Evan Schuman's StorefrontBacktalk

And this was the report’s take on Walmart: “Walmart also gained from in-store researchers who made the purchase in the store from 26 percent the previous year to 35 percent in 2013. Like Target, Walmart did lose some Walmart.com sales, dropping from 10 percent last year to 4 percent this year. Walmart is also doing a good job of combating defection to Amazon by decreasing its loss from 24 percent last year to 14 percent in 2013.”

First off, this report used some bizarre phrasing. I’m not so sure “defection” makes any sense in this context. If someone is trying to buy a television and he goes into Target and looks at the resolution and then finds the identical set for much less money on Amazon or eBay (NASDAQ:EBAY), I doubt the shopper—or anyone else—would see it as a defection. This isn’t some CIA agent taking a job with Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence. It’s a shopper trying to find the best deal. If that shopper explores four or five retailers and chooses one of them, it’s hard to see it as the shopper “defecting” from the retailers he didn’t choose.

As for those changes with the sites for Walmart and Target, again, the lack of context makes those impossible to analyze meaningfully. Were those dot.com reductions due to the store having better inventory? Also, some of those reductions involve how shoppers perceive the online/offline distinctions. (Hint: They may not perceive them at all.)

What if a shopper is in that Walmart and wants a specific tablet? The store has sold out, but an associate suggests the shopper purchase it online and—given that shopper’s work hours—have it delivered to the store for pickup? When filling out an online survey three months later, will that shopper recall the transaction as an online purchase or an in-store purchase? Even if shoppers have their products delivered to their homes, given that the purchase was made while they were in-store, wouldn’t they likely think of it as an in-store purchase? I am merely suggesting that these survey recollections may not be particularly precise and that the distinctions of how a purchase was made in the store may not be recalled correctly. (In short, the shopper doesn’t care. He got the desired tablet from Walmart. That’s all that will sink in.)

The real problem with trying to analyze so-called showrooming is that shoppers don’t think that way. And neither should retailers. These artificial—and quite likely counter-productive—marketing online vs. in-store distinctions are anything but helpful to either shoppers or retailers.

The way both should view this is quite direct: A shopper considered your store and ended up purchasing the product elsewhere. The fix involves the old-fashioned retail techniques: Improve customer service, boost inventory, deliver more value (which might mean lowering prices, but not necessarily) and create a more enjoyable and effortless shopping experience.

When shoppers drive to your store, park, walk into the store, go to the aisle where their desired product is and then, instead of buying it right then and there, walk out and wait days for the product to be delivered by some Web site (potentially also paying a delivery charge), you have a problem far more serious than someone using a mobile device in your store.

The numbers in this report may not be persuasive, but this isn’t to suggest that better research needs to be done. What is needed is the lack of a distraction—and yes, that’s what this showrooming nonsense is—from the core retail functions.