When retailers use the information gathered about their customers' behavior in order to predict consumer trends, forecast demand, or identify consumer interest in products, they do so by applying

A) journey mapping.
B) category management.
C) the marketing mix.
D) big data analytics.
E) merchandising techniques.

Big data analytics is the process of examining large and varied data sets to uncover hidden patterns, unknown correlations, customer preferences, and other useful information that can help organizations make more informed business decisions. Retailers use big data analytics to predict consumer trends, forecast demand, or identify consumer interest in products by analyzing the vast amount of data gathered from their customers' behavior.