Retail_Service

1JUNE - 2019ESOUTLOOK.COMWINSTON WEBER & ASSOCIATESINTRODUCING SHOPPER-CENTRIC RETAILING BUSINESS MODELJUNE - 06 - 2019Win Weber, Chairman & CEO$15RETAIL SERVICE SPECIAL

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4JUNE - 201912CXOINSIGHTSIN MYOPINION2608Technological Impact on Customer ExperienceDiane Magers,CEO, Customer Experience Professionals AssociationTechnology in Textiles-BeddingBrian Parnes,VP of Marketing, Product Development & IT,Down Lite InternationalCOVER STORYWINSTON WEBER & ASSOCIATESINTRODUCING SHOPPER-CENTRIC RETAILING BUSINESS MODELWin Weber, Chairman & CEO

5 JUNE - 20192429 Amazon Effect: Driving New Opportunities and Challenges in Demand ForecastingEric Wilson,Director Planning,Escalade Sports21Delivering an Elevated Customer Experience requires an Agile Retail Technology PlatformPerry Kramer,SVP & Practice Lead,Boston Retail Partners31Who Runs Retail? the MachinesMichelle Grant,Head of Retailing,Euromonitor InternationalCXO INSIGHTS34Which are the top retail technology trends to watch out forSavio Thattil,CIO & SVP of Technology, Sephora AmericasCIO INSIGHTSContentsI n f o c u s 1016 - 3310 MOST RECOMMENDED SERVICE PROVIDERS - 2019 RETAIL Digital in Retail: the Three Steps to MaturityPaul Conder, Principal, CallisonRTKLMobile Marketing and the Evolution of E-commerce19Marissa Tarleton,CEO,RetailMeNot

6JUNE - 2019Art & GraphicsAmelia StewartDeclan ColeJohn ConnorAlbert RozarioSalesRich [email protected] EditorSelena JamesEditorialLouis BeckerLeah JaneAlfred MardinRachael ClarkAshwani KumarRyan JacobEmail:[email protected]@[email protected], 06 - 2019, Volume 05 - Issue 05 Published by ES OutlookTo subscribe to ES Outlook Visit http://www.esoutlook.com/subscribe/Copyright © 2019 SiliconMedia, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part of any text, photography or illustrations without written permission from the publisher is prohibited. The publisher assumes no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts, photographs or illustrations. Views and opinions expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the magazine and accordingly, no liability is assumed by the publisher thereof.Editorial*Some of the Insights are based on the interviews with respective CIOs and CXOs to our editorial staffSelena JamesManaging [email protected] internet has blurred the knowledge gap between customers and sellers. Product reviews and a plethora of online platforms facilitating product research have empowered customers today significantly and increased their expectations from retail outlets. Merely transitioning into virtual platforms won’t suffice in helping traditional retail bigwigs stay ahead. Offering product choices tailored to their tastes is one of the preliminary requirements of most customers today. Creating omnichannel and personal experiences are a must for any retail brand to gain a competitive edge. Decision makers should accept the fact that customers today believe in immediacy and organizations should quickly adapt to their evolving needs.Our editorial board observed the void among retail enterprises today caused due to the lack of an ideal collaborator. Thus, the team of industry experts conducted an extensive study of leading vendors who are carving a niche for their unique approaches in retail services. The action was aimed at bridging vendors with retail enterprises and helping the legacy players elevate their capabilities to allure more customers. This edition of our magazine, a compilation of ’10 Most Recommended Retail Service Providers 2019’, is a result of their efforts. We hope this collection immensely helps our readers who are in pursuit of ideal vendors. Personalization and Immediacy is Vital Contact Us:Phone: 510.972.5010

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8JUNE - 2019Technology in the textile industry, specificallybedding,rangesfrom outdated equipment on a production floor to state of the art automated lines, home-grown ERP systems to full-fledged SAP installations. In between all of this are mounds of paperwork from faxed orders to shipping documents and historical records that have yet to be converted to a digital medium. Much of these systems and equipment serve to keep the businesses running. Producing product, shipping it, and moving on to the next project serve as the bulk of what is done. So what challenges are present in the industry? That requires a slightly deeper look.Manycompaniesareproducingproducts with a large degree of uniquenessinspecifications,labeling, and packaging. Retailers not only have their own private label programs, but they also purchase items under national brand licenses, and some from a smattering of manufacturer-created brands. This leads to a very unique world when compared to others in the larger textile industry and brings a few challenges with it. These challenges include everything from economies of scale on raw materials to rapid product design on an unprecedented scale to production efficiencies all the way through analyzing data on what sold at retail level and Technology in Textiles-BeddingBy Brian Parnes, CIO, Down Lite InternationalIN MY OPINION

9 JUNE - 2019why. Another challenge common in the industry is the role of IT in business strategy. To narrow the scope here, I’m going to focus on big data and innovation with concentration on including IT in business strategy.Big Data is a term that likely is not given enough – if any – attention in the bedding textile industry. While each company’s amount, types, and forms of data likely varies, one thing is consistent: there is an abundance of data and little focus on turning that data into useful information that could ultimately be used to spur innovation or narrow the focus of products.The types of data that are included range from manufacturing data points on efficiencies, run times, and pricing to point of sale data, customer reviews, in-store details, customer requirements, consumer data, brand data, and much more. Only a fraction of this information is currently in a form where it could be used. Traditionally, IT’s role in all this has been limited to maintaining the ERP system, servicing desktops and laptops, and making sure the company’s network is running. But what if that role shifted to be included top-down?Taking the steps of gathering all that data and getting into a system is a monumental task in itself, but bigger than that, the shift in mentality to bring an organization from a data-entry driven one to an analytical one is even bigger. Turning that data into information that is then analyzed, sliced, diced, and used to turn mediocre products into good products and to great products is the next big challenge for the industry. IT can help here. Finding ways that consumers talk about products, diving in to see what is truly selling, where it sells, who’s buying, and more can lead to turning that Big Data into actionable information which can help spur innovation and efficiencies in the daily business.Innovation being Innovative isn’t EasyBy establishing firm processes within the business that foster innovation, yet channel them in effective and efficient ways that don’t disrupt the business, can lead to it becoming engrained in the corporate culture. Traditional R&D methods, combined with Big Data, can help drive that innovation forward in a productive way. With IT as a key partner to each of the business areas, and one of the drivers of change, this can lead to a much more modern and efficient approach to maintaining high levels of innovation.Each industry looks at innovation in a slightly different way. To some this is solely product driven, or product and packaging driven. To others this shifts the business to service mentality or can lead to entirely new business segments altogether. In the bedding industry, for example, taking information gleaned from Big Data could lead to a new way to market a product based on consumer reviews and the way the consumer speaks about a product. That in turn could lead to higher sales, faster turn, and more productive use of space at retail.What about the manufacturing process and everything behind the scenes? How things are done behind the scenes, and bringing IT into decisions on equipment, robotics. Imagine saving one second on every unit that goes through a production line. One second in itself may not seem big, but over the millions of units produced annually means big savings, and dollars saved potentially. Having a robust system where IT, manufacturing, engineering, and others can evaluate and make the back-end processes better is a form of innovation.The end-game of all of this is customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, and profits. Incorporating Big Data and a robust methodology of Innovation can certainly play a huge role in achieving them in today’s fast-paced world. ESOBrian ParnesI'M GOING TO FOCUS ON BIG DATA AND INNOVATION WITH A CONCENTRATION ON INCLUDING IT IN BUSINESS STRATEGY

