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EUROPEAN RETAILERS ARE MISSING 35% OF SALES DUE TO LACK OF PRODUCT INFORMATION

The holiday season is the most important sales moment of the year. Nevertheless, a Zetes study reveals that retailers miss about 35 percent sales due to products not being immediately available or the lack of product information.

A quarter of consumers leave a store without actually buying anything if they do not immediately see the product that they are looking for or if that is not immediately available. It is one of the conclusions of a market research conducted by supply chain expert Zetes. The study specifically focused on buyer behavior during the annual peak period between November and January and analyzed both physical and online retail. 120 European retailers and over 2000 consumers were interviewed for this study in the January 2018 timeframe.

Time is money

The study states that stores miss 35 percent of sales due to the unavailability of products. The main reason for this is the expectation of the customer: more than in the past, customers will simply leave a store if they do not immediately see a product and they do not bother to talk to a shop assistant. 

If customers do however approach a shop assistant, they expect to receive more information about the product availability within two minutes. A rather limited window of opportunity especially if you know that the study also calculated that 51 percent of shop employees need to go to a cash desk to obtain the necessary information, and that 47 percent also needs to check the warehouse to verify the availability of a product. Both actions cost time and time is very expensive during the peak period. The study also reveals that 62 percent of retailers do not have access to real-time product data.  

Return Management

Also deliveries and returns typically cause extra problems during these busy months. It is common knowledge that people tend to buy quicker when they are sure that they can possibly return a product. The processing of returned parcels also causes problems. 26 percent of retailers indicate that they are having problems during the peak, so that only 39 percent of the returned goods are available for sale within 48 hours.  

Conclusion

“A lack of visibility of data is the core of these sales problems during the holidays,” the report states. “Consumers want choices, and they want to be informed. Instead of a general “not available” message, a retailer has a much greater chance of securing sales by telling the customer that a product will soon be back in stock and delivered within three days or will be available for click & collect.” There is still a significant room for information management improvement with direct sales optimization as a result. 

More information
https://www.zetes.com/en/white-papers

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FIND OUT WHO’S LEADING THE 2017 MASTER DATA MANAGEMENT SOLUTIONS MARKET

Gartner recently released an updated version of the Magic Quadrant for Master Data Management Solutions report and positioned Informatica & Orchestra Networks as leaders in this MDM market segment. 

 

 

Our key takeaways:

  • Specialized MDM vendors still lead the market and offer biggest added value. Vendors, delivering niche data solutions directly linked to i.e. specific business applications, seem to lack the focus and as result don’t meet the function & features of the leaders.
  • The multi-domain data trend continues to happen. This is the first edition of the Gartner Magic Quadrant on Master Data Management where Gartner consolidates the different data domains. This translates also a trend that we see it in the market where customers need an MDM solution that covers all their domains and not only customers, products, assets, etc. Reality is that customers need an MDM solution that they can use to address their complete data agenda.
  • Informatica still makes a difference compared to other vendors due to its end-to-end data capabilities which are also key for a successful MDM implementation. Data Quality, Data Governance and Data Integration are key components of any MDM platform and are available as integrated functionality in the Informatica MDM solution.

 

Learn more. Download the full Gartner report here

This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document.

Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product, or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Master Data Management Solutions, Bill O’Kane, Terilyn Palanca, Michael Patrick Moran January 2017.


If you are preparing or in the process of implementing an MDM solution and you are interested in getting additional advice, get in touch with us and we are happy to help you out.