Omnichannel Archives – unicommerce.com #1 Cloud based E-commerce Software Solutions to manage Order, Inventory, Warehouse Tue, 30 Jan 2024 11:43:08 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.5.2 https://infowordpress.s3.ap-south-1.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/03105610/favicon.png Omnichannel Archives – unicommerce.com 32 32 Omnichannel is the Future: Ship-From-Store Gaining Momentum https://unicommerce.com/blog/ship-from-store-gaining-momentum-with-omnichannel/ https://unicommerce.com/blog/ship-from-store-gaining-momentum-with-omnichannel/#respond Thu, 28 Sep 2023 10:53:09 +0000 https://unicommerce.com/?p=340792 The world of retail is undergoing a transformative evolution, one that is shaping and reshaping how consumers interact with brands and how brands position themselves in the market. Today’s consumer seeks a seamless transition between different touchpoints, expecting their favorite brands to be omnipresent – be it on an online platform or within the confines […]

The post Omnichannel is the Future: Ship-From-Store Gaining Momentum appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
The world of retail is undergoing a transformative evolution, one that is shaping and reshaping how consumers interact with brands and how brands position themselves in the market. Today’s consumer seeks a seamless transition between different touchpoints, expecting their favorite brands to be omnipresent – be it on an online platform or within the confines of a brick-and-mortar store.

Nowadays, people use multiple channels during their shopping journey, reflecting a pattern where consumers might browse in physical stores but finalize their purchases online, or vice versa.

Such trends clearly highlight that the retail landscape isn’t just changing; it’s converging. The distinctions of past shopping habits are blurring, making way for a holistic, integrated shopping experience. For brands, it’s clear that the future is Omnichannel, and they need to adopt this retailing swiftly to stay competitive in the e-commerce market. 

What is Omnichannel Retailing?

Omnichannel retailing is the convergence of multiple shopping channels to create a unified, cohesive customer experience. In simpler terms, it’s about ensuring that whether a customer interacts with a brand through a marketplace, D2C website, or physical store, the experience is consistent and integrated.

Take Nike, for instance, which offers a ‘Reserve & Try’ feature on its mobile app. Customers can reserve products online and try them on at their nearest Nike store. This connects the digital browsing experience directly with the in-store experience.

The Two-Way Street of Omnichannel

While it’s common to hear about traditional brick-and-mortar stores increasing their online presence, just like Chumbak, the opposite is just as prevalent. Digital-first brands are recognizing the value of offline interactions and are venturing into physical retail spaces. For instance, Rare Rabbit, initially an online-only luxury designer wear brand, now operates physical storefronts where customers can try their products, bridging the gap between online and offline retail. 

The Rising Importance of Ship-From-Store

One important element of the Omnichannel strategy is the ‘ship-from-store’ fulfillment model. Essentially, this leverages physical stores as mini-warehouses. If a customer orders a product online rather than shipping from a warehouse, the item might be dispatched from a nearby store. 

With companies deploying omnichannel retail solutions to meet customer expectations, online orders are increasingly being shipped from stores as brands are able to make faster deliveries and enhance their customer buying experience. 

But why are brands gravitating towards this model? Let’s look at some of the major benefits of ship-from-store!

Operational Benefits of Ship-From-Store

By turning retail stores into fulfillment centers, this approach offers numerous operational benefits to businesses. Here are some of these advantages:

operational benefits of ship from store to businesses

1. Inventory Optimization

One of the major benefits is the effective utilization of inventory. By using store stock to fulfill online orders, retailers can reduce excess inventory in some locations while meeting demand in others, thus minimizing stock outs or overstock situations. Also, this approach necessitates integrating inventory management systems, giving retailers real-time visibility into their stock across all locations. 

2. Reduced Shipping Costs

When products are shipped from a store closer to the customer, it reduces the overall distance a product needs to travel. This can translate into significant savings in shipping and freight costs.

3. Faster Delivery Times

Proximity to customers often means quicker delivery times. When an order is fulfilled from a local store, it can often be delivered within the same day or the next day, offering a competitive edge and enhancing customer satisfaction.

4. Enhanced Store Traffic

Offering services like buy-online-pick-up-in-store (BOPIS) or buy-online-return-in-store (BORIS) can increase foot traffic. As customers visit for pickups or returns, they might make additional in-store purchases.

Challenges in Implementing Ship-From-Store

Despite its many benefits, this fulfillment model introduces many new operational challenges to the retailer. One primary challenge is integrating multiple systems, such as in-store point-of-sale systems with online sales platforms, can be challenging. This integration is crucial for maintaining real-time inventory visibility and ensuring that online orders don’t overlap with in-store sales. 

Furthermore, manpower remains a concern. Traditional retail staff are often unprepared for the complexities of online order fulfillment, and during peak times, they might find themselves overwhelmed. This is especially true if an order is directed to a store with limited staff or even limited inventory, leading to potential delays or even mismanagement.

