Personalisation and relevance are two buzzwords we keep hearing over and over again. We keep hearing them because consumers are demanding them when it comes to their online experiences and, increasingly, their offline experiences.
For the retail store, excelling in delivering a personalised and relevant experience to their shoppers is going to be the key driver in their success. Retail stores are under increasing pressure from e-commerce. Despite the fact that 94% of sales are still generated in the brick-and-mortar store, footfall is declining by 15% annually.
The best retailers are combating this by delivering a seamless ‘omnichannel’ experience for their customers, where the digital and ‘real-life’ blend together to build brand loyalty, deliver success and hit growing revenue targets.
However, as pressure to control costs ramps up, store managers are often faced with the battle of trying to do more with less resources. This makes it all the more harder for them to deliver on the aim of giving a fantastic in-store experience for their customers. The two most precious resources they have are staff and time. And we know that when retail stores manage both of these resources more effectively, they have happy customers.
This is the essence of great workforce management; create more time in order to deliver a better service. Here’s three ways retailers are doing it:
1. Smarter Scheduling
Scheduling is an art form and the key is making sure the right people are in the right place at the right time. When scheduling is combined with business intelligence, store managers are able to see the optimum numbers of staff they need in-store at any given time. They can see when there’s a peak demand and adjust scheduling automatically to cope with that. By automating this process and using data to make scheduling decisions, retail stores are becoming smarter, more effective and more efficient.
2. Less time in front of a computer
Store managers are an incredible asset and most of them are promoted internally, having learnt their trade working on the shop floor. They then move into management positions and end up spending less time doing the job they love and more time in front of a computer. We changed all that. By being able to automate core processes like time and absence management, scheduling and budgeting, we’ve given store managers their time back. This means they can focus on their customers as well as delivering a great experience.
3. Empowered staff
When retailers make life easy for their employees they are removing distractions and time drains from the equation. An employee who doesn’t have to worry about when they’re working next because they have a complete overview of their schedule on their phone is an employee can concentrate and focus on doing a great job. Empowered staff are engaged staff and, not only do they have more time, the enjoy work and as a result deliver a top-notch customer experience. Don’t just take our word for it, see how Quinyx is helping this employee at GANT enjoy his work.
75% of retailers believe that developing a more engaging in store experience will be critical to success in the next 5 years. The easiest way to develop this experience is to invest in a workforce management system.
