2B POS terminal. The terminal will allow Revolut customers to pay directly from their Revolut app and earn loyalty points, at no cost to the merchant.
In addition to its payment capabilities, the Revolut Terminal can be paired with Revolut’s Point of Sale software, giving businesses access to valuable tools like advanced analytics, multi-location management, and customer catalogues. These features are designed to help businesses streamline their operations and make data-driven decisions that can improve efficiency and profitability.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9wkzv1zk91o
https://www.bobsguide.com/revolut-expands-b2b-offering-with-pos-terminal-as-fraud-reports-raise-questions/
💾Retargeting B2B Ads: a wise table to save
📖Book snippet: webs of Influence: colors in global design
I have the book “Webs of Influence” already for a long time. Just browsed it again and I share these pages on “colors”, as they might be a convenient save for every marketer, product owner or designer that works internationally.




Thank you for reading,