Discovery to delivery: Transform the shopper’s journey

The relevance of a promise

The fundamental principle of commerce is the concept of a “promise.” A promise of accuracy in product detail, product capabilities, quality, price and delivery.

The promise of accuracy in inventory—or, more importantly, in the availability of inventory—is very important when there are competing demands for the same unit of inventory and unpredictable disruptions to sources of supply. It becomes very challenging to uphold the promise when so much is changing in the processes that trigger demand and supply.

The challenges of keeping a promise

The challenge is particularly true in highly competitive areas like omnichannel retail or even B2B domains—wholesale distribution and dealer-based after-market parts. This is a space where IBM Sterling Order Management and IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising have been leaders since the early days of eCommerce.

The secret to success is making sure that changes to supply and demand are tracked and processed at ultra-scale in real-time and that an accurate Available to Promise quantity (ATP) is presented to the channels of promise. It is not enough to just present a quantity; demanding shoppers also want to see an expected date of delivery—not an estimated date of when a product will be shipped, but a precise date of delivery at their doorstep or a confirmed date for in-store pickup, etc. This means keeping track of stock availability, capacity availability and possibly, the availability of specific delivery slots for pickup. In the wider context of flash-sales, in-store campaigns, marketplaces and omni-channel connected commerce initiatives, staying on top of this dynamic environment can be very challenging to companies.

Welcome to a new era of intelligent promising: IBM’s Sterling Intelligent Promising approach

IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising addresses this challenge by providing powerful promising and inventory services that deliver accurate, real-time information to power an enhanced shopper experience. Implementation and deployment of this solution are not difficult and can very quickly help companies simplify the complexity.

IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising delivers what next-generation shoppers expect from modern commerce experiences:

• Certainty of product availability, delivery estimates, actual delivery and promptness.
• Choice of how to order, where and when they can have it delivered or picked up, and their post-order service options.
• Transparency of the entire customer order journey, from order tracking to returns.

Key features and benefits

• Strengthen shopper loyalty: Confidently deliver choice and transparency to every shopper throughout the buying journey.
• Manage accurate promises: Increase digital conversions by presenting precise promise dates on the product list page, product details page and during checkout.
• Maximize inventory productivity: Reduce order cancellations and optimize inventory by dynamically providing shoppers with enterprise-wide inventory views.
• Take advantage of fulfillment optimization: Balance predefined business rules with real cost drivers to make the best fulfillment decisions for business outcomes, optimizing across thousands of permutations in milliseconds.
• Increase omnichannel profitability: Drive higher conversion and in-store sales with accurate promise dates, choice in delivery and pickup, and upsell of related products.

Try IBM’s Sterling Intelligent Promising solution today

Commerce, inventory and fulfillment managers can envision how to improve digital and in-store conversion, omnichannel revenue and profitability via contextual, transparent and accurate delivery estimates at every stage of the order journey. To help them experience this journey ahead of the actual purchase of the service, IBM has made available a “try before you buy” trial experience for IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising.

Users and architects can try a 30-day trial experience that features the powerful capabilities of the promising and inventory services and the pre-configured data that powers the shopper experience. The trial experience will also demonstrate the architectural elegance and automation provided by the underlying Kubernetes container-based technology. This Kubernetes Operator pattern design brings simplicity and scalability to the management of interconnected ecosystem solutions.

The walkthrough of our solution will demonstrate the trust and confidence your customers have on your word. Learn how you can make accurate promises and how you can keep those promises—profitably.

Source: ibm.com

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Relocation reverberations: How pandemic moves have impacted demand and inventory management

Many people have relocated over the last year, as closed offices and increased remote working options enable more flexible living arrangements. With a shift of population to new places, particularly from large urban city centers to other suburban areas, retailers may be struggling to position their inventory based on historical data trends. For instance, an area that previously may not have performed well, may be over-indexing simply because more people have moved to the area during the pandemic and may be experiencing stockouts since inventory was not positioned for this shift. How can a retailer know how much inventory to position and where, when demographics are rapidly changing as a result of the pandemic?

