Partner Steve Rowen and I recently began our review of the Video Analytics benchmark survey we’ve been floating for a couple of months. I ‘ve been really surprised to see some of the responses. You’d think that cost of cameras was top-of-mind for retailers, but it turns out to be a smaller issue than we expected. Instead, Retailers are most concerned about the expense and usability of the analytics required to really get bang from their camera buck.

Ninety-two percent of respondents agree that cameras have evolved for practical use beyond LP. Seventy-one percent agree that the analytics associated with these cameras have done the same. Only a third believes that they would have a hard time tying their disparate systems together. That is quite a surprise, since system integration usually pops to the top of the “we’d do it but… ” list.

But we’ve got some serious issues that hinder adoption. Fifty-four percent believe the analytics are still too expensive to incorporate and 60% believe the analytics are too complicated to manage from a human capital perspective. That means they believe it will take too many human resources to monitor the results. I find this somehow troubling. I’ve looked at the analytics many vendors provide, and they don’t seem that complicated or time consuming to me. But I’ve always said analysts look at things from 40,000 feet up, so we may be missing out on something significant. Is it the number of false positives that require human attention? Or is it just that these systems are providing information we don’t want to know, or don’t know how to respond to?

I suspect it’s mostly a lack of education in the marketplace. An analysis of “value vs. use ” shows us implementation very closely in line with perceived value. So while I intuitively believe that video analytics can improve workforce allocation by shortening lines at check-out or reducing backlog of customers waiting for employee assistance, and that traffic flow analysis can help us create more compelling visual presentations in stores, most retailers don’t seem to agree.

I’m certainly not advocating “dumbing down ” the analytics so that they’re easier to use. Readers of my Forbes blog will know that too much dumbing down results in… well… dumb software. I am advocating some form of education across the market. Somehow the message isn’t getting across. I know there are some tremendous retailer success stories out there. But let’s face it, I spend most of my day getting told about success stories, most of which are told under NDA.

We know that Loss Prevention and its causes – most notably employee theft and organized crime – have become top of mind for many executives. Every retail trade organization emphasizes the problem, and all of us have seen forensic video analysis on the nightly news. Heck, video analysis even helped catch the Boston Marathon bombers.

To reinvigorate the store for the next generation of shoppers we need to use every tool at our disposal. Since most of us have those cameras, they seem like a natural choice. So my recommendation to retailers is to think about those opportunities: planogram compliance, traffic flow analysis, workforce allocation and merchandise location effectiveness are things we need sooner in the selling cycle, not later.

Stay tuned: we’ll be releasing full results of the survey soon. In the meanwhile, give it some thought. Have you looked at video analytics lately? And if not, why not?