10JUNE - 2019INF CUSTECHNOLOGIES IN RETAIL INDUSTRY DELIVERING TRULY CUSTOMER-FIRST EXPERIENCEFREMONT, CA: Of course, retailers are already making major investments in tech: Wal-Mart alone has spent over 10.5 billion dollars on IT and tops the list of the world’s greatest technological investors. However, many retailers struggle to meet an extremely digital customer base’s requirements and expectations. Surely the best way to fulfill consumer promises is technological integration. As “traditional” dealer experiences continue to be disrupted by online and mobile shopping, retailers rely on new technologies for customers to delight, bring them to stores, and eventually succeed in the multi-channel environment.A WorldPay survey revealed that more than half (55 percent) of Americans expect Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Realities (VR) to be so popular soon as smartphones, whereas almost 70 percent believe it will soon be mainstream. AR and VR offer endless opportunities for creating immersive experiences in the store. The “Virtual Artist” app from Sephora is an excellent illustration of facial recognition technology that enables consumers to try a virtual makeover with the “try on” lipstick, eye shadows, and other beauty products. Consumers can save and name different looks to view the used product combinations. Likewise, online color tools on hardware shop websites have increased, enabling homeowners to virtually test color paints. The online tools have been designed to help people from an aspirational image to find the right paint palette.Brands often look for inventive and unexpected ways to connect with customers. Luckily, the growth of Big Data and machine learning has led to a new era of prediction analysis that allows retailers to know their customers ‘ attitudes and actions. Chatbot technology is a logical step for retailers to deliver online or mobile customer service at a more personalized level. Chatbots can make advice by using predictive analytics and AI power based on past purchases of a customer, help to find items in shops, and even place orders.Because of the increase of the Internet of Things (IoT), retailers can serve more quickly and accurately to their customers. IoT will be significantly affected by customer-specific operations as well as back-office operations in the commercial sector. One way retailers can provide customers with real-time inventory information to make their brick and mortar stores more convenient. A combined effect of IoT, mobile apps, RFID tags, and other technologies can achieve this.The first thing that retailers need to do is deliver a truly customer experience. However, retailers need to handle the next technology generation, which is all about having an adequate network base, to take advantage of these benefits. ESO

11 JUNE - 2019LOCATION INTELLIGENCE BOOSTING RETAIL EFFORTSOMNI-CHANNEL RETAIL SHOPPING EXPERIENCE TO KEEP CUSTOMERS COMING BACKWith an accountable demographic still preferring to shop at brick and mortar shops in this digital era, it is a perfect time for retailers to think about leveraging location intelligence to maximize foot traffic. Here are specific ways to use location intelligence in the retail business.Customer Insights: Retailers can gain valuable customer insights by leveraging location intelligence by using the technique of geo enrichment in which customers’ residential address is converted into crucial insights. With this, retailers can use modern geographic information systems to create smart maps that identify locations of the customers that can accumulate information about various customer demographics and their behaviors and business leaders can effortlessly understand which localities have the highest number of loyal customers.Trade Area Analysis: It is essential for retailers to select suitable locations for new stores, define market shares and sales targets. Using trade area analysis retailers select locations for stores where target customers reside. With the help of location intelligence retailers can collect data over time to measure customer trends and understand whether their customer demographic is growing or shrinking in a particular area. Competitive Strength Analysis: Business leaders need to analyze their competitors’ market share before setting up new retail stores. Location intelligence can be leveraged in this context for measuring a competitor’s market share, and penetration in a specific geographical location and retailers can understand customer loyalty of competitors in that particular area. Location intelligence provides retailers with the frequency of store visits of competitor’s customers or if their customers tend to visit other stores.Asset Tracking: Retail businesses always require meeting the ever-increasing customer demand. In case a store receives a late delivery, productivity and customer experience can be severely affected. Hence, retailers have to continually track the whereabouts of their delivery staff and manage the supply chain. Asset tracking can be simplified by using location intelligence, and retailers can develop custom location apps that can be installed on smartphones.Geo-fence: Retailers can set up virtual geo-fences for marketing purposes. When customers enter or exit the geo-fence, retailers can push notifications about ongoing deals, offers, and product discounts using a mobile app and notify customers about the arrival of new products in their store. With these retailers can alert customers about the products and offers when they are in close proximity. ESORetailers looking to build customer loyalty in today’s digitalized economy must create customer-centric shopping experiences. It requires a holistic strategy that uses advanced technologies to curate personalized customer journeys. An omnichannel marketing system is going to help retailers in dealing with the challenges they are facing now.Currently, among retailers, all the communication channels are acting as an independent and individual entity. Different teams are building their own and working with different styles to bring traffic and profit from their source. When it comes to omnichannel processes, all the marketing channels act as a powerful entity, and the teams are well versed, with the concept, strategies, and stages of progress. The same facilitates retailers to come up with a single and consolidated approach. An omnichannel strategy also involves a centralized database that its connected channels can get access to the data and insights recorded by other teams.A challenge that is ruining retail customer experience is that it has to connect on the same communication channel for queries. But when retailers employ omnichannel customer engagement strategies, they can interact on different platforms at a radical pace without compromising the essence of the context and ensuring the seamless and memorable customer experience.Inventory management is a daunting task for retailers who have been selling their services and products across various channels. They are facing challenges with managing multiple warehouses simultaneously. An omnichannel experience infrastructure offers end to end supply chain management that allows them to sell products across different inventories.The first step to consider when planning to implement an Omni-channel experience is to get a basic understanding of when and how the customers interact with the business. Those insights will help figure out which communication channel should be integrated. Making a list of channels on which customers can connect with the brand will add to it by determining the presence of the touch points. Back setting after introducing an approach may ruin the business, hence analyzing and adjusting strategy at regular intervals helps the companies decide how to tweak the omnichannel approach to gain better profit. ESO

12JUNE - 2019PIONEERING SMART PACKAGING Today, the modern packaging industry is no more constrained to merely the protection of product; the role of packaging has transitioned from exterior covering to very brand identity. As the retail shelf is the very final frontier for brands’ marketing campaign, packaging plays a very crucial role in ensuring that it connects with the consumer in the right way. Intricate details like the weight, texture, color, the product information printed over the package govern the stakes of the consumer’s interest on the brand, and that is exactly what Colbert Packaging specializes in capturing. Colbert Packaging prides itself with unwavering commitment for producing safe, smart and sustainable packaging for its customers that include some of the biggest names in the pharmaceutical, healthcare and consumer goods markets. A pioneer in the manufacturing packages, Colbert is dedicated to improve patient adherence with drug treatment regimens. All of Colbert’s unit dose packages can be fully customized with a variety of blister cavities, and manufactured using secure and sustainable materials.By Ashwani KumarWINSTON WEBER &ASSOCIATESINTRODUCING SHOPPER-CENTRIC RETAILING BUSINESS MODELCOVER STORYWin Weber, Chairman & CEO

13JUNE - 2019THE INDUSTRY NEEDS CONSULTANTS WHO CAN SOLVE MODERN COMPLEXITY BY BRINGING LEADING EDGE THINKING AND PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS FOR RETAILERS. AND THAT’S HOW WE ARE BUILTbig drawcard for the people in the consulting business is being on the road all the time. But traveling 4.4 million miles? Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? Well, that’s how one would describe the life of the nomadic consultant, Win Weber, the chairman and CEO of Winston Weber & Associates (WWA). What keeps him going? “To me, quality is everything in the consulting business, and that’s why I travel so much. When it comes to WWA and associated retail clients, I want to make sure we deliver the best possible outcome by leveraging my knowledge and experience. If I’m busy elsewhere, our team—which consists of consultants with 25 years of average experience—takes over with their hands-on and tightly knit expertise,” answers Weber. The relentless focus that the CEO and his team show every day has gained them a stellar global reputation. The WWA team has worked with top-notch and multi-billion dollar North American, Latin American, Australian and Asian supermarket chains. “As the retail industry becomes flooded with technology, it is quite clear that the consultants who just read and apply textbooks are a thing of the past. The industry needs consultants who can solve modern complexity by bringing leading edge thinking and practical applications for retailers. And that’s how we are built,” mentions Weber.From the late 1980s, WWA has been instrumental in driving industry change by bringing the idea of trading partner collaboration. But that is not all. The company is recognized for introducing category management in 1990 and most recently, the novel, beyond category management process—the Shopper-Centric Retailing business model. At the helm of it all is Weber, guiding the company toward success.When the Purpose Is to ‘Win,’ Trust WIN!Weber began his career in 1962 and progressed rapidly into management positions of increasing responsibilities within the divisions of Colgate-Palmolive, General Foods, Squibb (Beech-Nut), American Brands (Sunshine Biscuits), Bristol-Myers (Drackett Products Company), Warner Communications (Atari) and Schering-Plough. Since entering management consulting 34 years ago, A

