Bricks and mortar go mobile

Retail execution and great merchandising are critical parts of the marketing process for both retailers and the consumer brands they sell. As sales and promotion cycles shorten, large amounts of money are invested to maximize retail exposure. At the same time, merchandising responsibilities are increasingly fragmented with the larger role played by contractors and agencies. Merchandising breakdowns due to fragmented execution responsibilities and poor communication can put new launches and promotions at risk. Even missing a day of peak sales due to poor retail execution can have disastrous consequences for a brand. For retailers, a poor overall shopping experience can cause customers to simply stop visiting a store. Oftentimes, by the time the problem has been identified, the damage has already been done. However, new technologies are making it easier than ever before to track retail execution and enable efficient reporting and responsiveness without a great deal of complexity or cost.

Facing the challenge

Brands and retailers have traditionally managed large field forces to perform the many retail management tasks, including display set up, inventory stocking and tracking, retail audits and replenishment. Success requires consistent and simultaneous execution across a wide range of retail locations. Often times, simply getting the latest details about a particular display to each location in a timely manner is a challenging task in itself. Contract employees can help companies extend their reach during peak sales periods, but training, managing, and ensuring quality results with external resources can be challenging. More and more firms are looking to get more out of existing field resources by extending their roles and speeding up their tasks.

With a heavy reliance on a diverse workforce—whether its external merchandising teams, mystery shoppers, or internal employees—getting consistent reporting data can be a challenge. Paper-based reports aren't always filled out correctly or entirely. Paper sent back to the office must then be transcribed into a central database, producing more time delays and more chances for oversights and mistakes. Also, management doesn't have ways to validate reports. Were stores actually visited? Were they visited at the right time, when promotions were live? Management needs better tools to ensure compliance with both merchandising and inspection policies.

Internal sales representatives and retail marketing services agents are the retail eyes and ears of any brand. When execution issues are discovered at stores, they need to be immediately reported and fixed. Retailers and brands lose money as execution issues persist. This is especially important during peak periods, such as holidays, launches, or promotions, when poor execution can have dramatic financial consequences. When there are issues among brands, retail, or agencies, firms need concrete data to support and resolve their claims. Traditional paper-based reporting make documenting, tracking, and resolving merchandising claims difficult.

Benefits of handheld devices

Best of breed retailers and consumer brands have long used handheld devices to help automate such retail processes as audits, inventory tracking, competitive tracking, and order entry. Providing field and in-store teams with data access has provided a range of benefits.

More productivity

In the past, representatives had to spend a lot of time filling out and sending mounds of paperwork—limiting the number of stores and tasks able to be completed in any given day. Today's handheld solutions enable fast and accurate data entry, helping representatives enter data and quickly move on to the next task or location. A single handheld device can manage retail audits, track inventory, and accept new orders. With this added efficiency, brand representatives can now more easily report on retail execution while also better managing inventory.

Paper-based forms can be automated with electronic data capture on Windows Mobile devices.>>

Better data reporting