The Solution

Addressing these challenges requires investing in a single-window solution, encompassing both order and warehouse management capabilities that can seamlessly integrate different sales channels. Such systems are enhanced by advanced features like proximity-based order routing combined with dynamic capacity allocation. 

This means the system intelligently considers both the nearest location and the daily processing inventory and manpower capacity of each store when determining where to source orders from. This approach not only improves efficiency but also optimizes resources, making the entire process more streamlined and customer-centric.

Conclusion: Embracing the Omnichannel Shift

The ever-evolving retail landscape highlights the importance of the omnichannel approach, weaving together the distinct threads of in-store and online shopping. To thrive in this dynamic market, brands must not only acknowledge the omnichannel wave but ride it. By leveraging the right technology and adapting to changing consumer behavior, retailers can unlock different opportunities and a path for sustained success in the digital age.

Related read –
Top Omni-channel Retail Strategies
Omnichannel Retail Trends in the Middle East
How Leading Apparel Brand driving growth through Omnichannel Retailing

 

The post Omnichannel is the Future: Ship-From-Store Gaining Momentum appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
https://unicommerce.com/blog/ship-from-store-gaining-momentum-with-omnichannel/feed/ 0
Retail & Fashion Industry in UAE – Growth, Challenges & Solutions https://unicommerce.com/blog/retail-fashion-industry-growth-challenges-solutions-in-united-arab-emirates/ https://unicommerce.com/blog/retail-fashion-industry-growth-challenges-solutions-in-united-arab-emirates/#respond Sun, 12 Feb 2023 12:27:31 +0000 https://unicommerce.com/?p=290716 The post Retail & Fashion Industry in UAE – Growth, Challenges & Solutions appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>

By the beginning of 2023, the fashion retail industry in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is projected to grow to $4.86B. Over the next three years, it will continue to grow at an annual growth rate of 9.92%, resulting in projected volumes of $6.46B by 2025. By 2025, UAE’s fashion industry will have 6.1M users, and the average revenue per user (ARPU) is expected to be $936.80.
fashion in united arab emirates

Fashion is a competitive industry in the UAE. The country is home to all the major fashion retailers worldwide, from Zara, Next, and Nike to H&M, Gucci, and Chanel. UAE’s multicultural and diverse economy also means that the fashion industry is diverse. It comprises a mix of segments – from luxury and premium to affordable wear.

However, one common thread connecting all fashion segments is that many shoppers are keen to shop online. At the same time, several emerging fashion and retail challenges in the UAE are unique to the country.

Growth of E-commerce Fashion & Retail Industry in the UAE

Since the pandemic, the digitization of UAE’s fashion industry has accelerated; today, 7-9% of all fashion sales are online. Several fashion retailers – from big box retail stores to luxury retailers – also grew their e-commerce operations during the pandemic.

It was the nudge they needed to start exploring the full potential of retail innovation via e-commerce. Fashion retailers began building their online presence and bolstering their digital marketing strategies to attract users online.

Yet, merely making these two shifts was not enough to build a successful, sustainable e-commerce business model. The mall culture is still a vital part of a shopper’s mindset and lifestyle in this part of the world. To succeed, e-commerce platforms must overcome several operational challenges to meet consumer expectations.

Fashion and Retail Challenges in the United Arab Emirates (UAE)

uae fashion & retail brands challenges faced by businesses in 2023

The UAE has built a stellar reputation as a global shopping destination. The flagship stores of brands offer a superior consumer experience. However, 90% of the brands are yet to build an online presence. Brands must understand that consumers face certain limitations when it comes to shopping offline.

For instance, they may need to wait in long queues for trial rooms or when checking out. They may need help locating their size or a product in line with their requirements. They may also not have the time to physically come to the store. These challenges may discourage one from making purchases altogether. However, all these issues can be easily eliminated when a brand starts marketing its products online.

Here’s a look at some common fashion and retail challenges in the UAE and why brands should make the transition to online sales.

1. Poor retail consumer experience:

Today, consumers expect a seamless shopping experience that matches the finesse of service delivered at a brand’s flagship store. Issues such as the unavailability of products of all categories and sizes, the inability to compare the prices of similar products, and store-limited choices can decrease customer trust.

2. Inability to scale Inventory Management:

As sales grow, retailers likely face major issues in managing their inventories efficiently. Manual inventory management can lead to errors, duplication, and inaccurate data collection. It can also put undue pressure on warehouse resources, which may be overstocked or understocked. Storage in warehouses is costly, and the inability to optimize the experience affects profitability.

3. Inability to process returns efficiently:

Consumers face a difficult process when it comes to returns in retail shops. A returns process that causes consumer stress may restrict them from repeat purchases. The return policies vary on e-commerce platforms as most of the process is done without the need for any human intervention. Leverging efficient technology-based solutions help with seamless returns and refunds.

It is imperative for brands to make the transition to online sales to scale and maintain quality. They will need the support of tech-enabled inventory and order management solutions. These are the tools required by retail teams to reduce manual efforts and optimize their digital operations at scale.

