Retail in Motion
Mobile technology is increasingly being used in all areas of the enterprise to create a truly seamless customer experience that starts in the back office and extends across all touchpoints. Samuel Mueller, CEO of Scandit, developer of a software-based barcode scanning solution and suite of mobile apps, recently discussed with Chain Store Age how mobile solutions are affecting every part of the retail enterprise.
What are the latest trends in employee-facing mobile solutions?
With the ubiquity of mobile devices, retailers are enabling staff to use low-cost hardware to deliver a higher level of consultative service and customer support in-store. With a simple barcode scan, mobile clienteling apps can now empower store personnel to provide customers with the vital product information and inventory levels they need on the fly. Retailers are also offering mobile POS apps that enable their salesforce to complete transactions from anywhere in-store using a smartphone or tablet.
Many retail chains are using mobile devices in back-office operations, as well. For example, with an inventory management app that includes scanning functionality, employees are empowered to calculate or update inventory levels in the warehouse using any mobile or wearable device, such as Google Glass. Using a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) model, retailers can do all of this without the additional costs of dedicated devices.
What are the latest trends in customer-facing mobile solutions?
With the saturation of smartphones in the consumer market, retailers are arming their customers with mobile apps that deliver unprecedented levels of customer loyalty, engagement, and service that enable customers to learn additional product details.
Another trend is the use of self-checkout apps that enable customers to add products to their cart while shopping and checkout on the go using their mobile device. These apps utilize mobile barcode scanning capabilities to speed up the shopping experience and eliminate the need for traditional checkout stations, successfully freeing up valuable in-store real estate.
By using mobile shopping and self-checkout apps that deliver analytics and customer history data, retailers benefit from a real-time, two-way customer communication channel. This has opened up many powerful marketing and engagement possibilities, including the ability to provide coupons, discounts and points toward loyalty rewards programs.
How is mobile technology revolutionizing the POS?
Dedicated, traditional hardware-based POS systems are costly and take up valuable real estate for merchants. As mentioned before, retailers are now using tablets and smartphones that include mobile POS apps, allowing store personnel to scan products and check out customers anywhere in the store with a mobile device. This is reducing checkout times and increasing customer satisfaction.
How can retailers lower the barrier of entry to creating a mobile enterprise?
In order to compete in today’s environment, retailers need to deliver a highly differentiated mobile experience for shoppers and employees, but many don’t have the in-house resources to develop these solutions. There are customizable, pre-built retail apps for mobile devices available that are easy to integrate with retailers’ existing systems, allowing retailers to rapidly deploy these apps and without the high cost of development, thus lowering the barrier of entry for retailers to creating a mobile enterprise.
How does Scandit help retailers enable their business for mobile?
Scandit, which works with a variety of major retailers, including Party City and Coop, offers an integrated suite of mobile apps that enhance the customer shopping experience and streamline retail operations. Our Mobile App Suite for Retail encapsulates a wide array of best practices and proven retail use cases in time-tested, high-quality, fully customizable, cross-platform mobile apps for retail employees and customers, including clienteling, mobile POS, mobile shopping self-checkout, shopping lists and procurement. This suite of retail apps successfully powers multichannel retail strategies from back-office operations to the sales floor and beyond, all via the power of mobile.