Is your point of sale system good enough for today’s omnichannel environment?
In a recent blog, we talked about how changing consumer expectations are disrupting legacy point of sale technology and shared five areas to focus on to differentiate the store customer experience.
If you want to ensure your next retail platform will grow and evolve alongside your needs, here we look at the challenges retailers experience when making the shift to a new POS, and the important tests the new tech needs to pass.
For many omnichannel retailers, the rise of online shopping has set higher expectations for in-store experiences.
Physical stores now play a key role in driving demand and profitability - even when the final purchase happens online.
Shoppers today view their online and in-store interactions as part of a unified buying journey, not separate channels. And by speeding up delivery, increasing share of wallet, and providing hands-on product experiences, stores are enhancing and differentiating the overall customer journey.
Yet, a significant challenge persists: many retailers find that their outdated point of sale systems are unable to meet the needs of today’s omnichannel shoppers, especially with the ‘phygital’ experiences that tech-savvy consumers now expect.
And making the shift to a new point of sale is complicated:
Many retailers defer upgrades because of concerns about potential disruption to current operations, the resources required for successful implementation and the task of staff training.
Compatibility issues with existing and future systems can make the transition to a modern POS seem a daunting task.
This can be amplified by a fear of not achieving the anticipated return on investment, especially if they’ve previously been burned by failed tech projects.
In the past, retailers who got behind on their store technology investments frequently focused on catching up to current standards. However, now the focus is on future proofing – choosing platforms that speed up innovation, with the flexibility to change direction as opportunities develop, competitors act and customer expectations evolve.
You don’t want a project that fails to deliver the desired returns because the wrong product was selected.
So at a time when point of sale software is undergoing a surge of disruption, innovation and investment, how do you select the right system for your business requirements?
Here are the 7 tests a point of sale purchase must pass, with the first being the most crucial of all:
Test 1. Can it be rapidly implemented and deployed?
The number one priority for most of the retailers we speak with is speed of deployment.
The complexity of upgrading legacy POS infrastructures can present significant operational challenges. This means you need a platform built on a modern architecture, with all your core requirements out-of-the-box plus the ability to customise and easily add new functionality.
When you choose a partner with a mature platform, they can focus on delivering innovation because the core functionality you need already exists.
Check the provider has recent and proven success planning, implementing and managing complex, large-scale deployments across multiple stores, multiple formats and multiple geographies. They’ll need to understand your fast-paced, data-intensive environment where any significant level of downtime is unacceptable. And their people will need the capability to help you plan and implement your projects so that they work for you now and into the future.
Our client GAS took only 10 weeks to rollout Infinity across 127 stores – a masterclass in POS deployment. GAS now has a modern retail system that supports its retailers to provide great customer experiences and drive growth.
“That is what Infinity point of sale system is able to deliver to us, a system which is fast, reliable, secure and on a modern architecture and platform.”
Nahid Ali, GAS General Manager
Test 2. Will it support your unified commerce business model?
Today, the store is mission control for a seamless omnichannel customer experience, making the POS the anchor for unified commerce.
That means you’ll want a point of sale system that will not only work with your existing systems, but also provide an end-to-end solution for a unified commerce business model.
The POS needs to be the hub for unified experiences spanning endless aisle, click and collect, store fulfilment, pricing and promotions, clienteling and loyalty, as well as functions that allow customers to search, transact, acquire and consume products across all your channels.
You don’t want to be tied to a point player that can only provide portions.
“The reason unified commerce resonated with me is that it would give us one core platform do the heavy lifting and a single source of truth to manage the customer data, inventory and order orchestration, rather than relying on too many systems to push and pull data everywhere.”
Shane Lenton, previously Cue’s Chief Information and Digital Officer
Test 3. Will the system work offline?
No matter how exceptional your retail customer experience is, it becomes irrelevant if you're unable to complete a sale.
When inevitable network outages happen, you need to trust that your POS will keep all your stores operational without any disruption.
When implemented correctly, the offline POS experience should be so seamless that your staff may not even realise the system is offline.
Though some features may be limited, it's essential to know what transactions can still be processed during the loss of connectivity. For example, the system should handle card and cash payments, process returns, capture customer data and link it to profiles, and continue scanning products for smooth checkouts.
Test 4. Can it grow with you, and adapt to change?
Whether you're expanding into new locations or launching pop-up stores, it's crucial to ensure your POS system can scale quickly and adapt to changes in customer expectations. While it might seem obvious, scalability can easily be overlooked in the excitement of cutting-edge technology.
Your growth plans should account for how your physical stores can complement your online presence - not just to drive online sales but also to strengthen customer loyalty. Your POS solution must be able to function anywhere your ecommerce platform can.
POS adaptability means having a system that can quickly adjust to evolving customer preferences. It should operate seamlessly across tablets, phones and fixed tills, allowing transactions to flow between devices effortlessly. This flexibility not only opens up possibilities for innovative store layouts and experiences but also provides the practical benefit of better backup strategies for your devices.
Your partner should let third party solutions connect via APIs so that you are free to focus your development efforts on the front-end. You can be more agile and create a community of third-party apps and systems that work together in an ecosystem. As a result, you’ll reduce integration and maintenance overheads, increase real-time accuracy and enjoy virtually limitless scalability and agility.
Test 5. Does it have an intuitive UX for a better EX?
Today, any innovation within the store must minimise friction for store teams because this directly contributes to delivering a superior customer experience. The focus is now on speed and simplicity to maximise staff productivity, no matter where they are in the store.
An easy to use UX and straightforward setup will enable new employees to quickly learn the system and begin selling almost right away. By removing the frustrations caused by complex technology, you'll also help lower staff turnover.
