Store Operations
Decision automation drives operational excellence.
Complex supply chains, loyalty programs, special pricing, returns and more make running a store an increasingly complex business. Business rules can simplify the business of running a store in several ways while taking advantage of mobile POS and RFID technologies as they come online.
- Labels and tags
- Pricing
- Point of Sale (POS) and Mobile POS
- Offer Redemption
- Returns
- RFID
Keeping your labels and tags up to date is a constant challenge. As prices, promotions and markdowns change so must labels on shelves and tags on products. In-store offers, integrating reviews from the web and special local information only make this more complex. Using business rules to manage all this information and assemble it for local printing ensures that timely, accurate updates can be made.
Allowing store managers flexibility in pricing and promotion while ensuring that company-wide pricing rules are followed and nationally publicized promotions honored is hard. Yet local store managers have expertise and information that is not going to be reflected in top-down pricing. Using business rules to manage pricing rules let's you square this circle by integrating store manager inputs into overall pricing models.
As POS devices become more capable and mobile POS becomes possible, an opportunity exists to make POS smarter using business rules. Business rules can manage loyalty pricing and overlapping promotions, they can identify the right cross-sell and up-sell, print the right coupon and much more.
Offers and coupons have become more and more complex. With manufacturers, distributors and retailers making their own offers and with third parties using offers to promote everything from movies to magazines as well as new mobile coupons, retailers must be able to redeem offers effectively. Yet not all offers are equal and retailers need to be able to help store clerks and managers redeem or decline offers effectively. Business rules allow you to specify when to accept offers and how the offer affects pricing. And business rules enable changes that are quick and effective, at the moment of need.
Which customers can return things without receipts? When do you give store credit not cash? Which customers are repeat returners? Which products can be copied and so only exchanged? All this and more goes into deciding how to handle a return. Instead of hoping that retail clerks or duty managers will get this right, business rules give you real control over the whole returns process. Even when handling returns from other stores or web purchases, the right rules can be implemented and followed.
Adopting RFID? How will all this new information about in-store stock, and about how people shop be used? Business rules will let you put this data to work in your systems and give your systems the agility they need to be changed as more products add RFID tags and as you learn more about your business.
Additional Corticon Retail Solutions: Merchandising Planning, Back Office, Multi Channel Retail, Supply Chain
Related Products:Corticon Business Rules Modeling Studio, Corticon Business Rules Server, Corticon Dialogs
To speak with someone at Corticon, please contact us here, call us at +1 888.619.2424 or email us at info@corticon.com.
