Whatever you sell, Valentine's Day offers all retailers an incredible opportunity to create incremental sales and visits.

Let's start with those who don't sell the typical Valentine's gift products. You can put together a one-week "We Love Our Customers" event that lets your customers know how much you appreciate them. You can promote the event on the run-up to February 7th, and then hold seven days of We Love Our Customers specials, events, and giveaways. I'd promote the heck out of it. There's still plenty of time to put something together.

Those of you sell typical Valentine's Day products can also do We Love Our Customers events, of course. Your challenge/opportunity is to figure out how to get your message to shoppers who may not get your newsletter or be a member of your Facebook community.

I recommend a fun, Valentine's-themed campaign suggesting how your customers can leave hints for the perfect Valentine's gift. It could include things like little cutout notes in your newsletter to be left for the reader's significant other, or Facebook posts that a follower can share so his/her significant other will read. There are lots of fun possibilities with this one. Don't be afraid to take it over the top. You need to stand out!

We were going to start today’s blog with a title in the form of a question. Something like, “Would you like a simpler system of price promotions when you go shopping?” or “Wouldn’t it be nice not to have to worry about coupons when you shop?”

We went with another title because the problem was that we couldn’t come up with a question where any rational consumer would have actually said “no.” We mean, come on, who wouldn’t answer “yes” to simpler pricing and not having to clip, save, and carry coupons.

But the reason we were having a problem coming up with a good "bad" question is that those are the questions we don't use, the kind that get you excellent answers to meaningless questions. All asked and collected properly, but not actually reflecting the emotional reality of the marketplace or the expectations of the consumer: a fact that Ron Johnson, the ex-Apple, new-J.C. Penney CEO might want to consider when making plans for the company.

Mr. Johnson announced both some long-term and short-term retail strategies last week. To wit, re-do all the stores, each divided into 100 boutiques. Unfortunately, that will take 4+ years, which is glacial in retail-time. More immediately, however, the company plans to introduce a new logo and move away from nonstop promotions to three kinds of prices:

1. Everyday low prices (like Wal-Mart)
2. Monthly specials (like Sears and Kohl’s)
3. Clearance prices (like, well, every other retailer)

IN MY MEANDERS around the vibrant NRF Expo hall (#NRF12) in New York this month, I tried my best to spot the visible stars of the show and detect the invisible three-degree background radiation that lurks behind the retail firmament.

The atmosphere was energized, the crowds were large and buzzwords were flying. Shopper insights swirled in the cloud, mobile technology hype charged the atmosphere, and business intelligence oozed out of every software booth into glowing puddles on the Javits Center exhibit floor.

Ultimately there was too much for one greying, recovering journalist to absorb. This is surely why I wound up at the bar in Manhattan's Landmark Tavern one evening with a group of senior retail business writers (a.k.a.,"ink-stained wretches") who gather each year to drink beer and tell lies.

We all know that finding and retaining great people is a vital element for any experience-based store or company.  What might not be as obvious is how much harder it is to work and succeed in our stores.  It's a heck of a lot harder to engage than clerk, or to maximize a sales opportunity instead of transact it.

Who better to help us find the people who can do this than the people who are already doing it?  True, most retailers have some type of current employee referral program, but most of them are ineffective.  How do you make them more effective?  Here are some things to consider.

1. Substantially increase the amount of your referral bonus.  Make the payout such a WOW amount that most of your employees are always recruiting.  Forget $100 or $250 payouts...go BIG!

Here's an idea. What if you paid a $1,000, $1,500, or higher referral bonus for every new sales associate?  Before you hit send on the email telling me I'm crazy, think about the cost of an open position or high turnover.  And how much more can a really good employee sell versus an average one?  This program will easily pay for itself.

2. Change the way you pay out.  Most companies only pay a bonus after the new employee makes it past their probationary period.  I think employees need more instant gratification.