In addition, many retailers run multiple systems within stores, forcing their teams to juggle between different apps and screens as they serve customers. By consolidating store technology onto a single POS-based retail system, your teams can do everything in a single view, from sales transactions, customer loyalty, pricing, product and promotions through to virtual appointments and endless aisle access to stock.
Test 6. Will it make complex sales simple?
For enterprise retailers with multiple brands, B2B operations or franchises, you’ll need a POS system that makes complex sales simple.
You’ll want to control everything from either head office or at store level to set pricing and promotion rules, permissions, return and refund validation, discounting and cash management.
And ensure it supports complex sales like charge-to-account, quote management by channel, debtor management, loyalty and all types of pricing, including retail, trade, contract, promotional, project, customer-specific and rules based.
“Infinity is one of the few platforms able to accommodate our diverse business model, with both retail and wholesale customers requiring multiple volume breaks and bulk purchasing. And Infinity’s New Zealand presence gives us an out-of-the box solution with local capabilities that can be customised to our requirements.”
Amanda Thompson, General Manager of Moore Wilson’s
Test 7. Can you rely on the vendor for new functionality and ongoing support?
Working with the right people and processes will make the roll-out of your new point of sale much easier and deliver results much faster.
A local partner means you’ll have direct access to second and third level support, with direct engagement with people on the ground committed to your success (and not distracted by offshore business activity).
It means you can have more influence on the product roadmap, with fewer layers of bureaucracy giving them more agility and responsiveness. And a mid-size partner is more likely to view you as an important customer of influence.
Louise Mitchell, NPD’s Senior Category Manager
Want help to modernise your point of sale?
As you transform your customer experience to deliver the seamless and personalised buying journeys your customers crave, your point of sale system must transform as well. If you’re looking for help to shape your strategy and extend your omnichannel capabilities, get in touch. We’d love to help you develop the solutions you need now and guide you to where you’re headed next.
For more on how a move to a unified commerce strategy gives you the flexibility and agility you need to keep in step with consumers’ changing needs, download our ebook:
Low tech, high risk: 8 signs your retail business is underinvesting in IT
Are retailers spending enough on their IT?
As we all know, retailers traditionally have spent less on IT compared to other industries and enterprises of a similar size.
In the past, it was for good reason.
Other sectors like finance and healthcare rely heavily on technology for their core operations and risk management. Banks need top-notch IT for secure transactions, while healthcare relies on IT for patient records and life-saving equipment.
Retail, on the other hand, focused more on physical store operations and customer service, where IT played less of a central role. Retailers didn't face the same level of regulatory pressures as other industries with strict data security and privacy requirements, nor did it handle much sensitive customer data.
Retail is also a volume-driven and highly competitive sector with significant operational costs and price sensitivity, and slimmer margins compared to other sectors. This leaves less room for significant IT investments, especially when measured against competing demands from inventory, store rents and staffing.
And retailers were often slow to adopt new technologies because they didn’t yield high returns. Business changes were more gradual and often driven by consumer trends rather than technology.
So what has changed?
It was only with the advent of new technologies like mobile apps, ecommerce and digital marketing that IT become a game-changer in retail.
Retailers learned to be agile and invest in technology for competitive advantage during the pandemic and are starting to embrace that agility as new technologies like generative AI become mainstream.
Now retailers are focussed on finding the right systems and partners to rebuild their business from the bottom up. They’re building a customer-centric approach to retail using technology and experiences to enhance the brand, drive sales and grow loyalty.
The most forward-thinking and ambitious retailers know that they need to do it quickly. Nearly one in five retailers have posted negative economic profit since 2015. And while the retail sector has created value over that time, the gap between winners and losers is widening, with the top 10% of publicly traded retailers now accounting for 70% of the sector’s economic profit.
Retailers that are aggressive on growth - creating distinctive omnichannel customer experiences and expanding the breadth of their product offerings, while also resetting their cost base - are the companies that will create value, meet customer needs and head off competition.
And that means retailers are now as dependent on technology as other industries for their survival.
How much should retailers spend on IT?
The simple answer is it depends. There’s no one-size-fits-all solution and the right number depends on a retailer’s specific circumstances. It can vary greatly by retail category, company size and growth stage.
Our anecdotal experience suggests that most retailers spend only 1-3% of their revenue on IT, although one study found that retail and ecommerce IT spend was 10% share of company revenue in 2023 (up from 7% in 2022).
This is still low compared to other industries such as software, tech hosting and financial services, which dedicate 19%, 16% and 15% of revenues respectively.
These industries, of course, have different business models with significant investments in R&D. We’re not suggesting retailers need to invest at these levels, but they do need to scale their IT spend for opportunities that make their businesses stronger, smarter and ready for the future.
What are the problems retailers experience when they underspend?
There are 8 indicators that can mean it’s time to assess your level of IT spend:
1. Things just don’t work smoothly
Retailers who don't spend enough on their IT infrastructure may face hardware malfunctions, software crashes and other technical issues that disrupt business operations and negatively impact customer experience. Legacy systems can be less efficient, more vulnerable to security breaches and don’t integrate well with newer technologies.
2. Customers are frustrated
Today’s consumers expect a seamless shopping experience, whether online or in-store. Inadequate IT infrastructure can result in slow service, unavailability of products, discrepancies in pricing and a disjointed omnichannel experience, all of which lead to disappointment and frustration, a lack of trust and even a sense that your organisation is dysfunctional and incompetent.
3. Growing pains
Retailers with outdated or poor IT systems may find it difficult to scale their operations effectively. As the business grows, systems can become a barrier, hindering expansion and adaptation to new market demands.
4. Data, what data?
The inability to collect, analyse and act on data due to poor IT infrastructure can leave a retailer behind in understanding market trends, consumer behaviour and inventory needs. That means missing out on insights that could drive business growth and operational efficiency.