Technology-Based Solutions to Overcome Fashion & Retail Challenges

Today, online and offline retailers can leverage comprehensive tech-enabled solutions that automate and streamline several repetitive tasks. These solutions offer smart insights that help businesses make better decisions. They provide analytics that gives information on consumer behavior, interests, and trends.

Here is a snapshot of solutions that brands can leverage to tackle common fashion and retail challenges in the United Arab Emirates:

1. Returns management:

Today, online retail customers primarily look for seamless returns. Returns happen at scale, creating chaos for retailers if not equipped with the right technology solutions. Returns management solutions are dedicated to solving these specific issues by automating the entire process. Online retailers will also have visibility of the whole return cycle via a dedicated & insightful dashboard. Another valuable feature is the returns data that can tell retailers a lot – for instance, what products and categories are not working. The returns rate is a key metric that brands can track and analyze for improving customer experience in the long run.

2. Quick Order Fulfilment:

Today, orders come from multiple channels –Offline stores, Direct to Consumer (D2C) websites, etc. You will also be using various shipping partners to fulfill orders. Fulfillment without delays, broken items, and incomplete orders is key to a retailer’s success, especially as one scales their business. Using an integrated omnichannel order management solution, you can automate the entire fulfillment cycle efficiently, accurately, and quickly. Businesses can track all orders through a unified dashboard.

3. Stable Logistics Integration:

E-commerce businesses use multiple shipping partners, marketplaces, ERP/ POS, and accounting software to run their operations. To ensure seamless operations, e-commerce businesses can leverage a middleware solution that creates a centralized command with a large number of stable logistics integrations.

4. Omnichannel-enabled Warehouse Management:

This solution enables e-commerce companies to manage multiple warehouses at any given time, automate purchase management, route and track shipments, and ensure location allocation at multiple warehouses simultaneously.

Read: How Kuwait-based Toyfull streamlined Warehouse Management Operations!

Explore – Top Warehouse Management System in the UAE

5. Omnichannel Order Management:

Online retailers receive orders from multiple sales channels, including physical stores, apps or websites, social media, online marketplaces, and messaging apps. Omnichannel order management system makes it convenient for consumers to shop through their preferred medium with a hassle-free experience. Even though the channels differ, all orders, inventory, and data are managed in one location, thus using a centralized workflow to process all orders efficiently. The software keeps updating as orders are placed and fulfilled, creating a seamless experience for the customer as well as the retailer.

Explore – Multichannel Order Management System to Maximize Business Profitability in the UAE!

The Bottom Line

Fashion is one of the largest retail categories in the United Arab Emirates, a country that is home to some of the more trendy and luxurious malls, branded stores, and shopping centers in the world. However, several retailers are struggling to compete in a world where more and more consumers are shopping online. The quality of their online retail experience needs to catch up with their vibrant, high-quality in-store experiences, thus enabling them to capture digital market share.

To address fashion and retail challenges in the UAE, companies must leverage tech-enabled solutions to compete in a digitally-driven world and reach their full potential. By making early investments in solutions such as returns management, quick order fulfillment, omnichannel-enabled warehouse management, omnichannel order management, and stable logistics integration, retailers will be able to bring a competitive edge to their digital engagement and sales. These steps will empower brands to focus on core business aspects that demand creativity and strategy and drive a higher return on investment.

Explore our platforms:

Related Read:

Uncover Big Brands Success Story with Unicommerce!

The post Retail & Fashion Industry in UAE – Growth, Challenges & Solutions appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
https://unicommerce.com/blog/retail-fashion-industry-growth-challenges-solutions-in-united-arab-emirates/feed/ 0
Solutions for Online Grocery & Pharma: Unlocking Fulfillment Operational Challenges Amidst Lockdown https://unicommerce.com/blog/solutions-for-online-grocery-pharma/ https://unicommerce.com/blog/solutions-for-online-grocery-pharma/#respond Mon, 06 Apr 2020 14:44:58 +0000 https://unicommerce.com/?p=18489 The nationwide lockdown has forced thousands of people to depend on the services of eGrocery providers like BigBasket, Grofers, Milkbasket etc., and ePharma platforms such as Netmeds, Medlife, 1mg etc. for the fulfilment of their groceries, essential demands, pharmaceuticals and medical supplements. This surge in demand has caused a turmoil in the operations of these […]

The post Solutions for Online Grocery & Pharma: Unlocking Fulfillment Operational Challenges Amidst Lockdown appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
The nationwide lockdown has forced thousands of people to depend on the services of eGrocery providers like BigBasket, Grofers, Milkbasket etc., and ePharma platforms such as Netmeds, Medlife, 1mg etc. for the fulfilment of their groceries, essential demands, pharmaceuticals and medical supplements. This surge in demand has caused a turmoil in the operations of these eGrocery and ePharma platforms causing sites or apps crashes, delayed/ cancelled deliveries and more such issues. 

