At a recent National Retail Federation conference, I stopped counting how many times "engagement" appeared in presentation decks. Heck, it’s even on my business card. But is "engagement" really the end-goal? No way. We’re looking for commitment, a relationship that lasts a lifetime. That’s what every guy that gets on one knee and every marketer focused in on hyper-local executions is looking for. Engagement isn’t the last step, and it’s certainly not the first step, either.

Passing competition usually starts with a high-value insight, but more often than not that comes with a hefty price tag and a long lead time. Linda Ashbrook, senior manager consumer insights at Taco Bell, shares how The Bell leverages cost effective social media outlets, like Facebook, to gain relevant consumer insights on a daily basis. Whether it’s feedback on product innovation or testing the limits of the brand, Taco Bell goes straight to their customer for fast and honest reactions that help steer the course for category dominance.

Listen now and learn how Taco Bell thinks outside the bun.

The guy at the DJ stand is going to feel the wrath of Tom. He’s got a pretty high- energy soundtrack featuring some pretty hip mixes. But here’s the problem–it’s like a seven-minute loop. Madonna, I liked your new song before I got here and now I’m near violence. I can’t stand it anymore. If I knew where the DJ was plugged in, I’d rip the his power supply out of the wall. If you can’t keep it fresh, I’ll ignore you. Hmm, there’s a lesson there.

Picking up where I left off yesterday with the whole ‘is it real’ theme, today the seventh grader who lives inside my head had me saying “Oh yeah? Well prove it.” practically the entire day. And I don’t mean that in a snarky, ‘I don’t believe you’ kind of way. There are just a lot of exciting things happening in the retail space and more than ever, we have ways to prove what we are doing is working. Or not.

Much to my dismay, I discovered last night that my hotel room overlooks the volcano show at the Mirage Hotel. Every evening on the hour, my windows shake from the roar of the flames and spouting water. Which caused me to wonder: is “mirage” the name of the hotel or an explanation of everything Vegas? Perhaps the latter. That Italian marble? Fake. Those stone columns? Actually fiberglass. One thing you need to know about Las Vegas is that what you see is not necessarily what you get.

Built upon the principle of making shopping easier for people, Peapod continues to deliver quality and value to online shoppers while demonstrating that buying online doesn’t mean losing personal touch with your customer.

Tune in as Tom Dorgan, VP and managing director of interactive with Peapod, shares how they mixe a unique blend of online convenience and offline customer service.