14JUNE - 2019Weber has consulted for CPG manufacturers, retailers, wholesalers, and industry associations. Highly regarded for his expertise in establishing collaborative relationships between retailers and suppliers, and credited with designing the first partnering relationship plan in the U.S. between a retailer and its suppliers 32 years ago, it was only a natural progression for him when—through WWA—he introduced the Shopper-Centric Retailing business model in collaboration with the Food Marketing Institute and Deloitte Consulting.So what is this business model all about and how is it creating a difference? As artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies become entities that must be integrated into any digital strategy alongside human workers, for many retailers and consumer goods manufacturers, this means moving from the evaluation of individual elements and solutions to an integrative approach that spans their entire technology ecosystem. While this has many advantages, it also raises challenges which include prioritizing investments, precisely evaluating available resources, and accurately identifying the magnitude of change. That’s where WWA’s Shopper-Centric Retailing business model comes in. The model ensures that merchandising management has a voice in these decisions and there is proper alignment between the theory and practical application.Beyond Category ManagementThe Shopper-Centric Retailing business model significantly increases the ability of retailers to enhance the shopping experience through the alignment of strategies, tactics and execution, organizationalstructure,businessprocesses,merchandising competencies and performance measures across internal functions, and between trading partners at the “touchpoint” with the shopper, the store. This includes moving from the current department structure based on merchandise attributes to a solutions-based structure relying on shopper attributes, consolidating decision support and analytics, restructuring store management, and upgrading vocabulary to align with a shopper-focusedculture.ShopperSolutionsPlanning—a core component of the Shopper-Centric Retailing model—builds upon and overcomes the limitations of the 29-year-old category management process. The company delivers advanced analytics at the backend which provides a much deeper look at item performance by category and total store. “Finally, we now have the ability through AI technology and machine learning to address the decades-old 8 to 10 percent out-of-stock problem that crosses many channels. Our experience to date indicates we have the ability to reduce out-of-stock conditions at least 50 percent,” says Weber. The Shopper-Centric Retailing business model, or components of the model, can be successfully applied across retail channels, to varying degrees. Mark Baum, the chief customer officer of Food Marketing Institute (FMI) says, “The business case has been made. Industrypractitioners—retailers,manufacturers,and service providers all agree; change must occur. The blueprint to creating a shopper-centric model exists. The capabilities, to a large extent, are in place. We encourage industry partners to come together and utilize the newShopper-CentricRetailingroadmap to begin the journey today.”Win Weber, Chairman & CEO

15JUNE - 2019WINning the Retail Service RaceWhatreallysteersWWAahead of the competition is their ability to easily adapt to different corporate cultures and practices, in any country or size of the corporation they are involved with. Combined withtheirleading-edgethinkingandunparalleledretail merchandising expertise from both an operating and consultingstandpoint,thecompany’s understanding of the interrelationship between a retailer and their trading partners, gains them traction from various retailers.Adding to this is the attractive-ness of their Shopper-Centric Situ-ational Assessment Process that identifies organizational strengths and opportunities for improvement based on over sixty benchmarks within categories such as shopper centric positioning, organization readiness and so on. It then defines the future state and implementation plan. Weber adds, “Combined with our deliverables, our fee structure is more attractive than the larger consulting firms” By focusing on the shopper and enhancement of the shopping experience, the company is also attuned to the dynamic chang-es due to expanding food lifestyles, shoppers wanting solutions tailored to their lifestyles, digital connected-ness, social media, online shopping, delivery options, and increasing generational complexities. This is reinforced by the fact that the com-pany has a very experienced con-sulting team that has an unparalleled ability to translate cutting-edge thinking into practical solutions.All-In to Deliver Practical Retail ApplicationsWebergivesanexampleofasupermarketchain,whichunderwentmajorrestructuringtoimplementShopper-CentricRetailing, and its core component, Shopper Solutions Planning. The SVP of the supermarket chain comments, “The categories planned to date have seen results regardless their size. For example, one category that had been seeing erosion outlined with a new set, consumer awareness, and education along with a shift in promotional strategy improved the overall profitability. The category has since exceeded its growth goals in units and profit goals by a whole point. It also saw a rise in its sales versus trend trajectory.” This retailer also says that the consolidation of analytics into one function has exceeded their expectations. Havingcreatedpracticalapplications for many retailers across the globe, WWA plans to continue and maintain its size as a small consulting firm to ensure that it delivers solutions that traverse their client expectations at all times. “This has proven to be a very successful strategy over the years. Geographically, we plan to concentrate on North America while growing in Latin America and expanding to more retail channels,” states Weber. The company recently extended its capabilities to capitalize on the growth potential offered by the U.S. Hispanic market with the hiring of an expert with over 30 years of experience in 17 Latin America countries. “Whatever theindividualretailer'ssituationis, the message is very clear. Our commitment to consistently exceed client expectations and our ability to provide a comprehensive solution is what we are all about, and we plan to continue providing more value and ROI to clients than the typical consulting firm,” concludes Weber. ESOCOMBINED WITH OUR DELIVERABLES, OUR FEE STRUCTURE IS MORE ATTRACTIVE THAN THE LARGER CONSULTING FIRMS

16JUNE - 2019As the emerging technologies are taking center customer-centric data combined with technology to stage, retail companies will seek to extend their provide buyers new and sophisticated digital shopping technological boundaries to draw in cognitive experiences and added brand value. computing and conversational AI platform to develop advanced analytics and maximize operational fundamentally changing the way we engage with efficiencies. Data’s role in retail decision-making is technology and is set to explode over the next on the rise and pioneers in the field will continue to four years to $ 40 billion by 2022. By leveraging explore ways to collect and utilize data in their sales, such advancements and best practices, enterprise marketing, customer service, and operations; allowing organizations are aiming to optimize transportation for significant insight into the consumer behavior performance, product tracking, and traceability to and psychology to aid the development of products. analyze product ROI. That being said, as more consumers embrace instant messaging apps too, such as Facebook Messenger and that matches their needs, ES Outlook brings forth a WhatsApp, we can expect retailers to follow and use comprehensive list of the leading service providers. these platforms to talk to customers and streamline This listing provides a fresh view of how the technology business communications. Corporations are hyper-personalizing and your retail processes. We present to you “10 Most digitalizing the experience of shopping through Recommended Retail Service Providers - 2019.”Smart speakers and voice assistants are As organizations look for a retail service provider solutions in this domain can deliver optimization to 10 MOST RECOMMENDED SERVICE PROVIDERS - 2019 RETAIL

17JUNE - 201910 Most Recommended Retail Service Providers - 2019CompanyManagementDescriptionGreat Northern CorporationAppleton, WI greatnortherninstore.comCommonwealth BuildingQuincy, MAcombuild.comDiversified MaintenanceTampa, FLdiversifiedm.comEnlinxWest Valley City, UTenlinx.comWinston Weber & AssociatesTampa, FL winstonweber.comJohn Davis CEOFrank TrainorChairman & CEO Derek GordonCEODave BurnsCEOWin WeberChairman & CEOColumbus ConsultingColumbus, OHcolumbusconsulting.comJon BeckCEOProvide consulting services ranging from strategic insight to tactical project delivery to the retail sectorCrowley Maritime CorporationJacksonville, FLcrowley.comThomas B. Crowley Jr. Chairman & CEOProvides services in marine solutions, energy and logistics through four business units: Crowley Logistics, Crowley Shipping, Crowley Solutions and Crowley FuelsProvides innovative solutions to solve clients’ packaging needsProvides personalized services to the retail and commercial construction industryProvides services in operational excellence and specialized cleaning and maintenance to help businesses run smoothly and seamlesslymindStartAustin, TXgomindstart.comKevin WhitehurstPresidentProvide outstanding technical, billing, and ‘whatever’ support to your customers, so you can focus on what’s most important - rolling out your project and providing the innovation expected from your customers, investors, and teamCornell Storefront SystemsWilkes Barre, PAcornellstorefronts.comChristopher Slocum Founder & Chief Customer OfficerProvides entryway and protection solutions, from design to installation to maintenance, tailored to meet specific business needsAn omnichannel fulfillment warehouse that is devoted to perfecting the 3PL business, allowing its clients to stay focused on designing and building great products for their customersThe CMI GroupCarrollton, TXthecmigroup.comJim LynchCOOCMI delivers innovative revenue cycle, accounts receivable, and contact center solutions resulting in enhanced operational efficiency and increased revenue for its clientsIntroducing the new Shopper-Centric Retailing business model that delivers benefit beyond category managementDescriptionManagement

