IoT is unveiling the enormous value for retail companies and is entirely transforming the way retail companies run their business. IoT is redefining the retail shopping from “ a place to buy stuff” to “a place for wonderful shopping experience”. Rapidly expanding number of demanding customers, their increasingly growing demands, their access to tremendous information on internet, need to supply the right product at the right time and at the right place, growing competition with mind blowing marketing and pricing strategies are putting enormous pressure on retail companies. Advent of internet and mobile shopping has already changed the shape of the retail industry and has forced the companies to evolve new business models.
As compare to many other industries, retail companies tend to have too little infrastructure to support and leverage the volume of data IoT generates. Not to forget cloud computing, edge processing networks, big data analytics, and even artificial intelligence have all added new dimensions to IoT. Although that makes the retail industry’s goal much closer to the reality today than the solutions available few years ago but still there is a great need to have the willingness to invest in such smart technologies.
Below are some we use cases that can add tremendous value to a retail company’s bottom line:
- Improving in-store customer experience
- Enhancing customer experience with Geo-fencing and location based marketing
- Optimizing supply chain operations
- Creating new channels and revenue streams
- Reaching out to maximum consumer’s devices
- Omnichannel fulfillment
- Leveraging IoT through in-store employees for increased level of customer engagement
- Smart carts to help customers navigate the store and find products
- Smart price tags to change price with changing demand
- Personalized digital coupons for loyal customers
- Personalized shopping experience and product recommendations with facial recognition and IoT sensors
- Learning about the buying behavior, pattern and preferences of different customers
- Contact-less check-out by auto-scanning the products
- Sharing demand data across stores and warehouses for inventory control and order fulfillment accuracy
- Optimizing store operations efficiency
- Ecosystem opportunities