Digital Strategy.… Chris Merkle (founder of Razur, a digital strategy agency advising clients on digital strategy across social, mobile and web channels) joins Pavan Bahl (OS Fashion), Rob Sanchez (Ralph and Remington [Episode 22]) and Marc Raco (The Hope Is Project and Monkey Radio) in studio. The FashInvest Investment News story about two Series B raises for Glamsquad [paywall] and Allied Commerce [paywall] leads to a discussion on strategic investments and delivery services . Merkle does some guest voiceover work and brings spicy chips for Feed the Animals. He talks the genesis of Razur, how mobile has played into the company’s growth, the discussion of businesses providing work-break services, how Merkle ending up in a CEO role is connected to a monogrammed briefcase, and how getting into his current business was influenced by neighbor due to game programming. Merkle offers a detailed exclusive sneak peek at the The 2016 Future of Retail Report with top trends in retail across social, digital, mobile, in-store, organization and consumer privacy. Discussion on growth hacking, an app for mapping colors to determine what a model is wearing, his in-development venture Flawless, the importance of custom content, promoted apps, trend forecasting, how social media follower-counts plays into the work Merkle does, whether beefing up social media number, and a Drake quote sums it up. Pain points for enterprise clients in commerce, communication multichannel, where people need most help in digital and commerce spaces, why innovation is most important, and adding a service and changing one’s brand vs. acquiring service. Plus, Off the Grid Questions reveals cartoon voices, the soundtrack of his life, and why Monopoly is not the game of choice. Postmates Amazon Prime UPS Shyp Uber Rush Mortar Archer Apple Music Spotify