People have been asked to stay back, not go out unless really necessary and only for purchasing either staples or medicines for them, but the real problem is to maintain social distancing in this situation and the obvious constraint of stocks. Closed borders, restricted travel have all added fuel to the disruption and fulfilment of orders even to the stores, let alone to people’s homes. 

Keeping all the issues of the public in focus, the government of India, Ministry of Home Affairs announced that eCommerce operations will continue to function with the delivery of essential goods and medicines will be done on a priority basis.

Supply chain operations from manufacturing, warehousing, to delivery, of essential items will continue to function while maintaining strict guidelines of sanitation and social distancing. To ensure enough manpower for the completion of all these tasks, employees of all such supply chain facilities will be provided with special e-passes and cards for smooth movement across all state borders and within localities. 

Increased Demands bring Magnified Issues: Unicommerce’s Solutions enable better processing in these times

As the demands surged, management of entire supply chain operations took a drastic hit and grocery or pharma providers have been struggling ever since. The major issues faced by online providers include supply chain management, ensuring last-mile deliveries and restricting delayed delivered or cancelled orders. 

Apart from this, most online Grocery and Pharma platforms requested time in order to regain stocks in their warehouses to further proceed with order delivery in various parts of the nation. Looking upon the major challenges faced in these industries, Unicommerce has been working on the go to provide support to our clients and through that to the consumers to not be in a situation of disrupted supplies. 

Unicommerce’s solutions have been designed to meet the needs of all our clients in managing their order and inventory, keeping track of deliveries and ensuring smooth flow of operations throughout the order cycle. 

Listed below are the major areas of support that we have been providing our clients dealing in essential products to ensure timely delivery of supplies all around the nation. 

Read: How Dubai-based Vidiwell achieved 230% sales order growth in 7 months while implementing seamless shipping to 5+ countries in the Middle East

Manage High Surge in Demand with Stock Prioritization

Panic buying among consumers and unclear provisions of supply caused a severe surge in demands and brands providing online delivery of medicines and groceries saw sudden disruption of services. In an interview with one of the leading media houses, a spokesperson from the Big basket team said that “We need a little more time to get items back in stock as all our stocks ran out quickly following the lockdown announcement.” Also, in another article by Financial Express, CEO Grofers, as well as CEO Milkbasket, shared the same concerns of 100% surge in demands and the issues of stock management to fulfil large number of orders.

In these times, our ePharma and eGrocery clients have extensively been using our order management system & inventory management software to swiftly manage their entire surge in demand and to maintain inventory accuracy and visibility by prioritizing which orders to deliver first to avoid SLA breaches, enabling quick order processing across channels, restricting any halts in service and reducing the effects of any disruption caused in fulfilment

Stock freshness remains the top priority of ePharma and eGrocery businesses, and Unicommerce’s batching solution helps the FMCG and Pharma industry to track, allocate, return or liquidate inventory frequently with uniquely traceable parameters like expiry date, mfg date, cost of purchase, vendor batch number etc. further enabling fulfilment of orders through different picking strategies such as FIFO, FEFO etc. ensuring accurate delivery of products

To help companies with the disrupted yet rapidly increased demands of staples, caused by the announcement of a complete lockdown in the country, stock audits in warehouses through our solutions such as Cycle Count can help brands reconcile all inventory.

Restrict Operational Glitches Through Warehouse Automation

In order to process orders and fulfil deliveries, stock in warehouses play the most important role and currently the stocks have an uncertainty of being available in these warehouses as most of them are either stuck in transportation or not yet manufactured. All of these cause operational glitches. 

Unicommerce’s warehouse management system helps automate entire warehouse processes from picking, packing, dispatch to how goods are received from the suppliers in the warehouse.

Our clients who use our WMS have always had the ease to know well before about any shortages in stock, a regular cycle of rotation of orders based on their shelf lives and much more.

Here’s a glimpse of our success stories: How Unicommerce strengthened GNC India’s business operations across multiple sales channels boosting 100% fulfillment rate

Enable & Track Last-mile Deliveries 

Delivery of orders right to the last mile and on time is what these platforms are struggling to manage in these times. Real-time delivery status makes the whole process much more efficient and in these times when the orders keep shooting up and customers are anxious enough to receive their order, it becomes much more important to keep track and ensure deliveries are made to the farthest extent and faster.

To make sure you are able to get through the challenge of managing your delivery, Unicommerce gives you the opportunity to check and be updated on the real-time status of your deliveries sent through 30+ global logistics providers. This gives you the assurance of delivery being made on time and that of your customers being fully satisfied.

Make Offline Inventory available through Omnichannel Solution

This lockdown has brought us to a state of being completely cut off from the outside world and in these times offline outlets may not see customers walking in their doors for quite some time. For businesses that are not present online and have been managing only through offline channels, the road to profit may be longer than those with an online presence. Once you go omnichannel, the horizon to reach your consumers widens to a great extent.

