Well, I thought maybe it is time for me to write about the in-store brand communication opportunities, which retailers have left largely untapped. I find many retailers are still thinking of themselves as stores that just sell merchandise. They continue to be in the "merchant" mindset even though we live in a world that is increasingly all about relationships and communication. It‘s time to bring forward a whole new retail model, one that sees customers as a social brand community. Social networking groups like YouTube, MySpace, and FaceBook, are evidence of the power social brand communities. Tailoring products, services, and information not just to the customer but also to a larger social community is the new retail model.

Apple has done a very good job exhibiting their core operating principle "Think different," as a brand. Beginning with Macintosh computer's friendly, intuitive operating interface; the iMac; their advertising using social icons such as Ghandi, Muhammed Ali, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, to name a few; the iPod; the revolutionary iPhone; and now their Mac OS X Leopard, brand communication through their products has always been their strength. Their store environment is designed to make you feel hip just walking through it. Stores feature the "The Genius Bar," which anyone would like being seen seated at. Apple has been brilliant at identifying its customer who connects with the idea of "thinking different" because its customers have often been the ones who have in fact been different and have not always fit into the social norm. When you walk around an Apple store you can feel this as the common Apple tribal glue.

So, it might seem a tad outrageous of me to suggest that they need to "Think Different" about the in-store experience they are offering their customers. How can Apple's "Think different" brand positioning be extended into other areas of their customers lives, which perhaps have nothing to do with computers or electronics? This question goes beyond the classic way a customer is thought of and begins to see customers as individuals sharing a larger social brand community. What could this shift in perception do for Apple in their retail environments?

Well, for one, it could ask the Apple customer community about different ways in which they have created their world. These ideas could then be shared with the Apple community right inside their stores with a "Think Different" info screen. The screen could show live video, pictures, or a simple text message that offer innovative, interesting, and timely information. The content for this could be collected from the Apple's virtual community by asking people to give their ideas on Apple's website. The ideas could be everything from a new cool vacation location, a new storage idea, a successful new business launch, to thoughts on how to address our current challenges on the environment. It would be a virtual “ iThink therefore iAm” communication board.

Retail environments tend to under utilize in-store research. For instance, Apple could have an employee development program to teach the art of asking questions as a part of their good customer service. A question like "Hey, what is the most outlandish thing you would want Apple to create just for you?" Or "Can you think of something so different you would want Apple to create in the next three years?” Dropping these questions into the store community is a way to bring the "Think different" brand to life in other areas of an Apple customer’s life. What better way to do live in-store research than by engaging with you brand community right in your retail environment? This is research in context via community conversation. I think that this mode of live research produces the freshest data from which to draw new ideas.

The other areas that retailers often overlook when it comes to connecting with their retail community are hang tags, bags, labels, and dressing rooms. Hang tags are communication tags. Some apparel companies are using their tags as brand marketing devices. Juicy Couture has 4 tags hanging off its apparel, each one delivering an element of the brands communication. You can engage in a dialogue with your community in a very direct manner. If you want to get some ideas of how to create a conversation buy a few different Vitamin Water bottles and read how they communicate to their community.

The bag as well is becoming a way to make a statement. Free People went to a soft flowered fabric bag to reflect their "60's San Francisco flower in your hair" attitude. The bag says a lot about its community.

Apparel labels can give a social message or be something that will just bring a knowing smile to your brand community. Don't get labeled as simply a retailer, go for communicating something bigger to your community. Bonjour apparel and its twenty-four licenses have new hangtags with tips on how to improve the environment. Each hangtag will focus on a specific environmental issue: Water, Energy, Pollution, Recycling Wastes, and Food.

Even dressing rooms can be communication booths. For an apparel client marketing to petite woman we recommended screening the heights and names of famous petite woman like Madonna, Queen Elizabeth, Mother Theresa, Sara Jessica Parker, and others, on the walls of the dressing rooms. This reinforced to their customers how powerful petite women have been throughout history.

When you think about your specific retail community think about what information they would appreciate receiving. Is it information on hiking, tips on gardening, car maintenance, skincare, basement storage, or a timesaving holiday recipes? Do a little research, get the information, and design a simple flyer that can be given away in the store. Roll them up, stick them in a bucket, and designate a place for them in the store. We recommended to one of our women's apparel clients to call this place "Café Central," as women have always shared tips over coffee. Having a color printer in the back room of your retail space is an easy way to print out these branded, stylish, info flyers as needed. In other words see everything in your retail space as being an opportunity to communicate to your community. Get yourself thinking beyond the limits of a retail merchant and move into the business of retail brand communications.

Today, the other platform for a retailer to connect to its community is by supporting global causes. Doing good in the world is more and more becoming a part of doing good business in the world. Angelina Jolie’s high profile work in Africa and other parts of the world has done much to communicate that it is fashionable to care. Seeing the world as connected gives fashion retailers a platform to communicate their global awareness. Bono's “Red One Campaign for Africa” in Gap: www.one.org, and his wife's apparel line, Edun: www.edunonline.com are serious efforts to support social causes through the purchase of products.

The retail communication model I really like is one on a much smaller scale. The American retailer, Aldo Shoes, began in the early 80's to connect their shoe company with the AIDS cause. Their website uses rock music celebrities to put attention on AIDS with their "Hear No Evil, See No Evil , Say No Evil. Make Some Noise. Wear A Tag" campaign. You can purchase these tags with their different messages in their shoe stores for $5. So far they have raised $2.5 million: www.youthaids.aldo.org Actually, I am waiting for other high profile American retailers like Converse or Levi's to step up and put light on other social causes, like disadvantaged youth, here in the United States.

Retailers can open up a whole new line of communication with their customer by getting into the heads of the people walking into their stores and seeing them as part of a larger, like-minded community. By finding out what is important to their customers through in-store research, retailers then have a better way to demonstrate they are hearing their community with the products, services, and outlook they offer. Moving from a merchant mindset to a communication mindset is the key. Retailers can put a person in charge of overseeing this communication with a title such as “Retail Brand Communications Director.” Mostly, they need to see their retail operation in a totally new way, one that is much more community driven. Wasn't it Tom Wolfe who said, "If you think that you know what business you are in you are probably wrong" In these rapidly changing times this has never been more true.

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Patt Cottinghan, founder of Genuine Imprints, LTD., and www.workforcetobrandforce.com, is a brand communications strategist and speaker living in the USA.