With a $1,000 bonus, I would pay the employee who made the referral $250 on the referred employee's first day.  I would pay another $250 if the new hire is still there after 90 days.

Here’s a great example of customer delight from Sainsburys!

When 3 year old Lily Robinson (sorry,3 and a half year old Lily Robinson!) wrote to Sainsburys to ask them why tiger bread isn’t called giraffe bread which she thinks it should be because it looks more like a giraffe, she got a personalised response from customer manager Chris King (aged 27and a 1/3!).

As well as explaining the reasons and praising Lily for her suggestion, she sent Lily a £3 Sainsburys gift voucher – simple but effective stuff! It’ has a number of the ingredients of ‘customer delight’: spontaneous, personal, makes the customer feel valued and is ‘remarkable’ – people ‘remark’ about it!

One can never accuse Nordstrom of not knowing its customers. The high-end merchant, which can easily set you back more than $500 for a pair of Jimmy Choos, is adding value where it knows its guests will most likely respond – in its loyalty rewards.

The Seattle-based merchant is tweaking its Fashion Rewards loyalty program, with about 2.6 million members, so that its rewards are less expensive to come by. With half as much spending as before, its regular members can earn tickets to shopping parties and other exclusive events.

It is an important and very insightful decision. According to a story in the Wall Street Journal, Nordstrom’s loyalty members make twice as many shopping trips and spend three times more than non-members.

I applaud the effort. Nordstrom, whose calling card has long been high-touch service, understands the value of its existing customers and is demonstrating just how well it knows these shoppers and identifying new value propositions to attract customers in desired segments. I see several key points:

Online retailers had a heck of 2011 holiday season, up 15%. Whew, in a tough economy no less. But the news wasn’t as good for some physical retail stores. Sears Holdings announced disappointing sales and will be closing over 100 stores. Best Buy same store sales dropped, and some have expressed their sentiment that the retailer is on a long downward slide.

Digital disruption. Coming to a store near you.

That online and mobile commerce is increasing its share of business really isn’t a surprise. The  Internet, as promised in the 1990s, is turning over many industries.

Retail being another such industry, although it’s a much slower process of disruption. Which means the physical retailers have time.

Avoiding Innovation's Terrible Toll is the headline for an article in the Wall Street Journal's management section which explores the life span of corporations. The Journal cites a study conducted by two management professors that spanned over six million firms and came to the conclusion: that only a tiny fraction (of firms) reach the age of 40.  And with the rapid pace of technological change the lifespan is likely to be shorter in the years to come.

Some key observations of the study include insights from business leaders, academics and venture capitalists, all of whom say that "large companies that do manage to survive are ruthless about change. The most successful ones aren't afraid to cannibalize their big revenue generators to build new businesses."  Successful (those with longer lifespans) firms "often make frequent—but, crucially, small—acquisitions that bring in new technologies and open new markets. And there's always the unpredictable role of luck in business—both good and bad." Notably, firms that were "felled by creative destruction tended to be bureaucratic, played too much defense, and tried to catch up too late by lurching into huge acquisitions.

I know how busy for the last few weeks, so I've taken the liberty of putting together some potential resolutions for you and your team in 2012.

This is a fairly extensive list, and you're probably already very good at most of these things. Even so, there might be one or two areas where improvement will have a positive impact on your business.

If you will, let me know which of these are right for you, and tell me about any of your resolutions that I've missed.

1. Taking your customer experience to the next level. Your store/company's customer experience is good, but deep down you know it could be so much better.  

2. Improve your staff's sales abilities. Your staff is really nice and delivers a very good customer experience. Now you aim to translate that to higher conversion and average sales.

3. Better clienteling. As online sales continue to grow and outpace traditional retail, in some segments the personal relationship between the customers and staff will become vital to keeping and maximizing customers.

4. More relevant marketing. The good news is you've got your Facebook page up and you're posting on a fairly regular basis. The bad news is you have no idea the impact it's having on your business. That probably means it isn't having much.