5. Security, what security?
Inadequate security measures and a lack of robust data privacy protocols are signs of underspending. Retailers need to invest in IT to protect customer data and comply with privacy laws. Failure to do so can lead to data breaches, legal issues and a loss of customer trust.
6. Compliance and regulatory challenges
Retailers are subject to various regulations, including those related to data protection and privacy. Insufficient IT investment can lead to non-compliance with these regulations, resulting in fines and damage to the company’s reputation.
7. Employees aren’t happy
Working with outdated systems can be frustrating for employees, leading to decreased morale, lower productivity and higher turnover rates.
8. Sales decline
With all these issues, sales and profitability can dip. Customers may choose competitors with better service and technology, and the retailer may incur additional costs due to inefficiencies and security breaches.
When is it time to increase your IT spend?
If your retail business is focused on any of the following goals, you’ll want to increase your IT spend as a percentage of revenue, at least in the short term:
Transforming into digital-first business: Retailers are implementing omnichannel strategies to make shopping a fast, easy and compelling omnichannel experience with personalised products, prices and promotions pre, during and post their purchases, plus fast and frictionless on-demand delivery options.
Meeting changing customer expectations: Changing consumer preferences and rising expectations for speed and convenience are creating new growth opportunities. The retailers that deliver a personalised and memorable CX are best positioned for long-term growth and loyalty.
Developing new business models: Retail leaders are improving and expanding their traditional products and services and launching in new, but related, market segments. Technology is blurring industry lines and allowing different operators – including retailers – to move into services such as media, healthcare, finances, travel and entertainment.
Improving operational efficiency: With increasing costs, pressure on consumer spending and the cost of doing business on the rise, there will be more consolidation and business failures. Retailers recognise that investing in technology now will lead to long-term cost savings, even if it means a higher short-term spend. It’s about making things run smoother and more efficiently, which cuts costs down the road.
Want help to find the right systems to build your unified commerce business model?
We can help you build a foundation for operational efficiency and continuous, innovative growth. Just contact me at kelly.brown@triquestra.com or get in touch.
For insights into how a unified commerce approach gives you the flexibility and agility you need to keep in step with consumers’ changing needs, download our ebook:
Success or surrender: 5 critical moves for rescuing a failing retail software project, plus when to cut your losses
Has your retail software project hit rock bottom?
In my last blog, I talked about why many retailers fail to achieve the expected ROI from their retail management software investments and shared five tests a new purchase must pass.
In this blog, we’ll look at what to do when a software project goes wrong.
Enterprise software failure rates are remarkably high, though naturally rarely discussed in public! For some companies, their investments become a black hole, sucking up funds and resources to rescue the project. Others lead to serious business disruptions when the software goes live and the loss of innovations that deliver a competitive edge.
So how do you resurrect a failed software project and, more significantly, what are the important signs it’s time to cut your losses and walk away?
There are five steps to take to salvage a failing software project, or rebuild after a failure:
Step 1: Rethink your game plan and goals
Take another look at the original project plan and strategic objectives. Adjust them to fit the new reality and the challenges you've faced. Then set realistic expectations and lay out clear objectives for moving forward. Maybe you need to tweak the timeline, shuffle resources or reconsider the budget? A fresh plan gives you a chance to gain momentum and start over.
Step 2: Take a good hard look at what went wrong
Figure out the specific issues and challenges that caused the project to falter. Was it poor planning, bad program management, miscommunication or technical shortcomings? Communicate openly with all the stakeholders involved and listen to their take on the situation. Working together and sharing ideas will foster trust, encourage problem-solving and ensure everyone is on the same page regarding the path forward.
Step 3: Take stock of your team
Are the people and team dynamics that got you to this point capable of turning the project around? Check that the individuals have got the right skills for the job and are aligned with the revised project goals. Examine the team dynamics and make sure your leaders are up to the task. A great team can often turn things around.
Step 4: Call in the experts
If the project is in a critical state, it’s probably time to bring in outside help. Get on board external consultants and software vendors with real-world experience in the current disrupted retail environment. Ask them to provide guidance, identify areas to improve and suggest potential solutions. They'll have managed complex, large-scale deployments and can provide new perspectives and bridge skills gaps to get things back on track.
Step 5: Take action and keep tabs on progress
Take actions to remedy the identified issues and implement corrective measures. Whether it's changing team members, improving communication, adjusting workflows or adopting new project management methodologies, implement the fixes needed to address the issues. Keep a close eye on the progress, track the key performance indicators (KPIs), and have regular status updates to make sure things are heading in the right direction.
But what do you do when you’ve completed all these moves and the project is still floundering?
If the project is still not delivering real value after taking these steps, it can mean the wrong product was selected. Any software purchase that doesn’t meet its target ROI is a failure. And at a time when consumer confidence is low and customer expectations are rising, new technology investments are being held to an even higher standard.
Sometimes making the uncomfortable decision to cut your losses and start the process of finding a new software provider is the right thing to do.
While it may first register as a loss, it could end up being the best thing that ever happened to your retail business.
Here are the indicators that mean it's time to pull the plug and start over:
Misalignment with business KPIs: If the project no longer aligns with your strategic goals or the original business objectives have significantly shifted, it's a fundamental mismatch. When the deviation is substantial and irreconcilable, it's best to cut ties and focus on initiatives that do.
Unrecoverable delays: If the project keeps getting delayed without any end in sight, it's a red flag. When the delays are significant and impact the project's viability or business objectives, it’s time to assess whether the proposed solution is even feasible.
Escalating costs: If the project costs are skyrocketing and return on investment isn't looking promising, it may be financially unsustainable to continue. When cost overruns outweigh the expected gains, it’s better to cut your losses and move on.