Aside from population-based demand changes, retailers also have been tasked with anticipating demand shifts from increased online shopping, decreased brand loyalty, and other shopping trends. Inventory allocation has never been easy, but a less clear picture of demand makes forecasting, planning and allocation increasingly complicated.

What is demand planning?

Demand planning is a critical process for supply chain management during which a company projects future demand, and therefore shifts output to meet those projections. With accurate forecasting of customer demand and sales, they can better plan for how much inventory to order or produce, as well as where to allocate that inventory across locations to ensure they can meet demand. Accuracy is necessary to efficiently balance inventory. By situating inventory where it is needed most, retailers can meet demand without excess carrying costs, or disappointing customers with backorders or out-of-stock situations.

How has the demand picture gotten more complicated since 2020?

A significant number of US offices remain closed for in-person work during the pandemic, with 41.8% of the American workforce currently working remotely. Without a need to be in person for work, many employees in the US have discovered that they can be anywhere and still get the job done. In addition, with financial challenges and unexpected layoffs, many reconsidered their city lifestyle and made the shift to more affordable suburban areas. In the second quarter of 2020, 51% of Realtor.com’s property searches from city residents in the 100 largest U.S. metro areas were for homes in the suburbs of those areas, a record high for the site. There has been a noticeable “urban shuffle”, with people leaving big, densely populated areas in favor of suburbs and smaller communities across the country.

On top of that, the flow of people into core US metro areas showed a net decrease – indicating not only that people were moving out, but that fewer residents were moving in. According to Bloomberg, 82% of urban centers saw more people move out than in, with 91% of suburban counties seeing the opposite. And, based on USPS address change requests, over 15.9 million people have moved since February 2020.

Discover how Sterling Order Management helped JOANN Stores manage unexpected demand during COVID-19

Demand forecasts and inventory allocation directly impact stock and availability across different retail locations around the country. However, with shifting populations, previous demand estimates using historical data may no longer be enough to efficiently situate inventory. For instance, in New York City (NYC), some residents took the pandemic as an opportunity to move out of the city center and into neighboring suburbs within commuting distance of the city or even to warmer areas across the country. In total, 320,000 people left NYC in 2020, a 237% increase from the year before. A retailer who allocated significant inventory in NYC may face excess carrying costs if their inventory allocation didn’t consider pandemic-related population and demand shifts.

To complicate inventory management further, previously forecasted demand for in-store sales has been dramatically impacted by the growth of eCommerce. In late 2020, 23% of consumers reported that they were doing all or most of their shopping online, and that this was a change from their pre-COVID shopping patterns. With rising online demand that may be here to stay, estimating in-store demand and inventory gets challenging. In addition, in-store cart conversion is now impacted by online inventory availability. Customers are taking another step before purchasing in store: checking in-store availability online. Retailers must provide accurate inventory estimations online to keep customers coming to stores, since 33% of US adults are less likely to visit a store at all if they can’t confirm online first that what they want to buy is available in-store.

What does this mean for retailers?

As the pandemic exposed flaws across many supply chains, retailers are emerging with a strong focus on resilience and building smarter, more dynamic supply chains that can react quickly to disruptions and better match supply to demand. With volatile and unpredictable customer demand at store locations, the best thing retailers can do is become more agile to react when change happens, and to establish best practices to keep customers satisfied.

A real-time view of inventory across store locations, warehouses, and in-transit enables retailers to identify mismatches between demand and inventory availability faster. Today, modern inventory management solutions alert users instantly when inventory is over-stock or below safety stock thresholds, helping retailers take immediate action to rebalance. And, with demand shifting across store locations, retailers can monitor inventory levels and reallocate inventory to locations where demand may be higher.

Using AI technology for order management and fulfillment ensures retailers are optimizing inventory and using it at its most profitable price point, continuously learning and improving outcomes for omnichannel fulfillment. With a combination of AI and an enterprise-wide inventory view, retailers can easily identify inventory in stores where inventory is obsolete or slow moving, and prioritize it to fulfill eCommerce demand to improve inventory sell-through. With full use of enterprise-wide inventory, retailers can ensure they are meeting demand in the most profitable way, no matter how demand shifts have impacted their retail locations.