Our omnichannel solution brings offline inventory into a centralised inventory pool and enables the retail and eCommerce operations to help brands sell across multiple channels. All the retail points receive accurate stock information and automated inventory updates to further plan their selling strategies.

The major challenges for the ePharma and eGrocery platforms can precisely be managed with the help of numerous solutions offered by Unicommmerce. Ensuring uninterrupted services amid the Coronavirus lockdown should not only be taken into account for business purposes but as a service to the entire nation. In one of his interactions, PM Shri Narendra Modi emphasised on the need of technology-driven solutions as the future of eCommerce operations and also as a huge support in such times when we all are forced to lock ourselves inside our homes and only through technology and highly advanced solutions can we continue to thrive.

The post Solutions for Online Grocery & Pharma: Unlocking Fulfillment Operational Challenges Amidst Lockdown appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
https://unicommerce.com/blog/solutions-for-online-grocery-pharma/feed/ 0
The Changing Face Of Retail – Keeping Customer At The Centre Of All Touch Points https://unicommerce.com/blog/changing-face-of-retail-omnichannel/ https://unicommerce.com/blog/changing-face-of-retail-omnichannel/#respond Tue, 14 May 2019 12:32:15 +0000 http://www.unicommerce.info/?p=9668 Retails today are concerned about selling more through many channels. But fail at providing a seamless experience to the customers across all touch points. This missing connection with the customers not only drives new customers away but also prohibits brands from retaining old customers.

The post The Changing Face Of Retail – Keeping Customer At The Centre Of All Touch Points appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
Today, retail is all about creating the ultimate shopping experience. Why?

Because the future of modern retail lies in creating meaningful and memorable relationships.

Retails today are concerned about selling more through many channels. But fail at providing a seamless experience to the customers across all touch points. This missing connection with the customers not only drives new customers away but also prohibits brands from retaining old customers.

The Unforeseen Consequence Of Multichannel Retail

“I don’t very often hear customers talking about ‘channels’ or ‘journeys’ or even ‘experiences’, customers just tell us they want to go shopping,” says Argos digital director Mark Steel.

The biggest challenge of retail is still focused on building connected customer experiences, irrespective of channel so that customers can enjoy a great shopping experience whenever, wherever and however they choose.

  • Inconsistent customer experience – When selling across many marketplaces, your customers go through a different experience across various sale points. Because of this, your brand image takes a hit. And customers are no longer restricted by brand loyalty to come back and shop from you.
  • Cumbersome performance evaluation- Multichannel retail makes it difficult to evaluate the market response and customer behaviour on each individual channel. And if your operations are manual, tracking and analyzing market response becomes all the more difficult.
  • Laborious management – For an early startup retail business, tracking sales across various sales points is easy. But eventually, every startup expects growth, increase in sales and higher profits.
    Imagine tracking a high number of everyday sales across 10+ marketplaces. If I tell you it’s difficult, it would be an understatement. It is nearly impossible to efficiently track sales across 10+ marketplaces without errors. This impacts the time of delivery, inventory management, customer satisfaction, and order fulfilment.
  • Integrating online/offline stores – This is a crucial step to achieving higher customer satisfaction in modern retail. When customers shop from you, they expect to be able to order online and pick it up from your offline store and vice versa. But non-integration of online & offline store restricts you from providing this seamless shift to the customers.

product-delivery

Fulfill Customer Expectations Through Omnichannel Retail

Retailers need to shift their focus from ‘platform’ to ‘purpose’. The only true channel in the future of retail is the consumer.

If you want to stay relevant across marketplaces in the coming years, you need to be able to engage with your customer. Further, you need to provide the best shopping experience for all your customers across all channels (whether online or offline).

And the omnichannel retail solution can help retailers, like yourself, to engage customers with consistent quality service across various channels of markets; online marketplaces, physical stores or a company website.

Read: How a Fashion & Accessories Brand Managed 145 Stores with Omnichannel Implementation

Integrated Order Management

The customer has endless options of where he can place an order to buy your product. For this reason, it is crucial to have an assimilated and robust cross-channel order management system in place.

The omnichannel retail solution can help you integrate orders from e-commerce sites, the company site, and the physical stores and processes it in bulk to keep the logistics costs low.

This helps in allocating orders from various POS to the nearest store for processing and shipment. This allows you flexibility and ease of routing the orders based on geographical location.

Online & Offline Store Integration [Endless Aisle]

Integrating the online and offline store could be very beneficial for your business. It can help you easily process orders across various marketplaces and stores.

Centralized Omni commerce platforms ensure the smooth functioning of business operations. Once you integrate your online and offline stores, you can –

  • Cut down the logistics cost
  • Process orders in bulk for quick dispatch
  • Manage online website, offline store orders from a single panel
  • Periodically generate data
  • Higher customer satisfaction
  • Expand your reach by crossing geographical hurdle in delivering orders

retail-store

Accurate delivery

The buyer’s journey does not end once they have placed an order at your online or offline store. The entire process from placing the order to the delivery, constitute the buyer’s journey. You need to ensure this process is smooth for the customers by ensuring accurate delivery of orders.