18JUNE - 2019Accuracy, speed, and transparency. These terms form the DNA of the modern omnichannel fulfillment warehouse that aims for ‘perfect delivery’ to meet the growing needs of today’s ecommerce customer. Likewise, B2B customers expect high flexibility and responsiveness in purchasing and returning products. Driven by the passion for perfect delivery, industry veteran Dave Burns laid the cornerstone of Enlinx. Enlinx helps its clients deliver shipments to their consumer and retail customers quickly and accurately. “Our tech-driven facility and processes, specialized omnichannel services, real-time inventory and shipment reporting enable our clients to stay focused on their core operations and exceed customer expectations,” says Burns, the CEO of Enlinx.At the outset of a new client partnership, Enlinx employs an onboarding manager who is responsible to build the synergy, trust, and set the right expectations for maximum outcomes. The company works with new clients to ensure their inbound shipments comply with Enlinx’s inbound routing guide, which ensures accuracy and speed throughout the order fulfillment process. Upon receipt of products, the company conducts an exhaustive inspection to measure and identify all the attributes that could potentially affect accurate, efficient packaging and shipping of orders. Enlinx uses a robust yet flexible iPad-based system with high scalability that protects against human error or confusion, even during peak demands. One thing that separates Enlinx in the market is its ability to be flexible with its core processes, and technology to accommodate nuances clients may have in their business models. Enlinx continually invests in its state-of-the-art distribution facility and robust technology stack to manage fulfillment operations for flawless receiving, storage, picking, packing and shipping. The company has automated conveyor and sortation systems as well as RF-based picking for smooth order fulfillment, high level of flow accuracy, and detailed product information captured using batch or serial number. The company also provides value added services including barcode labeling, repackaging and reworking product to meet retailer requirements. “We can assemble items, print and place labels, and dispatch shipments swiftly and accurately,” says Burns.Enlinx harnesses a culture that instills a sense of ownership among employees. “We are driven by our core values of respect, integrity, service, excellence (flawless execution), and leadership,” says Burns. The company values employee input and works hard to promote from within. As the company continues its rapid growth, developing new leaders and giving all employees the tools needed to succeed are priorities. An example of providing tools for success is the use of creative training videos to ensure new hires are productive sooner rather than later, which leads to individual, company and client success!“When culture, technology, and commitment to partnership meet, great things happen,” commented Burns. One recent example of this was working together with a long-term client that asked for our help identifying cost savings. Leaders from both companies collaborated, identified cost savings ideas and went to work implementing those ideas. The result was hard savings in the areas of inventory management, cartonization strategy, shipping, and supply utilization.Striding ahead, Enlinx is always refining inventory management techniques and technology that optimizes pick locations. “We also envision launching our new client portal that includes a heat map feature that will help our customers track freight and access details such as cost, estimated time of delivery, and shipment status in real-time,” concludes Burns. ESOEnlinxRobust, Scalable Omnichannel Order Fulfillment 10 MOST RECOMMENDED SERVICE PROVIDERS - 2019 RETAIL Our tech-driven facility and processes, specialized omnichannel services, and real-time inventory and shipment reporting enable our clients to stay focused on their core operations and exceed customer expectations

19JUNE - 2019Consumers love to shop. However, the means and methods in which they find what they want continue to evolve; and in true digital fashion, the e-commerce industry has transformed once again.More than ever before, it feels as if marketers are struggling to keep up with the pace of change.In 2016, we saw digital tipping past the 50 percent mark in terms of influencing in-store sales, according to eMarketer. Additionally, the rise of mobile technology has influenced online sales, with sales from mobile devices will total more than $102 billion in 2017, up 52 percent from the previous year.This year, one of the biggest opportunities for retailers and brands lies in the ability to capture new customers through a variety of mobile vehicles and content that will drive conversions. Here are three things to keep in mind as marketing for online retailers continues to evolve.Mobile is your Friend (That’s here to stay)In the world of mobile commerce, there’s been plenty of movement over the past year—and the growth is important to make note of. M-commerce now accounts for more than one-third of e-commerce sales (34 percent), with most of the growth coming from smart-phone devices. However, the window of opportunity goes beyond the bottom of the funnel. Retailers can find more opportunity in creating higher mobile consideration effectively with both the right content and the right timing—which often means immediately for today’s shoppers. The latest evolution of online retail marketing now allows brands to move beyond mobile websites and forced app downloads to more native content that reaches customers while they are engaged in mobile moments. Mobile also brings many challenges for retailers who aren’t prepared. Optimizing content for mobile viewing was just the first hurdle. Additionally, on average, today’s consumer has two or fewer shopping apps on their phone. This makes it imperative that brands serve up the right content across a variety of digital outlets: emails push notifications, alerts, text messages and more.One of the reasons that mobile marketing continues to take off is because of a fundamental shift toward immediacy and connectivity among consumers, especially in the case of new audiences such as millennia’s. In fact, 87 percent of millennia’s who own a smart phone say it never leaves their side.Millennial shopper’s are often looking for instant gratification when it comes to product searching and deal seeking. Smartphone devices allow brands to be their front and center, so their names remain on the top of the consumers mind during purchase.By Marissa Tarleton, CEO, RetailMeNotMobile Marketing and the Evolution of E-commerceMarissa TarletonCXO INSIGHTS

20JUNE - 2019Build a Strong Framework and Marketing MixWe are no longer marketing in a flat environment. The mobile marketing mix now allows us to drive consideration through multiple digital vehicles. Due to the latest technology advancements, everyone is now a cross-channel customer and, in turn, online retailers are challenged with ensuring their online experience is poised to compete. Marketers can do this by creating strong owned content across a variety of digital mediums, in addition to paid and earned content that reaches potential customers on channels where they already are.One Kings Lane is a brand that has successfully built valuable owned content and become a prominent mainstay among online retailers over the past few years. The furniture and home decor site offers content that is premium in nature. It’s built an online marketplace that is thriving in an industry that typically compels consumers to go in-store before ordering online. Between its e-commerce website, mobile app, Live Love Home blog and social media presence, One Kings Lane has established a marketing balance that elevates its product offering and makes transactions incredibly easy for the customer.Beyond brands successfully creating their own platforms for content, earned and paid content is an important part of the mix. Native ad content on mobile devices is a strong bet for brands moving forward, and adding it can deliver more than four times higher engagement rates on smart phones than traditional, non-native display ads can. Premium native ads—or native ads on publisher websites including branded or sponsored content—will be imperative to capturing customers as marketing grows in mobile, video and social content. Think Outside Your BandboxIt’s necessary to look for creative ways to engage and capture consumers that push beyond the boundaries of your traditional marketing strategies. Growing your ecosystem to include partner sites and apps—and reaching consumers in their local environment—allows retailers to convert more customers from browse to buy. By expanding your brand’s reach through partner technology, retailers can engage new customers in a targeted way with content that is highly relevant.In addition to utilizing partnerships to gain new customers, brands can partner in ways that allow them to get in front of customers in the moments that matter with strategies like geo-location marketing. The industry will see big growth in this area as geo-targeted content and offers move beyond the hype and become much more coveted by marketers.By collaborating, retailers and brands can work with partners who have higher opt-in rates among their user base for geo-location services. For example, the retail industry average for opting in to geo-location services, such as push notification, is 37 percent. However, consumers—and potentially your customers—elect to opt in to location capabilities at higher than average rates for apps like RetailMeNot and video streaming services like Netflix and Hulu Plus (53 percent and 47 percent, respectively). These services allow Omni-channel retailers the ability to reach their customers both digitally and in-store with relevant content regardless of channel and in the apps where they are already interacting with content. In 2017, the bottom line is that retailers and brands must push the boundaries of their marketing mix and mobile presence. From desktop screens to mobile apps to native content and whatever is next, retailers cannot expect their customer to simply come to them; they must utilize partner expertise to go where the customer is. That means using both old and new digital marketing tactics, such as geo-location targeting, native mobile ads and unexpected partnerships and expansions, which will help everyday retailers gain a larger share of voice among online competitors and brick-and-mortar retailers alike. All of this ladders up to higher mobile consideration, which ultimately leads to more online sales. E-commerce is an ever-changing force that will continue to transform in order to meet the needs of modern-day shoppers. Retail marketers must continue to evolve with it. ESOIN 2016, WE SAW DIGITAL TIPPING PAST THE 50 PERCENT MARK IN TERMS OF INFLUENCING IN-STORE SALES, ACCORDING TO EMARKETER