Susceptibility to the sunk cost fallacy: This is our tendency to follow through on a project if we have already invested time, effort, emotion or money into it, whether or not the current costs outweigh the benefits. Any unrecoverable costs sunk in the past are irrelevant when deciding what to do next.
Insurmountable technical challenges: If the project faces technical obstacles or limitations that can’t be overcome within a reasonable timeframe, it’s an indication that the solution is not suitable or feasible. When the problems are too big to fix or would require a complete overhaul, the software is not the right fit.
Stakeholders withdraw support: When important stakeholders lose confidence in the solution or no longer provide support, it's a clear message. If the solution cannot realistically recover to meet their expectations, it’s time to consider ending it.
Making the call to exit a failing software project is tough, but often necessary.
It’s an opportunity to find a solution that best meets your particular needs, allowing you to create real, sustainable value for your retail business.
Want help to assess the viability of your software project?
If your project is not delivering the returns you expected, we can help you navigate the complex issues and find the right path forward. Just contact me at kelly.brown@triquestra.com or get in touch.
For insights into how a unified commerce approach gives you the flexibility and agility you need to keep in step with consumers’ changing needs, download our ebook:
Your four stages to unifying customer experiences
Can you deliver to changing customer needs? Here’s how to simplify and streamline interactions with your brand and fulfil the promise of omnichannel retail.
1
Get tight control of your inventory
2
Extend your brand experience across all channels
3
Create delightful, personalised shopping experiences
4
Innovate, innovate, innovate
Omnichannel retail promised to make things better for customers by delivering unified shopping experiences, but the execution has left gaps in the user experience.
Shoppers today have numerous selling channels available to them, but silos mean that customers can’t just hop between channels in one seamless interaction and must deal with inconsistencies that lead to disappointment and frustration.
Omnichannel has also made it much tougher for retailers. Today it’s not just about providing multiple options – it’s about delivering a frictionless experience no matter where or when customers shop. This variety is overwhelming retailers, with 47% saying there are too many channels for them to effectively deliver the best experience.
And many omnichannel set-ups neglect to take full take advantage of stores, which provide unparalleled opportunities to provide excellent service and personalised recommendations to retain loyal customers, as well as take on activities such as returns, fulfilment, endless aisle orders, in-store wishlists and more.
That’s why retailers are moving from omnichannel to an integrated unified commerce platform strategy.
Unified commerce makes it easy to meet and even exceed customer expectations by creating a ‘one brand’ experience everywhere your customers shop while solving the problems and restrictions of omnichannel retail.
It’s gaining momentum, with 20% of retailers heavily investing in unified commerce, 32% beginning to invest and 36% considering doing so. Retailers who used unified commerce in 2022 saw an impressive 7% revenue boost over those who did not.
And the transition to unified commerce is simpler than many think.
Retailers can quickly reap the benefits by following these four stages:
Stage 1: Get tight control of your inventory
Ensure you can accurately manage your inventory levels across all your locations and customer touchpoints by centralising your inventory information in near real time.
With a unified inventory management system in place, you can guarantee you’ve got the right inventory available in each location, without carrying the cost of overstocking or “buffers”. You can optimise your product range by matching stock to each store’s location, community and demographics while still giving access to your complete range via endless aisle. You can also react to trends quickly, and forecast demand based on historical data, sales forecasts and seasonal variations.
See how Night ‘n Day started with inventory to create great customer experiences and increase net profit by around $12,000 a year for each store.
Stage 2: Extend your brand experience across all channels
Once your inventory is under control, you’re free to increase your purchasing, ordering and fulfilment options. To do that, you’ll need to move from multichannel silos to a unified commerce platform that provides a strong order management capability.
Exposing, rather than replicating, inventory and customer data from your platform to each channel means everything stays in sync. Your staff and customers will have consistent product visibility and can expect fluid and accurate interactions, whether in-store, on mobile or online.
And with real-time data on stock levels, you’ll be able to see where inventory is located, find the lowest cost or fastest fulfilment route, and provide better promotions.
Here’s how Cue Clothing is using unified commerce to combine physical and digital channels into a ‘one-brand’ experience.
Stage 3: Create delightful, personalised shopping experiences
Now you can build genuinely meaningful customer experiences. With a single view of customer, order and inventory data, you can treat each customer as an individual, all the time – one person with one account, interacting with one unified brand.
Make your loyalty programme your cornerstone for innovation, delivering the unified and personalised experiences customers expect. Use AI and data from online and offline channels to deliver timely and personalised communications, recommendations, offers and rewards across in-store and digital touchpoints, including desktop web, mobile web, mobile apps, email and social.
By delivering each customer a powerful, tailored, one-of-a-kind experience across all channels and touchpoints, you’ll create rich emotional connections, drive up conversions and send transaction values soaring.
Stage 4: Innovate
Your unified commerce platform is now your hub for innovation - a springboard for adding new channels and services to take advantage of new capabilities and deliver results at a speed and scale that would be unachievable within a traditional omnichannel model.
By using agile methodologies and APIs to expose data and functions, and easily plug in and deploy new services, channels and devices, you’ll reduce integration and maintenance overheads, increase real-time accuracy and enjoy virtually limitless scalability and agility. And by seamlessly embedding purchasing opportunities into everyday activities, you’ll make the shopping experience seamless for the consumer.
The end result is the ability to create extraordinary customer experiences that help to capture market opportunities, generate additional revenue and build brand advocacy.
See how APIs can help you innovate at pace and build powerful ecosystems to give customers extraordinary experiences.
This post was originally published May 2019 and updated on 28 August 2023.
