Sorted by Topic: Customer Experience Management
The Outdoor Industry: Why you need to invest in a multichannel strategy.
Not meeting your customers’ demands can mean the end of your company’s growth. Your competition sells through multiple channels. They offer fast delivery and different options for returns. If you aren’t doing the same, you are losing business to your competition.
This is true in virtually every market, but we’ll dive into some specifics in the outdoor industry to make it more tangible. If you’re not an outdoor retailer, think about how your industry faces similar challenges. They likely apply to you, too.
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Item Returns: How increasing your sales can reduce your profitability.
In retail, your job is to sell products. When you sell products, you generate revenue (and hopefully profit). If you sell more products, you increase revenue. Therefore, the more you sell, the more profitable you are, right?
Not necessarily!
It may seem counterintuitive, but there are reasons increasing sales can actually lead to a reduction in profitability. Reverse logistics (item returns, specifically) is one of the stickiest parts of your retail business. And, it can cause this profitability paradox.
What We’re Reading: Small Business Saturday, Customer Experience, The Golden Age of Retail
Although our software and services are enterprise class and support customers with billions of dollars in transactions, we have a soft spot for our smallest customers. We don’t like to call them “small businesses” though. Because they’ve invested in eCommerce, we believe they are focused and intentional about their future and are aggressively pursuing it. For that reason, we prefer to call them “growing businesses” as we feel that captures the essence of their aspirations.
Frankly, that’s why we’re here, to help them get there. In honor of Small Business Saturday coming up on November 29th, I’ve highlighted a few articles that can help those “small” businesses “grow!”
Why Retailers Need Buy Online/Pickup In Store (BOPIS)
The cheapest way to deliver is to not deliver at all, yet in a recent survey conducted by RIS News, only 26% of senior executives of mid-sized and large retail chains said they have up-to-date technology for Buy Online/Pickup In Store. This means only a quarter of stores are providing the seamless transition from online to in store that’s become the new retail holy grail.
The way customers shop is evolving, and so should the way we sell. This blog post will talk about the importance of Buy Online/Pickup In Store (BOPIS) and how you can use your store to your advantage against online only retailers.
What We’re Reading: Omnichannel is Dead, Optimized Fulfillment, Retail Evolution
This nChannel wrote about why we use the term “multichannel” when talking about the sweeping retail challenges we help customers address. That is relevant, because it reflects the need for commitment and pragmatism to be successful. Lofty theories and buzzwords sound great in a publication, but don’t help you build your business.