Automated operations can help you simplify logistics and accurately pack, label and deliver products. Based on the region, price, and weight of the order fulfilment, you can assign an apt logistic partner for the shipment of the order.

In fact, your customers can also choose how they want the order to be delivered. Whether they choose to pick it up from the nearby physical store or receive it at their doorstep.

Hassle-Free Returns Management

Order return management is a critical task for both you and your customer. The efficiency of delivering (and returning) orders reflects the customer’s experience with your brand.

Thus, you need to unify online and physical stores and deal with order returns effectively. Unabridged integration of marketplaces and stores help carry out the receiving of returns easily. It also helps in building a positive brand image. And leads to higher customer satisfaction.

Brand consistency

When customers have the same experience on each marketplace as well as your offline store, it helps in building trust and brand loyalty. It encourages the customers to come back to you for the seamless shopping experience. Increased brand consistency enhances the overall growth of your company.

Transform Shopper’s Experience Today

Retailers need to move with the shifting trends in the future of retail. Without changing with the dynamic market, your business can never succeed at the pace that you want.

We at Unicommerce, help businesses just like yours, create the ultimate shopping experience and help you rapidly increase sales and revenue.

Request a free demo with us today!

The post The Changing Face Of Retail – Keeping Customer At The Centre Of All Touch Points appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
https://unicommerce.com/blog/changing-face-of-retail-omnichannel/feed/ 0
9 Efficient ways to Optimise Retail Operations to accelerate business growth https://unicommerce.com/blog/9-efficient-ways-optimise-retail-operations-accelerate-business-growth/ https://unicommerce.com/blog/9-efficient-ways-optimise-retail-operations-accelerate-business-growth/#comments Tue, 16 Jan 2018 12:07:11 +0000 http://www.unicommerce.info/?p=3244 Retail operations are more than stock planning. It is an amalgamation of inventory, logistics, warehouse management, multichannel pricing management, integrating stores and orders across channels. Unless the pain points are recognised and addressed in these crucial functions, your retail business will keep suffering profit drainage and restricted growth irrespective of how big the retail industry […]

The post 9 Efficient ways to Optimise Retail Operations to accelerate business growth appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
Retail operations are more than stock planning. It is an amalgamation of inventory, logistics, warehouse management, multichannel pricing management, integrating stores and orders across channels. Unless the pain points are recognised and addressed in these crucial functions, your retail business will keep suffering profit drainage and restricted growth irrespective of how big the retail industry is growing and how many opportunities galore.

It’s time to optimise your retail operations to leverage business growth and increase the footprint in the market.

The first thing that any retail business should ensure is consistent inventory.

Inventory visibility – is the chief contributor to retail success. To ensure round the year inventory visibility across multiple channels of sales, maintaining accurate inventory is necessary. The business should have a inventory management software system that automatically manages inventory levels and visibility. Optimising the fundamental and critical factor like inventory ensure business success.

Efficient order fulfilment – Pick pack and ship on time and intact is what makes your customer happy and wants to come back to you again and again. You cannot do that without gearing up and streamline how orders are managed and fulfilled till the last mile.

Warehouse planning – Lesser wastage of warehouse space is a great way to push your sales volume to the ceiling. Any retail needs to plan and store the inventory in warehouses intelligently, without unnecessary stocking up of a non-moving stock. Planning the warehouse space is critically important to ensure optimum stock availability and order fulfilment.

Scale up to the challenges of omnichannel – Establishing tandem between online and offline sales operations and order management is essential to any retail success. Since the market is moving towards omnichannel, efficient management of both physical and digital processes significantly contribute to the optimising of your retail business.

Seamless shopping experience – Plan your physical retail space to offer the enriching experience of shopping to your customers as an extension of the digital channel. Creating a seamless shopping experience that enables placing an order, paying as convenient, picking up the order from a preferred mode, returning on the most comfortable channel; accelerate the retail business growth many folds.

Cross-selling – of hit and the slacking stock is a smart way to ensure healthy stock rotation and its optimum level. Simultaneously it positively affects the productivity and profitability.

Unified marketing activities – Tailor the promotional activities taking into account your customers’ preferred shopping channels, their shopping pattern, season etc. The activity should have a specific motto to excite and drive the customers to your brand.

Let your data do more – How you handle the data from various channels almost instantly shows on your other retail activities. Analysing and taking action on the periodically generated data helps the businesses steer clear of the non-contributing, unprofitable channels, stock and operations.

Automation is the key – There are two ways to keep a tab on your data flow. One periodic audit of all the retail operations or automating the whole process of inventory, warehouse, orders, offline sales, sales promotional activities etc. Automation of operations not only gives you ample space to work-out your go-to-market strategies but utilises lesser resources to the fullest, increasing productivity.

So, here are some of the tips to optimise your retail operations. To know how best you can automate your operations so that you can focus on core activities of business development and management, check out Unicommerce – suit of e-commerce products.