If you’re urgently revamping your omnichannel capabilities and want advice on which projects to tackle first, our checklist could help. It will let you assess where you are at against retail leaders and decide what you need to improve. Download it here.
Show me the ROI: 5 tests to justify your retail software purchase
Are traditional ROI measures good enough in today's environment?
Everyone’s focused on ROI for their enterprise technology purchases nowadays. ROI has always been important, but at a time when consumer confidence is low and customer expectations continue to rise, new technology investments are being held to an even higher standard.
But making the shift to a new retail management system can be difficult.
Research has shown enterprise software failure rates range from 30-70%, and some observers say that fewer than 10% of major software purchases fully meet expectations. Stories about outright software failures do appear in the media, but they’re just the tip of the iceberg - people don’t talk publicly about failures because they do not want to be associated with them.
For some companies, their investments become a black hole, sucking up funds to salvage the situation. They pour money and resources into further development, implementation and maintenance, only to find after a few years that they’ve fallen by the wayside.
And many projects may not be outright failures but lead to serious business disruption when the software goes live. Chaotic stores frustrate customers, supply chains go haywire, data integrity and security can be compromised, employee frustration kills productivity and integration challenges hinder efficient operations.
Plus there’s the loss of innovations that can give you a competitive edge. A successful solution will be implemented faster than expected and meet or exceed the expected ROI, letting you create frictionless and differentiated omnichannel customer experiences that drive loyalty and grow revenue.
You don’t want a project that fails to deliver the desired returns because the wrong product was selected.
So how do you justify your technology investment?
There are five tests technology purchases need to pass, and the first is the most important by far:
Test 1: Does it deliver your strategy and help drive forward your KPI's?
Evaluate how the software will help to achieve the strategic goals and objectives of your organisation.
It should be a solution to the challenges you face or help you take advantage of new opportunities. It needs to offer clear benefits like boosting productivity, cutting costs, improving customer satisfaction or increasing revenue. If it doesn't directly address your needs, it's probably not the right fit.
Test 2: Does it deliver REAL value?
The ‘shiny object’ syndrome is prevalent in retail. People can get fixated on the latest trends and fail to assess how the investment helps to deliver a return on investment.
How much will the system cost in terms of licenses, implementation, training and maintenance? Compare those costs to the benefits you expect to see. Consider both the tangible and intangible returns, such as increased revenue, reduced operational costs, improved decision-making, enhanced scalability or competitive advantage. A positive ROI should be evident over a reasonable timeframe.
Test 3: Does it deliver operational savings?
People are your most important resource. If your investment saves them time, that frees them up to work on higher value activities.
The system should be user-friendly with intuitive workflows and features that align with users' needs and preferences. You want a solution that your store and head office staff can easily adopt and start using right away. No one wants to deal with complicated interfaces or spend hours in training sessions. And a solution that provides a positive user experience will yield higher productivity gains and better overall results.
Test 4: Can it grow with you and adapt to change?
Assess whether the system can scale and adapt to your organisation's changing needs. It should be able to handle more data, channels and touchpoints, easily integrate with other systems, be flexible enough to adapt to new technologies and scale to provide long-term value.
You don't want to be stuck with an outdated or narrow point solution that won’t let you evolve to meet changing customer needs.
Test 5: Can you rely on the vendor for new functionality and ongoing support?
Biggest isn’t always best. A mid-sized company will have fewer layers of bureaucracy, giving them more agility and responsiveness. It also means that you’ll be an important customer of influence to your partner - they will value your business and work hard for it.
Assess the reputation and support provided by the vendor. Do they have a good track record of successful implementations in the current, disrupted omnichannel retail climate, with customer reviews and references?
Are they known for their customer service? You’ll want a partner that will be there for you when you need it, ensuring you can easily add new functionality and connect to third party systems (via APIs) to cultivate your retail ecosystem.
By putting your potential software investment through these five tests, you’ll find a solution that meets your needs and is cost-effective, adaptable, user-friendly and supported by a trusted and reliable partner.
Want help to ensure your software investment pays off?
We can help you define your goals, develop a business case and create your roadmap to create the unified experiences that are best for customers and most profitable for you. Get in touch.
For insights into how a move to a unified commerce strategy gives you the flexibility and agility you need to keep in step with consumers’ changing needs, download our new ebook:
Power your retail innovation strategy with APIs
This blog was originally published on 28 February 2020 and updated 18 April 2023.
Retailers are urgently innovating to create the seamless and personalised omnichannel experiences consumers now expect. They are looking for new ways to make use of their data and connect their systems together to streamline business processes and create great customer experiences. One major advantage of using a unified commerce is that its open architecture that lets you easily make those connections with APIs.
APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) are present in every part of our digital world. Every time you use an app like LinkedIn, make a Skype call or listen to Spotify on your phone, there’s an API in action.
APIs let you add specialised functionality to a website, application, platform or software without having to write all of the back-end code. By using APIs, you can expose data in real time, rather than having to replicate or move it. The result is a set of functions that’s available across various systems, plus a fast and easy way to plug in and deploy new services, channels and devices.
These improvements let you shift your team’s priority from maintenance to innovation.
By using APIs to access existing solutions in the market, you are free to focus your development efforts on the front-end. You can be be more agile and create a community of third-party apps and systems that work together in an ecosystem. As a result, you’ll reduce integration and maintenance overheads, increase real-time accuracy and enjoy virtually limitless scalability and agility.
APIs in action
Here are just some of the ways APIs help you optimise operations, personalise customer experiences and drive new revenue:
Retail anywhere, any time
APIs let you easily expose your product catalogues and other eCommerce solutions to give customers many more ways to engage with your brand, including social commerce.