Regardless of demand shifts, retailer indication of available in-store inventory online is becoming a pre-requisite for brick-and-mortar sales. To better stabilize in-store demand, retailers must meet the modern customers’ changing needs for transparency and certainty in shopping experiences. Retailers should look to increase online transparency of inventory availability for all omnichannel touchpoints like curbside pickup, in-store purchasing, or delivery, using intelligent promising software. With sophisticated inventory promising software, retailers can improve in-store sales, as well as digital conversions, while increasing profitability.

Source: ibm.com

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Don’t let the shipping container crisis ruin Christmas this year

By now we’ve all heard the rumblings (and the roars!) about how myriad challenges – backlogged ports, factory shutdowns, and shipping delays – are going to impact Christmas shopping this year. According to Business Insider, the cargo ships waiting off the coast of California are creating record backlog. We don’t want to minimize the serious impact of these substantial roadblocks – especially as the retail industry enters the eight-week holiday shopping window that accounts for a big portion of many businesses’ annual sales – but we also want to acknowledge that there are steps you can take to prepare for and successfully work around the issues.

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1. Be up-front with your customers

Chances are, your customers have heard about many of these issues and have concerns they might not be able to buy the gifts and goods they want for the holidays. Address their concerns directly, through touchpoints like social media, advertisements and emails. They want to hear from you, and they want to know the steps you’re taking. For instance, encourage customers to shop early, to sign up to be notified when an out-of-stock item is back in stock, etc.

2. Kick-off the holidays earlier than usual

NBC News is reporting early holiday shopping is anticipated this year. Additionally, 27% of holiday shoppers plan to start Christmas shopping by the end of September. If your customers are concerned that supplies are limited, it makes sense that they will shop early, hoping to avoid out-of-stock disappointment. Be ready for them by taking steps like adding extra staff to handle increased sales volume.

3. Rethink promotions

As the price for goods – and for shipping and delivering goods – goes up, it leaves less room for discounts and sales, two traditions during past holiday seasons. This year, rather than offering big discounts or slashing prices, consider promotions that encourage loyalty (after all, repeat customers are your best customers), offer bundles (combining two or more items), and consider high-value, low-cost freebies with purchase.

4. Prepare for more in-person shopping

Ed Desmond, Executive Vice President of the Toy Association, says that more in-person shopping is expected this year than compared to the 2020 holidays, when the country was in the middle of a deadly winter surge of the coronavirus. Again, be ready for in-person shoppers by taking steps like creating plans for how to keep the shelves stocked when inventory is low. Well-designed visual merchandising and signage will entice shoppers to stop in and quickly drive up sales by displaying the most popular items in windows and high traffic areas. Give shoppers more time during the busiest time of year, especially the procrastinators and last-minute shoppers, by extending your store hours.

5. Hone in on your most popular items

With so much in flux, some companies are finding solace (and sales) in the classics. In addition to stocking up on your customers traditional favorites, consider including less variation than you might normally offer. For instance, if a cotton v-neck tee is your signature item, offer it in your best-selling colors and top-selling sizes, without taking too many chances by including unique or unusual hues, or sizing too far beyond either side of what’s standard.

6. Consider supplier alternatives

If the clogged ports and shipping delays have you rethinking some of your vendors, and your company is in a position to get your products from other sources, consider finding local or USA-based suppliers. This reduces delivery time and allows you to market the products as “local”. There are also huge benefits here in regards to reducing carbon footprint which is a major consideration for 32% of US consumers who are prioritizing companies that are actively reducing their impact on the environment.

7. Find shipping alternatives

As national shipping carriers face staffing issues and major backlogs, look for local and regional alternatives. If you can, consider building up your own delivery services, even at a local level, to help relieve some of the shipping pressures.