Our Ecommerce Solutions for Ecommerce Businesses:

The post 9 Efficient ways to Optimise Retail Operations to accelerate business growth appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
https://unicommerce.com/blog/9-efficient-ways-optimise-retail-operations-accelerate-business-growth/feed/ 1
Define How Your Customers Experience Omnichannel Marketing https://unicommerce.com/blog/define-customers-experience-omnichannel-marketing/ https://unicommerce.com/blog/define-customers-experience-omnichannel-marketing/#respond Sat, 16 Dec 2017 12:15:21 +0000 http://www.unicommerce.info/?p=3247 Omnichannel has been the critical market strategy for some time. The results and challenges of adapting omnichannel marketing are changing the business landscape and the way customer’s encounter the brand or the product. Omnichannel’s focus is to unify online and offline marketing channels complying with brand communication to provide a uniform and seamless brand interaction […]

The post Define How Your Customers Experience Omnichannel Marketing appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
Omnichannel has been the critical market strategy for some time. The results and challenges of adapting omnichannel marketing are changing the business landscape and the way customer’s encounter the brand or the product.

Omnichannel’s focus is to unify online and offline marketing channels complying with brand communication to provide a uniform and seamless brand interaction experience to the customers.

While most of the companies work on improving their material flow from one end to the other across all the channels; it’s not enough.

There is a pressing need to create a milieu of customer experience that defines and drives them to interact with the brand again and again. Here’s how to create a lasting customer experience in the omnichannel market.

Firstly, why is it essential to create an ecosystem for the customer experience?

Wikipedia explains customer experience as,

“In commerce, customer experience is the product of an interaction between an organisation and a customer over the duration of their relationship.”

It is very natural for the customers to lose touch with or interest in the brand given the vastness of omnichannel concept and operations. The need to keep the customer engaged and interested in your product or service is a challenge. For example, the tech-savvy end users are often inconsistent when it comes to sticking around a product. How to keep them interested in your offering? Be continually visible to them by offering more digital touch-points and creating an interactive customer experience (or CX).

The advantages of focusing on creating worthwhile customer experience are

  • Constant touch with consumers helps a great deal to forecast the future opportunities and challenges accurately.
  • Enable seamless adaptation to the customer preferences.
  • Swiftly act to tap into the potential market or a business idea, right from ideation to the production and launch.
  • Build a robust network of business partners and enhance your reach and exceed the competition.

The second important thing is how to create an enthralling customer experience in the omnichannel market?

Omnichannel approach opens up lot more opportunities to connect with the consumer than one ever anticipated! The businesses have to think beyond product or service to develop an invaluable customer journey in the first place.

  • Create sufficient touch bases with the customers both online and offline through emails, TVCs, feedback mechanism, social networks, media and recommendations.
  • Initiate the customer journey with your brand on physical, rational and emotional levels.
  • Study impact of diverse interactions with the customers on various platforms.
  • Provide a uniform and unequivocal shopping experience to all the customers across all the channels.
  • Invest in building a mechanism in place to re-invite the customers to explore the brand or product further.

The above moves create a customer experience, from starting the journey with the brand to interacting with it at various levels and experiencing the product and the service directly. The cumulative effect of having a compelling customer engagement strategy is a fulfilling customer experience.

Arriving at the last point of our post, let’s see who are the key contributors to creating a customer experience.

All the stakeholders in the omnichannel business significantly influence the customer experience. They are the company, vendors, shipping partners, e-commerce sites, online and offline stores, franchisees and the ultimately the customers themselves. These stakeholders add value to the entire operation of creating a memorable customer experience.

The post Define How Your Customers Experience Omnichannel Marketing appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
https://unicommerce.com/blog/define-customers-experience-omnichannel-marketing/feed/ 0
Omnichannel: Future of Retail Commerce https://unicommerce.com/blog/omnichannel-future-retail-commerce/ https://unicommerce.com/blog/omnichannel-future-retail-commerce/#respond Sat, 02 Sep 2017 02:17:33 +0000 http://blog.unicommerce.com/?p=773 According to the present market analysis, Retail can be summarized in two ways—Brick & Mortar (physical) Retail and E-commerce (digital) Retail, each of them being resourceful and impactful at delivering values. Brick & Mortar retail gives customers the touch and feel of products & brands while E-commerce offers them the flexibility of choice &  greater […]

The post Omnichannel: Future of Retail Commerce appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
According to the present market analysis, Retail can be summarized in two ways—Brick & Mortar (physical) Retail and E-commerce (digital) Retail, each of them being resourceful and impactful at delivering values.

Brick & Mortar retail gives customers the touch and feel of products & brands while E-commerce offers them the flexibility of choice &  greater convenience. With each of them having their own set of benefits still fails to enhance the customer experience. Physical retail doesn’t offer choice to select a particular product from a variety of range while digital retail takes the customers through the hassles of after shopping effects like returns, size mismatches, and wrong product deliveries.