21JUNE - 2019Retailers that are thriving—and there are lots of them—anticipateandreacttoconsumers’demandforanenhancedand continuously changing retail experience. Retailers that have successfully anticipated the changing customer experience have created a technical platform, with the supporting process changes, that allows them to react quickly enough to stay ahead of a new set of customer expectations in an increasingly competitive digital retail environment.Increasing Pressure on the Retail ModelOne of the greatest hockey players ever, Wayne Gretzky, said “A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.” The retailers who are profitable and continuing to grow are executing this same philosophy. The pressure on physical stores continues, as more than 7,100 retail locations have closed this year and additional closures are expected after the holiday season. With an estimated 15 percent of holiday shopping moving to digital this year, the competition for share of wallet has become more intense than at any point in the digital retail era. As retailers shift more of their sales online, additional pressures are exerted as retailers deal with the lower margin generally associated with digital sales and the need for modified businessprocess,organizationaland technology changes to remain competitive. For retailers to succeed in the future, they must transform their business with agile technology and new processes that adapt to current and future customer expectations. Retailers don’t have the luxury of time. They must act now to survive. Focus on Agile TechnologyThe first step is to migrate the current budget and focus expended on maintaining legacy commodity systems to a model that is focused on advanced, agile systems that drive a distinguishing customer experience and/or improve margin. Moving commodity systems such as finance, HR, asset protection, network, mobile device management and monitoring to a SaaS model is a critical first step. In addition, the business needs to refocus (not eliminate) Delivering an Elevated Customer Experience Requires an Agile Retail Technology PlatformBy Perry Kramer, SVP & Practice Lead at Boston Retail PartnersPerry Kramer CXO INSIGHTS

22JUNE - 2019resources onmigrating the distinguishing business-focused systems to a more agile technology platform. More efficient technology and processes are critical to enable retailers to adapt quickly and anticipate rapidly changing retail dynamics. With a narrower set of internally supported applications, retailers have a greater focus on the key systems that have the greatest impact on the customer experience and product marginincluding, analytics, merchandise planning and allocation, digital commerce, CRM and customer engagement (mobile and POS).The major obstacle for retailers in transforming their technology has been the short-term budget impact of shifting capital budget funds to expense budget funds that is associated with moving to a SaaS model. Savvy CIOs have been able to build a strong multi-year story and convince the CFO and other C-level decision-makers that the short-term financial impact is key to their long-term success. The business needs to understand the value of the investment as a proactive strategic initiative, not a cost savings initiative. Leading and fast following retailers are beginning to realize the urgency of this transformation. According to BRP’s 2017 POS/Customer Engagement Survey, adding omni-channel integration and POS functions were the top two retailer initiatives, which indicates that most retailers are focused on the ability to deliver an exceptional customer experience.The Need for Real-time Data and AnalyticsDeveloping an agile technology infrastructure and organization is critical to leveraging the large amount of data that retailers collect but fail to use effectively. In many cases, retailers have as much information as retail giants like Amazon and Walmart but have failed to make it actionable in their analytics, CRM and merchandising systems. This results in lower margin because they have not accurately anticipated customer demand and positioned the right merchandise, and people in the right place at the right time. Additionally, retailers who are trying to play catch up do not have real-time enterprise-wide access to the data needed to meet consumers’ rapidly changing expectations, which makes it challenging to properly allocate their resources—products and people. Customers expect retail associates to have easy access to rich, detailed enterprise-wide product content and consumer preferences in real-time when they are engaging with the customer. To keep the customer at the epicenter of the retail transaction, retailers need to migrate to an environment that offers real-time access to enterprise-wide product information, customer preferences, and transaction history across all channels—and it must be accessiblefrom mobile devices.Flexible Processes are a RequisiteIn addition to adopting agile technologies, such as micro services, winning retailers anticipate changing demands andleverage a more narrowly focused, and more flexible set of processes to work with their business units to quickly build lower cost proof of concepts and learning centers. By reducing development costs and time to market, they are able to budget for and work with the business units to build proof of concepts and learning-focused pilots. This is a critical difference between the leaders and the followers. Other moderately successful, and slightly more conservative retailers, are leveraging these changes to position themselves as fast followers.For retailers to be successful they need to stay ahead of customer expectations and their significant use of mobile technology, by building flexible and reusable technologies with aligned processes that are focused on areas that are impactful to the consumer while still maintaining margin. Agile environments allow for a lower cost structure and the ability to leap frog the trends of online pure-plays opening brick-and-mortar stores and traditional retailers experimenting with new store models—and be where the customer will be. ESOFOR RETAILERS TO SUCCEED IN THE FUTURE, THEY MUST TRANSFORM THEIR BUSINESS WITH AGILE TECHNOLOGY AAND NEW PROCESSES THAT ADAPT TO CURRENT AND FUTURE CUSTOMER EXPECTATIONS

23JUNE - 2019

24JUNE - 2019Before embarking on a career in retail design and customer experience in the late 1990s, I was part of a tech 1.0 startup. Back then, our marketing activities involved showing our wares at trade shows and tech conventions along the lines of CES and Comdex. This month, nearly twenty years later, I found myself at The National Retail Federation’s “Big Show” conference in New York, and the roster of participants looked eerily familiar.The big players at the show were the likes of Oracle, IBM, SAP, Microsoft and Toshiba. The smaller booths were taken up by relatively newer brands such as Viniculum, Comqi and Sprinklr. It seemed that the whole conference—the biggest one of its kind for brick-and-mortar retailers—had become 100 percent digital. So many retailers are in the process of digital transformation that it has taken over the entire discussion in the industry.The traditional retail sector has reached a kind of early-maturity when it comes to digital. A few years ago, initial attempts at integrating digital into the brick-and-mortar retail experience focused on spectacle—immersive graphics pushing repurposed ad content. We also saw a several attempts at bringing an ecommerce website into the store, often leaving a flashing C-prompt on a blue screen when the web connection faltered. Thankfully, we’ve moved past these early approaches for the most part. Now, most of the big players in retail have realized that the true power of digital is to get retailers back to what they do best, which is to meet their customer in a way that is personal, relevant and meaningful. Benefits of this change will be improved sales and customer loyalty for the brand, and an effortless, curated and personalized shopping experience for the customer. And the backbone of all this is customer data.There are three big challenges that brands face as they become more mature as digital retailers–how to store and organize data, how to collect it, and how to use it. The promise of digital in retail won’t be realized for a specific brand until all three of these challenges are solved.Let’s start with the storage and organization of the data. The big issue here isn’t capacity, but compatibility. For many retailers, creating a unified view of customer data is a difficult task, with legacy systems working out of sync with each other. We worked recently with a large retail brand, whose customer service staff would often need to access eight or nine different databases to respond to a single call, and this brand is not alone. Often, inventory data is held separately between different geos and the ecommerce team. Data from the aging POS system might not connect well with data from the CRM. Customer experience survey Digital in Retail: The Three Steps to MaturityBy Paul Conder, Principal, CallisonRTKLCXO INSIGHTS