8. Embrace technology

The retail market is moving quickly. To stay competitive, your technology needs to be adaptable, scalable and on-point this holiday season. Worldwide eCommerce retail sales in 2020 were 4.28 trillion USD and are projected to grow to 5.4 trillion dollars in 2022. Customers are expecting a fluid experience from end-to-end, and you can shape their overall experience to increase conversions and build brand loyalty. IBM experts can help you successfully navigate a sea of challenges with eCommerce. It’s always the right time to get on board with our offerings, or to add-on to the IBM solutions you currently employ. Here’s a trio of ways we can help:

Dynamic inventory – Avoid lost revenue from out-of-stock goods with dynamic inventory. You can combine inventory intelligence with real-time data and be proactive about store transfers to optimize your safety stock. Keeping a minimal amount of safety stock is a balance of the right amount of extra stock while keeping reasonable inventory costs.

Intelligent promising – Improve eCommerce conversions and reduce cart abandonment with intelligent promising. Make and manage order promises with accurate delivery dates for customers, and easily support even the most complex scenarios, including orders that from third-party services and multi-brand orders.

Fulfillment optimization – Handle rising fulfillment costs from growing complexity and heightened customer expectations with fulfillment optimization. With advanced data science to achieve multiple objectives, you can optimize profitability by balancing various business goals while delivering the best customer experience, from discovery to delivery.

Preserve brand trust by providing shoppers with greater certainty, choice and transparency across their buying journey this holiday season. Explore how to improve digital conversions and in-store sales while increasing omnichannel profitability with IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising.

Source: ibm.com

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Part 3: 4 ways retailers can boost store sales this holiday season

This is a 3-part blog series to prepare you for the upcoming holiday season.

Think Santa is the only one to make the holidays a success? Think again.

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As the final blog of a three-part series with IBM, this article will share with you realistic ways retailers can optimize their holiday season by leveraging data, managing fulfillment, being proactive in shopper care and offering consumers consistent experiences no matter where they prefer to shop. The best part? The holidays won’t be the only time of the year that retailers can appreciate these tips.

#1: Leverage data to help increase multiple units per transaction 

With big data, retailers can be more predictive, more proactive and more profitable in their efforts. This also means that merchants can bulk up each transaction making relevant recommendations to upsell and cross sell. Leaning on historic data generated from past holidays and current trends, identify what inventory has sold the most, what price points are your sweet spots to sell, and what items have historically been easy add-ons to help add more dollars to each transaction. This will vary depending on your overall average price points, but the goal is to increase sales and increase customer retention by gently marketing relevant products that customers either need (such as batteries), or want, (such as an affordable holiday candle), in addition to their main purchase. Aid them in making add-on choices by being fully informed about stock availability, location, and arrival time. Combined with strategic merchandising both online and in physical stores, this is a great way to boost overall holiday sales.

#2: Incorporate a variety of ways for customers to shop and connect with your brand

Consumers want what they want when they want it—with very few exceptions—and that includes how they shop. With COVID still making many consumers wary of shopping in physical stores, and other consumers simply preferring to shop online, having multiple channels for consumers to shop is vital this holiday season. This also means building trust with your customer by sending consistent and honest communication about inventory, fulfillment, shipping, and holiday messaging. Make it convenient for them to reach you if they want. For example, if one customer prefers to phone in holiday orders while another wants to buy online then pick up at a store, it’s important to have clear contact details, shopping options and customer service support across every step of the journey. This should include, but is not limited to, branded websites, social media, email marketing, online review sites such as Yelp and Google, and of course in-store signage and communication. Everything from store hours to return policies to shipping costs to delivery options should be shared consistently across each touchpoint, helping to ensure a seamless and excellent shopping experience for your customers this holiday season.

#3: Manage fulfillment challenges before they arise

With holiday sales predicted to grow 7% to 9%, better than the 5.8% increase it tracked in 2020, retailers need to proactively prepare in order to reward themselves later this holiday season. But let’s face it, fulfillment has been a challenge ever since COVID started and this holiday season will be no exception. Get ahead of the challenges by communicating with vendors what shortages they anticipate, budgeting for last minute orders due to unexpected delays and even consider introducing new vendors that can guarantee on-time deliveries. Additionally, implementing intelligent inventory promising into a store’s inventory management and fulfillment responsibilities confidently positions merchants to maximize their conversions, gain control over immediate and future inventory actions, and prepare stock based on consumer demands throughout the holiday season and beyond. The key takeaway here is simple: Be proactive to remain profitable.