Deliver anywhere, any how
Consumers now make purchasing decisions based on shipping costs and timings. APIs can power the fulfilment options they now expect - such as click-and-collect, store-to-door, scheduled delivery and even 1-hour delivery.
Payment convenience counts
APIs give consumers the payment options and ‘buy-now, pay later’ services they want, both in-store and online. Infinity was the first retail system in the world to integrate with Afterpay at point of sale and supports Adyen, Smartpay, Laybuy, Alipay, WeChat Pay, Slyp and Zip to name just a few payment partners.
Personalised communications
APIs let you connect internal and external data to create timely and relevant communications, recommendations, offers and rewards. You can provide customers with real-time shipping visibility and tracking throughout the shipping journey, no matter the fulfilment solution. APIs let you create customised recommendations for customers visiting stores during click-and-collect pickups, and extend them into other communications, such as e-receipts and shipping notifications.
And they help to create personalised marketing experiences that boost loyalty and increase conversions - such as notifications for items on sale, low-in-stock or restocked – plus product recommendations on the website, based on each customer’s behaviour and past data.
Virtual Shopping
APIs support virtual retail shopping ecosystems that go beyond live chat to support in-store experiences on digital channels. By integrating video commerce platforms with POS solutions (like Infinity), you can automate the end-to-end process, from customer communications and data insights to seamless sales transactions and fast delivery.
Extending digital into stores
APIs also improve the in-store shopping experience. You can give your in-store teams’ data on customer histories and shopping preferences, as well as personalised recommendations based on past purchases and wishlists. APIs can help provide product recommendations for customers visiting stores for click-and-collect pickups, answer product questions in real-time and support self-checkout. In addition, new multichannel wishlists let customers add items to their wishlists while browsing in stores
So how do you start making the most of APIs?
Begin by evaluating your company’s value chain. Can you easily integrate and use APIs to access third-party platforms and services to scale your business? Or can you release your own APIs to attract partners and build out your platform? The two options are not mutually exclusive.
An API-enabled platform like Infinity lets you scale your business quickly by easily adding new apps and services as business requirements change.
We can also help if you’re looking for advice on how to create a strategy and implement an API programme that quickly creates customer and business value.
The end result is the ability to create extraordinary customer experiences that help to capture market opportunities, generate additional revenue and build brand advocacy.
Find out more about Infinity APIs and our integration partners. Then contact us for advice on how to use APIs to achieve greater agility, faster growth and better margins.
For more on how a move to a unified commerce strategy gives you the flexibility and agility you need to keep in step with consumers’ changing needs, download our new ebook:
Connecting, engaging and delivering: unified commerce’s top benefits
A single retail management platform positively impacts your entire business in so many ways.
1. Simplify your technology
A single commerce platform gives you a leaner and more flexible architecture to deliver greater agility, increased efficiency and more control. By centralising data and systems you can expect many IT efficiency improvements, including:
Scalability: third parties can easily plug in, building the ecosystem of retail software, tools, resources and devices you can add and change to match your business needs.
Accuracy: exposing data and functions (rather than moving and replicating them) reduces integration - improving efficiency, decreasing errors and increasing accuracy.
Easier to maintain: the single centralised platform reduces the need for reconciliation and manual processes to maintain and manage data and functions, and there is only one system to secure.
Reduced costs: reduced maintenance, management and integration of data and systems decrease your overheads.
2. Accelerate speed to market
These improvements in IT efficiency and flexibility let you meet business demands faster and innovate much more quickly. There’s less work required to plug in and implement new functions across channels, test cycles are reduced, and you’ll use development capacity more effectively. Teams currently tied up in building and checking integrations can be moved onto more innovative, customer-centric initiatives.
3. Optimise inventory and availability
Your most significant benefit will be increased sales generated by ranging and fulfilment capabilities that enable you to sell products across channels (and even sell products not normally stocked within any channels).
With a single view of stock across all locations, plus the ability to easily move it around the business, you’ll reduce your inventory costs and overall stock requirement. And by giving customers a range of purchasing and fulfilment options, you’ll enhance your service and increase customer satisfaction.
4. Boost in-store productivity and sales
You’ll benefit from lower shipping costs and increased sales when your ‘click-and-collect’ customers pick up their purchases at stores, with research showing nearly 50% of users bought additional items when picking up purchases.
Foot traffic has declined, and store closures are increasing. By arming your staff with extensive product details and providing shoppers with experiences that entertain and entice them to linger, you’ll enhance customer interactions, improve staff productivity and ultimately increase conversion.
5. Mobilise and personalise your customer experiences
The ability to see each customer’s shopping preferences and history across all channels is critical for building personalised shopping experiences.
With a holistic view of your customers, you’ll be able to better plan your pricing and promotion strategies and get the right offer or message to the right customer, at the right time and right place.
6. Use data for business insights
One of the most compelling benefits of unified commerce is the value that comes from using all the centralised data to obtain insightful or actionable information and have it available when and where it’s needed.
A single, unified platform gives you the ability to view all customer touchpoints and react to potential issues in real time. With a single source of truth and powerful analytics, you can turn large amounts of data from disparate sources into insights that help you to attract and engage customers in new ways, and improve your bottom line.
For more on unified commerce and why it’s the future of retail, download this free ebook.
Start your journey to unified commerce. Get in touch
Becoming customer-centric: The new mindset of fuel retail innovators
The fuel retail market faces a number of disruptive threats that are spurring massive change and a relentless focus on customer experience.
Kelly Brown explains why fuel retailers are shifting their focus from the vehicle to the customer, and how to remain relevant.
Three forces of disruption are changing the game for the fuel retail business: the rise of alternative fuels, emerging mobility models and sky-rocketing consumer demands for digital and personalised services.