25JUNE - 2019data might sit in its own silo, manually correlated with sales data but not as a regular practice. At some retailers, it feels like every Vice President has their own little data silo that they defend from the barbarians down the hall. And while it may be easy for people to get a small budget to work on sexy, customer-facing touchpoints, fixing the “plumbing” that allows the data to be accessed where and when it’s needed is often neglected. This was what most of the exhibitors at the “Big Show” were on about, and this is a big enough problem that it can practically hijack the entire discussion around retail. Fixing this kind of problem involves silo-busting between management teams, and a strong commitment from the top of the company to invest in a solid, secure, integrated IT infrastructure across functional groups. The brands that have an advantage here are new enough (or small enough) that they don’t have the backlog of legacy systems to deal with, and they likely built-in customer data as a foundation to their business right from the start. So, assuming a brand is on a path to solving the storage problem, we now need a way to collect the data consistently. There are many ways to approach this, but in retail they all come down to one principle: providing a reason (value) for the customer to identify themselves every time they connect with the brand. Whether providing a discount on a future purchase (Airmiles) or a streamlined customer experience via an app (Starbucks) or an extended brand experience (Nike Run Club), or an enhanced online shopping experience(AmazonPrime’spersonalization and shipping) brands need to understand where they can provide real value to a customer in exchange for their data. In this sense, data is a form of currency—with the customer sharing it only when the brand provides a compelling value proposition to do so, and the promise to use the data responsibly. We still get approached by retailers who want to build an app without a clear customer-focused reason for doing so. Defining a value proposition and then wrapping it in a compelling experience is what retailers do best, and the brands that have been successful at data collection have leveraged their retail skills to get there.This leads us to our third challenge, namely how we should use the data. Customers’ expectations have shifted in recent years, with “omnichannel” retail experiences becoming table stakes for most retailers. While privacy is still a concern, customers now expect their shopping experiences to be as deeply personalized in store as it is online, and expect to see no barrier between the “digital” offerings of a brand and their instore counterparts. The store, service, web, mobile and app ecosystem is simply how the brand presents itself, and it seems obvious from a customer’s point of view that they should all mesh together. One of the most powerful retail applications of digital technology that we’ve seen is to support personalized face-to-faceservice.Staffcanaccess customer shopping profiles, endless aisle, product information, delivery options, event calendars, special brand experiences, product recommendations, checkout, past purchases and special discounts all from a smartphone. This application has been successful when it has been able to support the real-world needs of customers, and does not get in the way of the face-to-face experience. Building a system like this requires a fair amount of sophistication on the part of the brand—touching on service design and staff training the physical design of the space and the design of the digital interface and infrastructure itself. From the customer’s side, they are simply receiving an elevated level of service. From the brand’s side they are breaking down data silos and taking a cross-functional approach to retail experience design—and that’s not easy.As I was exploring the “Big Show” one thing stood out for me. There will be one common thread that will tie together retailers’ long-term success: a focus on the real-world customer experience. As retailers deal with the three big challenges around customer data—storage, collection and end-use—the successful brands will design their entire brand around their customer in an effort to better connect with them. And this is what the best retailers have been good at all along. ESOPaul ConderCUSTOMERS NOW EXPECT THEIR SHOPPING EXPERIENCES TO BE AS DEEPLY PERSONALIZED IN STORE AS IT IS ONLINE

26JUNE - 2019Technological Impact on Customer ExperienceBy Diane Magers, CEO, Customer Experience Professionals AssociationEvolution of Customer Experience With all the technology advances, we find that organizations that focus on human experiences to understand what customers need and want as well as their feelings about our brand’s services and products. Information technology and digital data provide us with insights into the experiences of memory and human connection that were not prevalent earlier. Today, technology helps us toto track and understand all of the touch points and integrates huge amounts of information. The ability to interpret more information about the human body through facial recognition, body language recognition and emotional measures for confirmation with the use of technology helps in developing solutions and services for the customers. Technological Trends Related to Customer Experience We shouldn't think of technology as being the answer to experience. Technology is an enabler of creating great experiences. It helps us build and deliver better value for the customer, the employee and the brand by creating simpler, easier, faster and more personalized experiences. It can also inform us about what we should continue to change or innovate, but more importantly, the why.”So, technology is crucial for business growth as it provides value to both the customer and the organization. It enables interactions, provides intelligence and provides insights and analysis. The opportunity for organizations that work in ‘cylinders of excellence’ or silos is that technology and customer intelligence will provide more holistic view of the complex interplay between customers and brands. Whether your customers visit a retail store, shop online, talk with a sales person – all of these interactions are enabled with technology and provide vast amounts of rich information. The importance of operational and interaction data can now include many more factors that drive experiences including sentiment analysis, digital body language, facial and emotion tracking all gives us an insight into how brands can build their interactions to meet those the customer’s needs. all that rich information is gathered to get a 360-degree view of the characteristic traits of the customers. Many organizations are analyzing and using customer intelligence to define the impact of experiences and using machine learning, Chatbots, and Artificial Intelligence to help reduce effort, provide personalized service and enable more engaging interactions. Although technology is a highly valuable factor in customer experience, we can’t forget the human elements in our design of our experiences. Personality Traits that Shape Leadership I started my career as a clinical psychologist so my focus has always been about the human behavior, personality, emotions. A trait that is evident in all the members of our Diane MagersCXO INSIGHTS

27JUNE - 2019association customers is the desire to connect the dots that let them look at all the touchpoints a customer has with a brand. holistically. Customer experience professionals know that technology can enable fabulous experiences, but in the end, the human element and the customer’s perception of the experience is what drives their behavior – to buy buy more, stay longer, or tell others about their experience with your brand. If you think about you last interaction with a brand, was it memorable? How did you feel after the interaction? Will you go back to interacting with the brand? All of these behaviors– as a result of an experience – are what impact our brand’s sales, costs, social presence and brand presence in the marketplace. In this fast-paced world, it is critical to deeply understand the customer's mindset and their behaviour that drives brand’s business performance. Valuable Advice to Fellow ExecutivesCustomer experience has a huge impact on every organization. There are many critical factors for creating great customer experiences including design thinking, building more collaborative working teams, or a council that is representative of a cross-functional, enterprise decision making. The ability to manage and leverage all the available customer intelligence and data, turn it to insights and define actions that will improve or optimize the experience is critical. Technology can help us achieve better customer experiences but in the end, it is the human experience and needs that we must care for. ESOWE SHOULDN'T THINK OF TECHNOLOGY AS BEING THE ANSWER TO EXPERIENCE. TECHNOLOGY IS AN ENABLER OF CREATING GREAT EXPERIENCES. IT HELPS US BUILD AND DELIVER BETTER VALUE FOR THE CUSTOMER, THE EMPLOYEE AND THE BRAND BY CREATING SIMPLER, EASIER, FASTER AND MORE PERSONALIZED EXPERIENCES. IT CAN ALSO INFORM US ABOUT WHAT WE SHOULD CONTINUE TO CHANGE OR INNOVATE, BUT MORE IMPORTANTLY, THE WHY

28JUNE - 2019“The amount of time a company takes to resolve a customer issue can make or break the relationship with its customers,” begins Vicky Ezell, whose company is uniquely positioned to support startups and entrepreneurs to build and retain the relationship with their growing customer base. The advent of different social media channels and platforms has caused the customer service industry to undergo a paradigm shift—from being a mere sales and services provider to going the extra mile to provide delightful experiences. Responding to complex queries and questions quickly in today’s world of ‘instant gratification’ has become all the more challenging for companies, making it critical for them to focus on modern communication modes. This is where mindStart brings value. mindStart is not only about providing customer service solutions but being a partner to a new company’s growth, making them thrive in the competitive world.mindStart systematically addresses the customer support challenges of its clients with a step-by-step approach. It focuses on understanding the preferred channel of the end-user, and comprehending the overall demographics and ensuring it’s well-equipped to handle that channel. The client engagement process begins by asking specific questions to discern the client’s vision and mission; understanding the client’s strengths, weaknesses, and the passion that drives them along. The company then leverages its customer support platform to train its knowledgeable workforce—who are the first point of contact for a client’s customers—for the clients’ products and services. In the course of the training, the support associates are introduced to clients’ products; they also receive training directly from their clients who visit mindStart’s operations center once in a while to conduct live training. The cutting-edge software allows the employees to communicate seamlessly with the end customers while catering to their queries across multiple platforms. To ensure transparency and accountability, mindStart can also integrate the platform with clients’ hardware system for seamless access to all communication records with the end customers.Additionally, mindStart gathers insights through the regular feedback from clients and makes the best use of those insights to improve their efficacy and service offerings. “An agile process, passionate and client-focused employees, and a vision to be at the forefront as a customer solutions provider are the values that make mindStart unique in the industry,” says Vicky. A case in point is when one of mindStart’s clients from the manufacturing industry was unable to manage communication with customers in the post sales scenario. Although the client had the required technology to monitor products for any issues, overseeing after-sales service was complicated since they had limited resources to focus on their core production process. The client observed that there was a gradual decline in the product usage until mindStart stepped in with its customer service solution. mindStart’s agents did outbound calls to connect with the end-users to understand the issue in depth and started troubleshooting the key problems on behalf of their clients. As an emerging company passionate about transforming the customer experience, mindStart will continue to invest in resources to improve their core customer support platform and workforce. With a significant part of their clients based in international markets, mindStart plans to extend their global wing to Asia and other markets soon. mindStart continues to upgrade its knowledge base and competence to create a deep base of loyal customers for its clients. ESOmindStart:Powering Customer Experience 10 MOST RECOMMENDED SERVICE PROVIDERS - 2019 RETAIL Vicky EzellAn agile process, passionate and client-focused employees, and a vision to be at the forefront as a customer solutions provider are the values that make mindStart unique in the industry

