Each month, NACS Magazine publishes the “Bits & Bytes” column, addressing the technology-related issues that affect the convenience and fuel retailing industry. This month’s column by Conexxus Executive Director, Gray Taylor discusses the group’s strategic direction. For more on technology topics, visit Conexxus.org.

This past August, Conexxus leadership and staff came together to set the organization’s strategic direction for the years to come. As an organization centered on technology, this can be a daunting task—and the risk of running after every “new thing” is ever-present. Rather than chase names from headlines, we follow emerging but established trends, with the objective of informing the industry on each trend’s development, and having standards ready to integrate the innovation to the industry.

Several trends have been on the Conexxus radar for years, and will continue to be our focus for years to come, although not exclusively.

EMV, while onerous, is fairly proscriptive in its approach. Our EMV strategy is education—certainly for our industry, but also for the very card brands that are foisting this massive change in our payments system onto us. Conexxus is participating in the EMV Implementation Forum to work with retailers and educate card brands about the very real challenges we face in implementing EMV, let alone meeting the liability shift deadlines. On this strategy, I am pleased to report that we have made great strides and are even engaged in writing the fleet sections of the EMV specification.

Data security will continue to be a strategic focus, as data thieves continue to evolve their interests and approaches to stealing customer and employee data. The PCI Council has announced its renewed focus on bringing small and medium merchants into “compliance,” as most large merchants now are compliant (but still getting breached). Conexxus continues to insist that any compliance process focus on true risk reduction and the documentation of compliance be extremely simple to complete. Already, PCI has adopted the Conexxus “8 Points” process to risk mitigation as a cornerstone to its new approach for small and medium merchants—a significant acknowledgement of our strategy to combat data fraud. (For more on these 8 points read “8 Steps to Data Security” in the October issue of the magazine.)

Our mobile strategy is simple: As mobile commerce is about convenience, our industry must take a leadership role or risk losing our advantage with new consumers. In just the past 18 months, Conexxus has established convenience and fuel retailing as the leader in mobile, releasing the only mobile commerce standard known to exist, co-writing ANSI and ISO mobile specifications, working with the Federal Reserve Banks on regulatory issues, co-chairing the World Wide Web Consortium payments initiatives and working with consumer package goods partners to bring digital promotions to our economy. Conexxus volunteers and staff work for the success of our industry in a competitive landscape that is increasingly determined by technology. We take on emerging issues that no single operator has the luxury of addressing, but which must be addressed in the collective to ensure our competitiveness and profitability.

Our strategy is set by membership and we have a seat at the table for you. Make the decision today to take control of your technology future and join us at Conexxus. Visit conexxus.org for more information.

Gray Taylor is the executive director of Conexxus; he can be reached at gtaylor@conexxus.org.