While global demand for fuel will continue to increase over the next decade, this growth is not sustainable. The traditional fuel industry is on borrowed time: energy demand is expected to plateau around 2030 as the world shifts to renewables, and traditional sources of revenue will eventually evaporate and profitability dwindle.
How are fuel retailers innovating to survive?
The most innovative fuel retailers recognise that to unlock new business models and revenue streams they need to shift their focus from the vehicle to the customer.
Historically, fuel retailers have been focused on fuelling and servicing vehicles. While they also sell snacks and convenience goods to consumers in stores, the business is still centred on the vehicle, not the driver or walk-in customer.
In addition, fuel retailers have relied on convenient physical locations - “build and they will come” - rather than on inspiring their customers to visit them. Some have effectively given their customers (in the form of data and opportunities for relationships) to third party loyalty and payments providers, and to the brands they sell, like Coke.
The future business of fuel will be less vehicle-centric, and more focussed on the customer.
Today’s consumers expect brands to deliver fast and frictionless experiences through compelling interactions across all physical and digital touchpoints.
For fuel retailers, that means re-imagining the customer experience to become the place that people want, rather than need, to go to. It’s about becoming a neighbourhood hub, with more of what customers want. And it’s about extending your relationships outside the service station with digital channels and partnerships.
The fuel retailers that fail to recognise and seize this opportunity, will be the businesses left behind.
What steps can you take to revamp your customer experience?
Here’s a two-pronged strategy that will help offset the future decline in traditional income streams
1. Lock in your customers now
Focus on the end-to-end needs of your customers and revamp the customer journey to expand your relationship beyond quick visits to service stations.
That means enabling fast, digital, contact-free purchases, transforming your convenience stores with new products and services, and personalising your customer communications, offers and experiences. To do that you’ll need to create true omnichannel experiences that seamlessly integrate physical and digital channels to create an array of engaging customer experiences using your own brand, in conjunction with the third parties' customers value.
Case study: Our client Z Energy replaced a third party loyalty scheme with its own loyalty strategy and programme. Pumped is now Z’s cornerstone for innovation, with the ability to deliver the unified and personalised experiences its customers expect.
2. Embrace complexity to build new capabilities
To revamp your business and aggressively embrace innovation and new technologies, you’ll need to develop new expertise and capabilities. That will introduce more complexity into your organisation, with sales channels becoming less physical and more digital.
You’ll need to embrace agile working to innovate and get products to market faster. You’ll want a retail platform that connects your physical and digital channels to let you deliver customer experiences that go beyond the novel to become meaningful. And by using APIs, you can create an ecosystem of partnerships to deploy new apps, services, channels and devices.
Case study: Z Energy is transforming its business to pursue growth opportunities and deliver award-winning customer experiences, including a world-first innovation – a virtual fuel tank called Sharetank.
If you’d like help to create immersive, seamless and personalised customer experiences across all physical and digital channels, get in touch. We’d love to help you develop a unified customer journey.
Power your retail innovation strategy with APIs
Connecting channels and personalising the shopping experience is vital to meeting consumers’ rising expectations. One major advantage of using a unified commerce platform as your retail management system (RMS), is its open architecture that lets you easily make those connections with APIs.
APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) are present in every part of our digital world. Every time you use an app like LinkedIn, make a Skype call or listen to Spotify on your phone, there’s an API in action.
APIs let you add specialised functionality to a website, application, platform or software without having to write all of the back-end code. By using APIs, you can connect tools and expose data in real time, rather than having to replicate or move it. The result is one set of functions that’s available across various systems, plus an easy way to plug in and deploy new services, channels and devices.
These improvements let you shift your team’s priority from maintenance to innovation. By using APIs to access existing solutions in the market, you are free to focus your development efforts on the front-end. You can be more agile and create a community of third-party apps and systems that work together in an ecosystem. As a result, you’ll reduce integration and maintenance overheads, increase real-time accuracy and enjoy virtually limitless scalability and agility.
APIs in action
Here are just some of the ways APIs help you optimise operations and personalise customer experiences:
Retail anywhere, any time
APIs let you easily expose your product catalogues and other eCommerce solutions to give customers many more ways to engage with your brand, including social commerce.
Deliver anywhere, any how
Shipping and delivery APIs let you integrate third party services to automate everything from the sale through to the parcel being delivered to your customer’s address of choice. Think fulfilment options like click-and-collect, store-to-door and drop shipping.
Payment convenience counts
Give consumers the payment options and ‘buy-now, pay later’ services they want. Infinity was the first in the world to integrate with Afterpay at point of sale and supports Adyen, Smartpay, Laybuy, Alipay, WeChat Pay, and Slyp to name a few payment partners.
Voice and visual to boost personalisation
Visual search APIs help customers quickly find the products they want – like Cue Clothing’s Style Finder mobile app. And you can consider using Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant APIs to further tailor the shopping experience and boosts sales.
So how do you start making the most of APIs?
Begin by evaluating your company’s value chain. Can you easily integrate and use APIs to access third-party platforms and services to scale your business? Or can you release your own APIs to attract partners and build out your platform? The two options are not mutually exclusive.
An API-enabled platform like Infinity lets you scale your business quickly by easily adding new apps and services as business requirements change.
We can also help if you’re looking for advice on how to create a strategy and implement an API programme that quickly creates customer and business value.
The end result is the ability to create extraordinary customer experiences that help to capture market opportunities, generate additional revenue and build brand advocacy.
Find out more about Infinity APIs and our integration partners. Then contact us for advice on how to use APIs to achieve greater agility, faster growth and better margins.
People, partnerships and innovation: Why we introduced agile to Triquestra
Faster time to market, quality customer experiences, engaged employees and disruptive competitive advantages – each of these core business goals can be boosted with agile working.