29JUNE - 2019The ‘Amazon effect’ has already changed the landscape of retail marketplace but the disruption goes much deeper. As a result, demand planning and forecasting is very different to how it was just a few years ago. With e-commerce comes e-planning and if you are already not forecasting and demand planning differently - you will be.Where there once was a corner department store now consumers shop online and want a shopping experience customized to their needs. The effects of this new omni-channel world are not only the need to plan faster but it is impacting what we forecast, how we forecast it, and when we forecast it. All of this creates challenges but there are also key opportunities presented by the new e-planning environment as well. To exploit these opportunities, we need to be aware of this different type of planning and of the value of the different types of information and then subsequent exploitation of it.Brave New WorldTraditionally, forecasting techniques were based on historical demand and the assumption that history repeats itself. While these methods and principles generally hold true, with e-planning many traditional forecasting models and the technology of the past struggle to keep up. It is a brave new world for demand planners where predictive analytics encompasses a variety of new statistical techniques like probabilistic modeling, machine learning (ML), Amazon Effect:Driving New Opportunities and Challenges in Demand ForecastingEric WilsonBy Eric Wilson, Director Planning, Escalade SportsCXO INSIGHTS

30JUNE - 2019and data mining that analyze current and historical facts to make predictions about the future.In today’s business environment, changes in the marketplace are swift, sudden, and may not follow the historical pattern. Just looking at historic shipments will not give you what you need and tell the whole picture. Instead we look at patterns of consumer behaviors and other attributes to try to not only predict the sell but understand why they purchased it in the first place. The new e-planning environment is dynamic and it operates on the power and speed of technology and innovation. Prediction is becoming more about behavior than history. This is powerful because once you understand the drivers, you can influence demand like never before. With new modeling, comes new inputs and the means of collecting the data you need. Third-party syndicated data from Nielsen and others could help you better understand markets and competitors in traditional retail stores—but now we have web crawlers that traverse multiple sites and bring us relevant By understanding what drives the consumer and data whenever we want. Instead of looking at just shipments or forecasting e-commerce faster and better, companies sales history, we have access to website clicks, rankings, and can plan their business strategy to take advantage the number and sentiment of customer reviews. We have a new of e-commerce’s significant impact. Working with wealth of information all of which needs to be understood and demand planners and focusing on new models, modeled and translated into real-time forecasts.Planning in this e-commerce environment now means you to provide our customers with what they want- a collect data, plan demand, and micro-target at much lower levels personalized shopping experience, affordable price, of aggregation and time. This means we may no longer have and a wide variety of available products.weeks to put together the next demand plan and are dealing with changing prices or impact of new reviews hourly. With and with it, demand forecasting and demand planning. e-commerce, you are competing almost in real time with price, The question may not be if the Amazon effect has in features, and delivery promises and feedback comes just as filtered your planning but when. Keep in mind though quickly in the form of reviews and competitive responses. To be that this just happens to be the newest disruption that more agile, companies are looking at technology and demand is impacting more than just retail sales but changing sensing techniques to translate the drivers into rules based or the way demand planning is forecasting and doing machine-learned responses. This brings us closer not only to the level of demand, Forecasting (IBF) shows that this is just the beginning but also closer to demand intent. Where traditional demand and the demand planners’ role will continue to sensing focuses purely on information from a customer relation transform. It goes to reason that with the changing management (CRM) or point of sale (POS) data from retailers landscape of the internet of things, AI, and unstructured aggregated weekly, you are now absorbing sales directly on data that things will continue to change, and we will an hourly basis or even quicker. At the same time, for those need to innovate and adapt. Those left in its wake of us who aren’t Google, Amazon, Facebook, or Starbucks, have no choice but to embrace change, technology, many companies struggle to take advantage of consumer innovation, and find new ways to forecast and plan. insights and this digital revolution. Forecasting and demand planning is still only a supply chain problem to generate a discrete demand signals to assist operations and they miss opportunities this new world is offering. While artificial intelligence (AI) ML are buzzwords many technology providers are stuck in their old methods and still struggle to adapt to this new e-planning environment. In addition, for some companies, big data is as much a problem as it is an asset.We need to better understand this new environment and we need to forecast and plan differently – the winners in this new era will be the ones that can see, interpret, and act most efficiently.A New Experiencesources of data, and technology we can learn how Amazon has totally revolutionized the marketplace, business. Research from the Institute of Business ESOPREDICTION IS BECOMING MORE ABOUT BEHAVIOR THAN HISTORY

31JUNE - 2019The arrival of Big Data and the ability to process it have led to improvements in machine learning, creating new use cases for this technology. As a result, machine learning, algorithms that execute tasks without preprogrammed rules, has become a crucial part of a retailer’s operations. Some of the most important use cases include better personalization, lowering operational costs and enabling the future of commerce. It will be important for retailers in 2018 to determine how to deploy this technology to drive revenues and lower costs.Improving the Customer Experience through PersonalizationOne of the first applications of machine learning was for product recommendations. The improvement in machine learning means that not only have the recommendations become better, but other types of personalization are possible. Many retailers offer personalized search results to shoppers based on their past purchase history and other behavior. eBay has personalized its home page for shoppers with the aim of reducing the time it takes to find an item.Another area of personalization is price optimization. Groupon Goods uses the Boomerang Commerce Price Platform management tool to optimize its prices. Groupon looks at external factors, such as consumer demand and market elasticity, and at internal factors, such as traffic and sell through targets, to optimize its prices for shoppers.Decreasing Operational CostsMachine learning is tackling tough operational challenges to lower costs. One of the best use cases is for inventory Who Runs Retail? The Machines By Michelle Grant, Head of Retailing, Euromonitor InternationalMichelle GrantCXO INSIGHTSMACHINE LEARNING PROGRAMS CAN MAKE PREDICTIONS ON THE OPTIMAL AMOUNT OF INVENTORY TO AVOID OUT OF STOCKS OR TOO MUCH INVENTORY

