Powered by People: James Turnbull on turning location insights into real-world outcomes

Good location decisions take more than data alone. They also rely on experience, context and a clear understanding of the business challenge behind the numbers.

As Director of GapAdvisory and a member of the GapMaps Leadership Team, James Turnbull works closely with customers on a wide range of projects, from network strategy and shopping centre analysis to planning approvals, acquisitions and the growing role of AI.

In this edition of Powered by People, James shares some of the projects he has found most rewarding, the location and network planning questions customers are asking today, and why the combination of trusted data, technology and human expertise is so important in making confident decisions.

1. As Director of Advisory, what does your role involve, and what do you enjoy most about working directly with customers?

As part of the GapMaps Leadership Team, I head up bespoke project advisory and our shopping centre related service suite. In practice, I might be selling GapMaps solutions to a major shopping centre group one day, the next I’m deep in an apparel retailer’s network strategy, and the day after I’m thinking about AI and what our future service model looks like for clients. I enjoy working with customers because I learn a lot from them and I’d like to think they learn a few things from me.

2. Of the projects you’ve worked on at GapMaps, which one are you most proud of, and what difference did it make for the customer?

I tend to enjoy things that potentially result in tangible outcomes like approvals or acquisitions, or real value gain for a client. That might be helping a client secure a planning approval, analysing a shopping centre that is ultimately acquired, or seeing a client save time thanks to a new dataset, tool or feature.

3. What’s a recent customer challenge you’ve worked on that really stands out, and how did you approach solving it?

One of the more enjoyable projects of the past year was for a mature apparel brand weighing up how best to optimise its network through smart consolidations, strategic new store openings and sensible refurbishments. We partnered with CommBank iQ to generate a ready-made customer loyalty dataset (a spending distribution profile for every store in their network), then combined it with the client’s sales data, third-party and proprietary data, and spatial analytics to identify the optimal micro-networks across Australia. The analysis covered likely sales redirection from closures, uplift from refurbishments, and forecast sales and impacts for new stores. Closing the loop across all those datasets and presenting the information in a digestible manner gave the client an informed, objective reference set for both short-term decisions and medium-term planning.

4. What are some of the biggest location or network planning questions you’re hearing from customers right now?

“Can we do this with AI?” Well — yes and no. Standard enterprise AI tools will produce reasonable results across all manner of business problems, market planning requests and development advisory briefs. However a model only knows what it’s been trained on, largely public information, and it only sees private data if someone deliberately connects it. Out of the box, that means no high-quality spending data at a small-area level, no live-feed mobility data, limited specialised datasets, and a reliance on public statistics which can be somewhat unhelpful in some markets. AI also doesn’t hear the on-the-ground stories from retailers, landlords and industry participants. What AI tools are very good at is processing datasets, distilling information and helping analysts like us deliver bespoke, relevant material far more efficiently and with greater impact. Combined with thoughtful users and access to reliable, non-public data, it’s genuinely game-changing for solutions businesses like GapMaps and for the clients we serve. Our clients are all at different points on the AI journey, and we’re becoming more flexible in how we service them as a result. Some want access to our data only, which we can now provide across a range of formats and pricing models, while others want more, including our spatial platform, analytics and expertise.

5. How does combining GapMaps’ technology and data with the expertise of the Advisory team help customers make better decisions?

We are custodians of vast amounts of data, of which not all is readily available in the public domain. We also have a deep range of experts, many of whom have worked client-side and therefore understand the businesses and sectors well. Every client’s problem is slightly different, so we pride ourselves on solving the actual problem and delivering what the client needs, typically in close collaboration with them.

6. Outside of work, what’s something people might be surprised to learn about you?

I’m Hungarian…My mother’s first languages were German and Hungarian, yet she speaks English more clearly than I do.