RetailTechNews’ weekly roundup brings you up-to-date research findings from around the world. In this week’s edition: Microtrips Form Amazon’s In-Store Strategy; AMEX & Amazon Design Credit Card for Small Businesses; and Echo Look Reaches the Mainstream.

Microtrips Form Amazon’s In-Store Strategy

Microtrips could hold the key to Amazon’s success in brick-and-mortar retail. Microtrips, defined as trips that take less than five minutes, show that, just as Amazon did with its e-commerce site, its in-store retail strategy will focus on convenience.

At Whole Foods, that strategy is well underway. Microtrips at the organic grocer are up 8.7% chainwide since it was acquired by Amazon in August 2017, according to a report by InMarket.

InMarket says this growth is likely thanks to the Amazon Lockers that the e-commerce giant installed in most Whole Foods stores, where customers can come and pick up their online Amazon purchases.

Amazon has already indicated this could be a strategy for the future, with their Amazon Go stores, which focus on a seamless, quick in-store experience. The focus could be their ‘Eureka’ moment for in-store retail. Brick-and-mortar competition has not yet placed a great deal of focus on speedy in-store experiences, instead centring their stores around low prices and superior in-store service. A focus on an experience that requires minimal amount of time spent in the shop itself will appeal to a great many customers.

AMEX & Amazon Design Credit Card for Small Businesses

American Express announced plans to introduce a co-branded Amazon credit card for small businesses. The card company said the offering is part of a broader multiyear partnership. It is Amazon's first small business card.

The deal gives Amex a big platform to woo small business customers, as it aims to become a leading lender to small and mid-sized companies. Amazon also has a branded card with J. P. Morgan Chase, which issues one for consumers shopping on Amazon's site and elsewhere.

Amazon has been looking to deepen its reach with small business owners by replicating the success it’s had with household consumers. The firm has previously launched a Prime membership programme for businesses and has already lent USD$3bn (£2.28bn) to more than 20,000 small businesses that sell on its website, Amazon said last year.

For Amazon, the more vendors selling on its platform, the better. It means they have a wider sales dataset to analyse and can, therefore, get a better idea of what customers are after. They can then use this data to design their own private-label products, maximising revenue potential on their platform.

Echo Look Reaches the Mainstream

More than a year after Amazon debuted the Echo Look, a USD$199 (£151) Alexa-fuelled, freestanding camera to take photos of a user's outfits, the device has moved from the invite-only stage to full U.S. availability. Coupled with Amazon's push into private-label apparel, Echo Look is just one more attempt to penetrate the competitive fashion category.

The 'Style Check' feature allows users to compare photos of themselves in two outfits side by side, and gives scores to both outfits with reasons why one was more successful – like the colours matching better or the choice of shoes working better.

Through usage, Amazon is capturing a rich trove of customer data to offer up personalised recommendations. The average apparel retailer doesn't have granular insights into what styles, brands, or colours customers are wearing every day, how often they wear items, or how they choose items depending on season or occasion.

Retailers across sectors, like Neiman Marcus and The Home Depot, have been introducing visual search initiatives for the past few years. Roughly one-third (32%) of retail executives worldwide that use artificial intelligence (AI) to personalise the customer experience said they had enabled visual search, according to a January 2018 Deloitte and Salesforce survey.