Kelly Brown - CEO of Triquestra
I spoke with Kelly Brown, Triquestra’s CEO, about the business case for agile and how it helps retailers tackle their most pressing problems to deliver value for their customers and people.
For more on becoming an agile retailer, see our earlier blogs on why retailers should adopt agile and why you need both stability and agility to innovate.
What made you first pursue agile working?
KB: We started agile in 2016 with four business goals: High quality software, fast product delivery, energised and engaged people, and tight client partnerships.
Agile has helped us meet all of these objectives. It has improved the way we innovate to deliver products faster and better, and we adapt more quickly to market demands. Plus our team and clients have been impressed by what we’ve achieved together so quickly.
While many of agile’s benefits are well understood, its impact on both internal and external partner relationships is sometimes less appreciated.
People often talk about building ‘partnerships’ with their customers but aren’t clear on what that actually means. When you think about any relationship, you don't expect it to go well all the time. Things do go wrong and when that happens, the key question you’ll have to ask yourself is: ‘Do we have the same goals and will we collaborate to fix the problem?’
If your customer relationship goes bad every time something goes wrong, then it’s not really a relationship. It’s a transaction.
Agile changes the engagement from transactional to collaborative. It’s a completely different way of working together.
What can retailers do to move from transactional to collaborative partnerships?
KB: For agile to succeed, both parties have to play an active part in building a successful collaboration. This is done by focusing on shared success, continuous learning and iterative processes. Our clients not only achieved this with the Triquestra team, but within their own organisations by bringing their own business and technology teams closer together.
These business stakeholders are now highly involved in every stage of our product development. The work is delivered by self-organising and cross-functional teams selected from across each client’s organisation and the Triquestra team.
And they operate as one team. Everyone jointly sets the goals, agrees what’s in or out of scope, makes decisions as one team and equally shares in project success.
What were some key learnings from your move to agile?
KB: One of our biggest learnings was that although agile is perceived to be totally flexible, it’s not. The process is actually very rigid and disciplined. Once you put agile methodologies in place, your build becomes automated, like a factory.
But scope, priorities and mindset with that methodology – is really flexible. And that’s what generates all the innovation, agility and value.
Mostly it comes down to ‘being’ agile rather than ‘doing’ agile.
And we are constantly working on how to take both our processes and thinking to the next level. Our commitment to continuous learning has seen us recently engage experts at Fr@nk Innovation and Transformation to help us with current best practice and continually evolve our approach.
What else needed to change?
KB: The impact on people is profound and your culture will need to change. While we were fortunate to start with a flat management structure and diverse team, it can be challenging for people to move to small, self-managing teams.
We found that some people find it easy to adapt to agile and some people don’t. It comes down to each individual’s willingness and desire to embrace change.
Agile isn’t for everyone. Some people just don’t like change or prefer to be task driven. We found that the most successful people take the attitude: ‘I'm empowered, I can get this done’ and ask what they need to do to succeed in their role and help others do the same.
Another big learning was how to select and deploy the systems and technologies you need to support agile working. Agile teams need high visibility and regular communication and this can put pressure on traditional time, tracking, financial and management systems.
What are the successes you’ve had with agile?
KB: It’s no coincidence that the winning retail brands we support – such as Z Energy, Cue Clothing and Fonterra’s Farm Source – are the clients using agile with us.
With a deep knowledge of each client’s business needs and very close working relationships, we’re delivering higher quality products with valuable features, faster.
Agile has also transformed our culture. Our people are more engaged, energised and, generally, far happier. Because we’ve adopted agile, our teams are empowered to make the best calls on products and services, they achieve things faster, and their relationships with clients are better.
That has improved our staff retention and talent attraction. In a recent internal survey, almost everyone said that they would recommend working at Triquestra.
Another exciting outcome is that our clients recommend us to others and nominate us for awards. For example, we were thrilled when a panel of industry experts assembled by Inside Retail awarded us runner-up 2019 Supplier of the Year.
What are the benefits retailers can anticipate if they move to agile?
KB: Our clients tell us they enjoy the same benefits we’ve experienced. Their teams are happier and more productive, with better engagement and retention, they have greater connections between their business and IT teams (and the Triquestra team), they spend less time testing and get products to market faster. And their customers are getting innovative new experiences, faster.
One client reduced its regression and UAT testing by 50 percent. That’s a massive saving in time and effort, which has driven down costs and is helping to meet evolving market and business demands.
What are the most common questions you get from retailers considering the move?
KB: All clients want to know if agile is going to cost them more. While upfront costs can increase, our clients’ internal costs dramatically decrease, resulting in overall cost savings. And the improved time to market means that they are unlocking revenue increases or cost savings faster, re-balancing the return on investment equation.
For example, the retailer I just mentioned acknowledged that while agile was going to result in more upfront spending on product development, this would be more than offset by those downstream savings they’ve achieved through reduced testing.
The other common question I get is ‘Am I going to be able to control the outcome?’. It’s an important question because an agile partnership does need a high level of trust. You’re going to move from a top-down hierarchy to a more horizontal, self-managing model. There’s still control – it’s just exercised in a different way, with the focus shifting from the process to the output.
And while agile generates short bursts of tangible outputs and regular outcomes, the end product is not going to be defined and costed upfront like a traditional, waterfall approach.
That's a big shift and one that doesn’t work for all organisations or even all projects. But for those that make the jump, agile will forever change the way they work and deliver fantastic new experiences for their employees and customers.
If you’d like advice on how agile can work within your organisation, get in touch. We’re continually evolving our approach to product development using the agile methodology and we’d love to help you deliver capabilities faster and better to meet your changing market and business demands.
For more on how to give your retail business the flexibility and agility you want, download our ebook.
