If your retail sales team is currently strategizing and preparing for effective in-store merchandising, you’ll be pleased with recent statistics.
Studies show that 70 percent of purchase decisions are made in-store, and approximately 7 out of 10 store shoppers prefer to leave a store with a purchase in hand.
When customers visit retail stores, they intend to purchase something. In-store visits from customers present the perfect opportunity for representatives to boost sales by using various strategic optimization tactics (aka retail execution strategies).
While customers are typically ready to purchase when they walk through the door, it’s also critical to note that brands lose 25% of sales annually to poor retail execution practices.
This post will cover a few successful retail execution strategies you should implement to maximize sales opportunities so you can ensure your brand is effectively capturing consumers' attention.
What is Retail Execution?
Retail execution is a business procedure that ensures the overall brand strategy of a consumer products maker is carried out in retail outlets. Simply said, retail execution seeks to place the appropriate goods on the appropriate shelf at the appropriate moment.
Think about the last time you impulsively bought something. Was it because of placement, pricing, or promotion? Successful retail execution strategies aim to attract those impulsive purchases from consumers. The first step in this process is to understand the customer by collecting relevant information.
Focus on capturing comprehensive consumer data
The retail world has endless opportunities to collect consumer data, but that doesn’t mean the process is naturally straightforward for every brand and retailer.
According to Kara Romanow's recent retail execution report, The Scope of Retail Execution, nearly half of retailers have problems obtaining data rapidly. Additionally, one-third of respondents claimed they had difficulty accessing data from multiple sources and efficiently presenting it to sales.
To improve retail execution strategies, brands and retailers must standardize their consumer data and point-of-sale data collection methods, typically with a retail execution and management platform.
Retail execution management software helps capture and organize data, so brands and retailers understand shopping trends, quickly identify growth opportunities, and learn critical information about the competition.
When brands and retailers invest in the right technology, it informs data-driven decisions on how to build effective promotions and strategize more effectively.
Plan and monitor in-store promotions
Once you have a tool to help you with retail execution and point of sale management, it’s time to make a plan to maximize sales opportunities with data-driven promotions.
Your team can review data related to sales, merchandise, and promotions to glean insights about the best strategies for seasonal sales, holiday promotions, and more. Additionally, data offers insight into which general merchandise and promotional activities will most dramatically affect sales.
Sales planning and monitoring improve your bottom line. According to statistics, targeted promotions can raise sales by 193%.
It’s also worthy to note that success for planned promotions depends on creating a smart roll-out plan, educating sales representatives, and complying with the plan.
Thankfully, it’s also possible to capture data about employee adherence to promotional plans and make any adjustments or re-alignments as necessary.
Strengthen brand and retailer relationships
Another critical aspect of successful retail execution is making sure brands and retailers maintain healthy, productive, and ongoing relationships.
To ensure consumers are getting the products and goods they want and need from businesses, brands and retailers must monitor stock and inventory, consumer demand, competition, and industry trends.
When brands and buyers collect data on merchandise, inventories, and trends, they can ensure the retail cycle runs smoothly.
In other words, tracking in-store purchasing activity assists companies with forecasting and purchasing stock and inventory.
The last thing merchants want is to run out of a popular collection, and the last thing brands want is to miss out on a sale due to insufficient data collection or declining partnerships.
Wrap Up
Consumers have thousands of options when it comes to purchasing clothing. The brands and retail stores that experience the most success in the field are the ones that know how to capture data and use data to create promotions that resonate with consumers at the point of sale.
Successful retail execution is also more than putting cute clothes on the shelf for all shoppers to see. It's a partnership. Retailers and brands must stay connected through technology, tools, and by building ongoing and mutually beneficial buyer-seller relationships. Remember, as you nurture your brand and retailer relationships, tools like NuORDER can help you keep track of inventory and collaborate online.
