With the shift to e-commerce and the COVID-19 outbreak, brick-and-mortar retailers have disappeared as a result of the e-commerce market. When a customer enters a retail outlet, she expects impeccable service, much like the one she receives online. That puts a lot of pressure on the retailers to ensure excellent customer service and superior experience for the shoppers. Automation in retail, can help retailers do just that. Retail automation is on the rise. Globally, retail automation is expected to reach a value of over $19.5 billion by 2024. Let’s look at what retail automation is and how you can use Robotic Process Automation for your retail company to jumpstart your retail automation journey.
Did you know? The present level of automation technology can help you run a retail store can run with as less as 65 hours as compared to fully human operated store.
Retail automation refers to the technologies used by retail businesses to streamline and automate their business operations. Automation of retail processes involves automating manual processes. The list of repetitive and similar tasks includes inventory management, accounting and bookkeeping, analytics reporting, purchasing, and others. Additionally, it can also be related to automated commerce, automatic purchases, subscriptions, and recurring payments.
With today’s technology, every step of retail can be automated and software applications ensure that automation isn’t confined to large companies. Using automation solutions like Robotic Process Automation, small and growing retailers can also serve their customers better.
1.Streamlined Back-End: With orders pouring in from all over the world every day, retail personnel are likely to be overloaded with the processing, documenting, and expediting. This is the type of task that automation can help automate very easily. Bots can help simplify client data input and provide delivery details, and customer service among various other high volume tasks. It also makes chores like filling out forms and monitoring order status, and replying to simple client query considerably easier, allowing teams to concentrate on more creative and strategic work. Furthermore, automation decreases the chance of mistakes or oversights, allowing the company to provide excellent customer service.
2.Actionable Insights: Millions of online interactions and orders are placed every day, providing retailers with important customer preferences. With automation in place, businesses can quickly gather information on new product kinds that customers want or several complaints about a single issue, enabling speedy resolution before customers move on to purchase somewhere else. In addition to giving individualized recommendations, data insights enable retailers to launch new products in anticipation of future demand and be first to market.
3.Better Customer Experience: The pressure on physical stores to attract and retain customers is greater than ever today. Delighted customers with novel shopping experiences driven by innovative campaigns, great RPA, and efficient responses is a must for retails to thrive. RPA can help deliver impeccable experience to the clients, all thanks to the bots ability to complete tasks much efficiently, and without errors.
4.Improved Supply Chain Management: Retailers can gain vital insights about inventory requirements at different locations and times of the month or year by bringing automation into the supply chain and distribution network. This allows them to organize their inventory and only purchase what they require, reducing waste tremendously. Furthermore, merchants can use sales data from different regions and seasons to plan new shop openings, seasonal campaigns, and product launches.
5. Improved Vendor and Partner Collaboration: Today’s technologies can enable network awareness at an unprecedented level. APIs can connect different vendor partner/supplier systems to communicate essential information in real-time. Self-help vendors and partner portals can provide relevant stakeholders with vital data from ERP systems, reducing the number of support requests and time spent on tedious data changes and ad-hoc communication.
6.Streamlined Operations: According to a recent McKinsey report, approximately 50% of current retail procedures can be automated. This does not, however, imply that human occupations will vanish. It would simply require the retail industry to reassign its staff to more strategic areas where the human touch is critical by automating mundane activities. More process designers will also be required to put out the blueprint for the automated functions. As automation becomes more ubiquitous, we can anticipate workers to invest in reskilling to be ready for the new employment created as a result of it.
Automation has the potential to transform the retail value chain over time, resulting in more flexible companies with fewer layers and better-trained workforces who rely on real-time data and analytics to power all tasks. Businesses that embrace automation early will reap these organizational benefits sooner, giving them a competitive advantage.
Consider the characteristics of successful retailers you know. Whether it’s Costco, which earns about US$ 1,540 per square foot of space despite its low prices – more than twice what Walmart does – or Trader Joe’s, which sells unique items, or Amazon, whose virtues are self-evident, the mantra is always a low cost, great convenience, quick response, and memorable experience. All of this is possible through automation!
Every business decision should consider what is happening and what you require right now, and where you want to be in the future. Automation is going to play a huge part in retail sector and missing out might just prove to be fatal in the long run.
When it comes to choosing an RPA in Retail with advanced automation capabilities, ebizframe has you covered. We can help you automates laborious operations, allowing you to concentrate on your core business. Our interface with UiPath also aids in marketing automation, allowing you to cultivate a devoted customer base and brand evangelists.
Eastern Software Solutions’ is one of the best Retail automation companies. Small businesses are being empowered by technology, and we’re creating incredible customer experiences and competing on a wider scale. With ebizframe ERP software, you can equip yourself with the proper tools and methods to take advantage of future business development and technological advancements. ebizframe is a state-of-the-art intelligent ERP with various intelligent components like Automated bots, NLP (Natural Language Processing), Advanced BI, and more. All of these features can help you take your retail business to the next level.
Reach out to our experts today at marketing@ebizframe.com
