BS4 Retail

Retail analytics: the IT store manager's secret weapon to win business and customers

2021 June 3

Enhance the points of sale thanks to the most advanced data analysis. This is how product display is made more efficient and the offer more attractive.
Retail analytics or advanced analysis at the service of distribution. In the era of multi-channeling, the ability to study consumer behavior inside and outside the store allows store managers to intercept all the dynamics of offline and online interaction of shoppers (real and potential). Compared to the past, our purchasing paths are no longer linear. Before buying a product or service, in fact, the information variables no longer pass only through traditional media and word of mouth from relatives, friends and acquaintances.

Today the points of contact between a customer and a brand's offer are extremely fragmented, embracing an extremely varied ecosystem in which multi-channel consumers live daily in their double dimension, physical and digital. From social media to in-store digital signage solutions, from e-commerce sites to apps in support of loyalty programs, from chatbots to call centers, from access management to receipt data, the progressive adoption of a whole series of technologies on the part of the distribution it represents a very precious information asset. For retailers, the challenge is no longer to be able to put a product in the consumer's bag, but to study and analyze that sea of ​​information that allows them to understand the needs and dreams of real and potential shoppers.
The information recorded by all the physical and digital touch points that dot the customer journey, in fact, is essential to better design the quality of the experience, but also of the services offered. Behind an economy enlightened by data is data fusion, or the ability to integrate growing information flows of data to apply advanced analysis techniques: retail analytics.

Retail analytics means the use of analytical tools to perform trend analysis, events and performance in the retail sector, with the aim of improving the customer experience, increasing sales and optimizing operations.
The analysis of retail sales data can be transformed into intelligence that can be used to positively affect every aspect of the business, from sales to marketing, from supply chain management to warehouse management to customer relations.
Retail analytics tools can help identify customer clusters, their behaviors and preferences, so that strategic marketing campaigns can be developed more effectively. You can identify the products that sell best, predict future sales and demand, and better control your cash flow.
In other words, thanks to retail analytics it is possible to improve operations, identifying inefficiencies and opportunities, and the customer experience, along the entire purchase path.