So, in this era of hyper-connected consumers, a retail mechanism needs to be enhanced to a level which delivers greater customer experience, seamless and an unmatchable shopping experience across all the platforms where the customer is or may be available.

Source: Ipsos OTX/Google 2012 Holiday Shopping Intentions Survey, 1500 respondents

“I want us to stop talking about digital and physical retail as if they’re two separate things. The customer doesn’t think of it that way, and we can’t either”– Doug McMillon, CEO Walmart. 

The above quote from Doug McMillon clearly indicates the requirement for the merger of Physical and Digital Retail which is nothing but what Omnichannel commerce is all about. In present market scenario, this merger will be benefitting for consumers, to feel like King by completely sorted and smooth shopping experience and at the same time for both online and offline retailers to increase their demand and presence in the market.

With the drift of product driven market to a consumer-driven market, retailers are now focusing on getting their business operations more advanced to be in line with the current market changes. Managing offline orders at physical stores would no longer be just a point of sale and processing multichannel online orders would no longer be just sale with deep discounts after the implementation of the Omnichannel mechanism. Reforming traditional business mechanism to Omnichannel mechanism comes with its own set of challenges for the retailers.

For retailers, along with revenue growth and ROI, factors like increased customer satisfaction, net promoter scores, loyalty, and brand insight are required to attract new prospects and maintain a large customer base. Selecting right processes and technology are essential for enabling complete Omnichannel experience.

In case of Omnichannel solutions, technology majorly needs to provide following features:

In order to experience complete benefits of Omnichannel, retailers must consider their capabilities and the challenges to seamlessly integrate systems such as CRM, POS, Order management software (OMS), Warehouse Management (WMS), stores and E-commerce platforms.

And the solution to all such challenges…

E-commerce supply chain management solutions provided by Unicommerce are focused on changing the face of retail in present market scenario.

Unicommerce is a SaaS-based product which exhibits its Order and Warehouse Management solutions to automate client’s supply chain operations for online and offline businesses (Both B2B and B2C). Unicommerce comes pre-integrated with 40+ online Marketplaces and 30+ Logistic partners, with support for offline channels as well to manage the needs of Wholesalers, Distributors, Retail Chains, Individual Store owners and E-commerce sellers to increase revenue and save operations cost.

Unicommerce’s Omnichannel feature ensures the same level of customer experience irrespective of where the customer decides to purchase from (online marketplace or offline store). It enables central management of orders and inventory of online & offline stores. It also helps e-tailers in the routing of an online order to nearest store, thus providing a uniform experience to the customers and also lead to minimize logistics cost.

A detailed description of Key Modules of Unicommerce’s Omnichannel feature:

Key Modules of Unicommerce’s Omnichannel feature

1. Dynamic Order Allocation

Robust dynamic allocation for online orders to ensure that the online orders get routed to nearest offline store to minimize logistic cost. The order routing is flexible, and can be done based on the pincode, city location, state location etc. We provide a scalable solution to manage 1000+ stores.

2. Online/Offline Stores Integration

Unicommerce Omnichannel solution provides a seamless integration of online and offline stores including websites & pre integrated 40+ marketplaces. Integrating Multichannel, websites and offline stores to Uniware will help e-tailers to centrally manage the E-commerce and offline business, thus providing uniform customer experience which is the key to success in Omni channel retailing.

3. Centralized Order Management

Unicommerce Omnichannel solution comes with pre-integrated world’s leading marketplaces and cart integration solutions, Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal, Magento, Shopify, etc., so along with managing your Offline store orders, dispatch your online orders faster by printing invoices, labels and manifests in a few clicks.

4. Centralized Inventory Management

Unicommerce inventory management software lets you centralize the inventory for both online and offline businesses and auto sync the inventory across 40+ Marketplaces. It lets you automate the inventory, define criteria and set priorities so that you never oversell. Using Unicommerce’s omnichannel solution ensures entire offline inventory gets online helping better inventory turnover, and reducing the cost of working capital, in addition to increasing sales

5. Logistics Integration

Purchasing Shipments is the backbone of E-commerce/retail industry. We understand this and that’s why Unicommerce comes pre-integrated with 30+ Logistics partners and self-managed logistics which helps you deal with any Geographical Restrictions and pushes you to sell anywhere.

6. ERP Integration

Unicommerce allows you to seamlessly integrate information of your online business (orders, inventory etc.) across 40+ marketplaces with any ERP Integration (SAP, Oracle, Navision etc.) to centralize your website, marketplaces and offline inventory.

Selecting right processes and technology is essential for enabling complete Omnichannel experience. As it will help to digitize the retail stores and connect them to the world of E-commerce.

Unicommerce’s Warehouse & Omnichannel solutions are already being used by 5000+ brands like,

& many more… who are fruitfully experiencing the enlisted benefits:

The post Omnichannel: Future of Retail Commerce appeared first on unicommerce.com.

]]>
https://unicommerce.com/blog/omnichannel-future-retail-commerce/feed/ 0