32JUNE - 2019management and forecasting. Machine learning programs can make predictions on the optimal amount of inventory to avoid out of stocks or too much inventory. This helps retailers avoid lost sales and markdowns. Another area where machine learning is cutting costs is with the aim of reducing apparel returns. About 30 percent of online apparel purchases are returned. Not all of the merchandise can be resold at full price and the remainder makes its way through an expensive liquidation process. Retailers are turning to machine learning to help shoppers better understand the fit of clothing and apparel to help cut down on a reason for a return. Bold Metrics is a company that provides a machine-learning fitment tool to retailers. The shopper answers four questions about their height, weight, age and either jean size for men or bra size for women. It uses that information in its machine learning to accurately predict the correct size for a brand. The retailer, SnapSuits, uses one of the products and has a return rate of only 13 percent -lower than the average for its category.It’s also being used to make the supply chain more efficient. Machine learning can determine the type and amount of inventory needed for each warehouse so that the product mix is accurate and can be shipped at a lower cost to appropriate shoppers. Kohl’s is using machine learning to determine how to fulfill an order from one or multiple stores or its fulfillment centers to lower the fulfillment cost per order.Enabling New Types of CommerceMachine learning is behind the next forms of commerce. In his 2016 shareholder letter, Jeff Bezos pointed out some of the ways that Amazon uses machine learning in its business, highlighting the AmazonGo and Alexa. Machine learning powers the computer vision that allows the AmazonGo store to be cashierless and powers the natural language processing behind Alexa that allows shoppers to use voice to shop.General Motors and IBM are partners behind GM’s connected cars with the program, Marketplace. The inclusion of IBM Watson means that the program will learn the driver’s routes and habits to provide recommendations and reminders. For example, it will know if the driver missed his usual weekly shop and recommend that he place an order. Another interesting use case is for click and collect orders. The program will allow retailers to see the driver’s route to their stores and direct the driver to the correct collection point. Moving Forward with Machine LearningIn 2018, it is important for retailers to understand how to use machine learning in their operations. With numerous use cases available, a retailer will need to evaluate which ones are a priority to the business. Once those are established, retailers will need to know if they have enough data for machine learning to be effective. Without sufficient data, machine learning will not work when built in-house. A retailer can work with third party vendors to overcome this but that means the retailer’s data commingles with other retailers’ data. The machine learning program gets smarter, benefiting all on the platform, including competitors. It will be important for retailers to decide whether it’s worth possibly helping competitors to leverage a better machine learning program.The final piece is to keep an eye on the bigger picture. Machine learning is enabling new ways for shoppers to shop, such as through voice assistants and cars. There are likely many more experiments underway. It will be necessary to for retailers to track new technologies that can enhance or disrupt their business. ESO

33JUNE - 2019In an omnichannel world, progress is determined by how extensively communications take effect. Today, the traditional ‘picking up the phone’ is just one of several channels by which companies collaborate and interact with their customers. When it comes to the debt recovery challenges faced by companies today, the potential of omnichannel has been a large opportunity, observed by The CMI Group. “We are an intersection of optimizing the omnichannel through technology, dedicated people, and a customer experience aimed to set the clients head and shoulder over the competition,” says Jim Lynch, COO, The CMI Group. The company has invested heavily in state-of-the-art technologies and customer service professionals to create partnerships, solving customers’ issues, regardless of the channel they choose for contact. The full-service receivable management firm offers innovative first- and third-party accounts receivable management, data processing and back office solutions.The CMI Group’s Contact Service Center offers customized, best-in-class, outsourced call center solutions to assist clients in improving customer loyalty and brand image, which in turn accelerates cash flow and revenue. Each customer interaction CMI makes is aligned with the quality and compliance standards, which not only resolves and effectively manages the receivable issues but also increases the lifetime customer value. The company focuses on being at the forefront, utilizing their expertise in custom-fit service to understand customers’ requirements and identify their behavior patterns for a more effective contact. Thus, CMI’s objective is to maximize both resource and savings for their customers through better understanding of cutting-edge technology and collaboration with their customers. With their receivables management division, CMI operates in the cable and the telecom space, in situations where consumers could find themselves delinquent. This is pertinent in instances concerning a billed due date on payments, where CMI can facilitate specialized routines to schedule reminder calls, communicate through SMS, utilize telephony or any other platform to best meet the scope, and deliver the best fit for that project. In other cases, certain outbound efforts are constrained by the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), limiting the scope of communicating with larger audiences. CMI can mitigate those restrictions throughtheirTCPAcompliantdialing campaigns and innovative use of omnichannel solutions to gain optimum efficacy over multiple communication nodes. In a bid to enhance the performance, cost, and quality of customer interactions, the company offers sophisticated quality and complianceprogramswhiledeveloping and executing debt recovery strategies. CMI leverages quality and speech analytics tools that help measure the tone of speech of the consumers. Another is a post-interaction survey, where the team can reach out and simply ask the customer as to what they thought of their last interaction. That survey can be delivered via multi-channel through e-mail, SMS, or as a prompt to answer a single simple question. While serving post-interaction survey to customers, CMI engages in a dialogue taking a consultative approach to figure out their needs.In the case of one of CMI’s clients, the objective was to reduce their internal expenses, while still driving productivity and liquidations. To add to that, keeping up with all the regulatory and compliance requirements was yet another challenge. With their consultative approach, CMI understood what that liquidation curve looked like for a certain segment of the business. CMI found niche areas where they saw an opportunity for the client to address separate populations and businesses differently. The result was an upward liquidation curve, while simultaneously reducing expenses.A 100 percent employee-owned company, CMI’s employees receive stock to the organization, which truly set them apart. Currently, CMI has invested in a marketing and sales effort to expand their revenue cycle management service offerings to the health care market. ESOThe CMI Group:Customer Service beyond Expectations We are an intersection of optimizing the omnichannel through technology, dedicated people, and a customer experience aimed to set their clients head and shoulder over the competition10 MOST RECOMMENDED SERVICE PROVIDERS - 2019 RETAIL Jim Lynch

34JUNE - 2019Which are the top retail technology trends to watch out forBy Savio Thattil, CIO & SVP of Technology, Sephora AmericasTo my mind, the top retail technologytrendismobile payments, and offeringconsumersgreateroptionalityinhow they pay, particularly with the advent of Apple Pay. We are following mobile payments very closely to see the pace of adoption in the US by retailers and consumers alike and whether it becomes a clear preferred choice among mobile wallet options, including those applications that have already launched and those that have yet to. There is no doubt that many players are trying to take share in this market.In addition to thinking through how consumers will pay for their merchandise, events in recent years have of course made it even more incumbent on retailers to ensure they are taking all steps possible to protect the security of their customers’ personal information. This is one of the top “conversations” among people in my role--essentially exploring how we can continually raise the bar with respect to data protection. It is something we take very seriously.Beyond that, a trend that continues and accelerates is the new “byte-sized” world, where both consumers and those in the workforce are spending more of their time on mobile/small screens. Technologies have - and will continue to be-developed for these screens that are simpler than technologies used for desktop screens and it seems that this is a trend that is here to stay. For us, mobile shopping is a critical part of our business, so we also follow it very closely. We were an early adopter and we want to remain a leader!Lastly, personalization techniques in store environments are increasingly becoming a mainstream part of the retail experience. As with mobile technologies, we recognized many years ago that personalization could be a key differentiator for us and we have brought it to life through the Color and Skincare IQ technologies in our stores, which make personalized recommendations for our clients, in our Beauty Insider loyalty programs and other many ways. It is an integral part of our business and again, we want to remain ahead of the curve.Evolving Role of CIOsOver the years, we have witnessed a massive change pertaining to the role of CIOs depending on the organization, the industry, the business strategies, the prevailing market conditions and the financial climate in terms of business value. How would you describe your own role as CIO has changed in the past couple of years?The“oldworld”CIOwasessentially in charge of technology operations and keeping them on track. It was much more a functional role than a strategic one. Times have changed, dramatically, across many industries–including and especially retail. An effective CIO essentially has two jobs. One is developing the best technology possible to support all business initiatives and operations. The other and equally important job is remaining current–or indeed ahead of–rends in technologies in order to bring new concepts to the business that will drive it forward in some manner, from improving efficiency to enhancing the customer experience.At Sephora, I have made it my core mission to ensure that my team is considered a key partner for our leadership in continually improving our business processes both within our organization and in our customer-facing initiatives, protecting the security of both our company’s and our customers’ data and, in general, bringing the Sephora vision to life and reinforcing our position as a digital leader in the retail industry.I cannot comment, for competitive reasons of course, on what is next for Sephora on the technology front. But I can tell you that developing and utilizing predictive technology to enhance the customer experience is foremost on our minds at all times. ESOSavio ThattilCIO INSIGHTS

35JUNE - 20192,000 online clients spread The VTEX True Cloud Commerce platform is a comprehensive solution for brands and retailers who put the customer first and seek for lower costs. Companies running VTEX have seen a 37% increase in conversion rates.for more information visitdeployments per year, enabling innovationThe True Cloud CommercePlatformdays to go live accelerating Time to Marketcertified partners to support your business strategywww.vtex.com2300 clients spread across 25 countries such asWe run to make you go faster. And further.+11k109+1k

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