#4: Deliver customer service that Santa would be proud of

Creating a balance between profitability and the best customer experience is not easy. But it needs to be among your top goals this holiday season as consumers have countless options to where they shop. Consumers want convenience, speed, and product availability. With costs increasing on global supplies and demands increasing among consumers, finding the balance between store operations and customer care can be a challenge. Data analytics enables retailers to make recommendations based on their customers purchase history and key touchpoints for communication, creating a more personalized experience. To make every interaction feel personal, take the time now to identify holiday expectations and how you will make sure the customer feels supported by your team. Next, proactively aim to prepare frontline associates working directly with consumers on how they can meet these standards. Schedule trainings, plan for employee reviews, incorporate incentives on customer service experiences that are recognized by consumers and be proactive in encouraging your company to outshine their competition with customer care this holiday season. As a result, your sales and customer retention will increase.

Finally, as the holidays near, there are two ways to approach them. You can take control of them, or they can take control of you. What do you want for your retail business? Give Santa a break this holiday season and gift yourself the gift that keeps on giving. IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising can empower to you create next-generation omnichannel experiences and preserve brand trust by providing shoppers with greater certainty, choice and transparency across their buying journey.

Part 1: 3 ways retailers can gift themselves with enhanced inventory management this holiday season

Part 2: ‘Tis the season for fulfillment: 3 retail holiday hurdles and how to overcome them

Source: ibm.com

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Part 2: ‘Tis the season for fulfillment: 3 retail holiday hurdles and how to overcome them

Looking to have a big holiday season? Let fulfillment lead the way.

As retailers prepare for the upcoming holidays, it’s critical they consider all the influences that can make or break their holiday success. At the core of their preparation should be a single inventory tracking system that gives a 360-degree perspective on inventory management, customer engagement and fulfillment risk and opportunities. With each of these factors ultimately positioning businesses for competitive advantage, fulfillment will take a starring role in the success or failure of sales.

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Let’s explore three ways in which fulfillment can be challenged during the holidays and how to overcome these hurdles with preparation ahead of known events.

1. Holiday peaks present challenges to supply chains and order management

Demand peaks are an unavoidable reality that occurs most holiday seasons. And COVID has certainly heightened the uncertainty of supply and demand all year round. In fact, 32% of consumers are concerned that global supply chain issues causing lack of inventory could impact their ability to purchase holiday gifts this season. Due to this, gaining a stronger, more proactive approach to fulfillment is an essential part of optimizing your supply chain. The best way to manage this is to proactively prepare for important moments and enable the ability to track and perform fulfillment based on order volumes and workloads – particularly during peak seasons such as the holidays. This requires real-time inventory visibility and optimized order orchestration, helping to deliver stronger customer care through more polished fulfillment experiences. When retailers implement technology to overcome these hurdles, they are empowered to improve digital conversions and in-store sales while increasing omnichannel profitability. As a result, this also helps retailers protect their margins, meet delivery expectations and increase profits during peak periods.

2. Unexpected inventory disruptions are bound to happen. It’s how they are handled that can make or break a retatiler’s success

Let’s face it – the holidays will test your supply chain more than any other time of year. As retail business decision makers, welcoming a technology infrastructure that helps manage inventory fulfillment ahead of events is a key factor in your overall success. Being proactive, as it turns out, leads to profit. And the only way to do this is to have a strong order management system in place. As you look ahead to the holidays, consider how the IBM Sterling™ Event Readiness program can help you meet your fulfillment goals. In particular, you want to be prepared for escalated consumer traffic and expectations alike during the holidays with the ability to deliver orders seamlessly no matter where a customer’s journey leads thanks to intelligent fulfillment platforms.

3. Inventory visibility is not clear for customers and retailers alike

Lack of data – plain and simple – can quickly turn what could have been a successful holiday season into a very average or even bad season overall. Without data, retailers are literally blind to the opportunities that can better support their customers, strengthen their inventory management and optimize fulfillment. Gaining real-time, accurate data, however, leads to order opportunities across all selling avenues. Leveraging embedded AI technology into your inventory management further enhances this, positioning your brand to make smarter sourcing and fulfillment decisions at the lowest cost-to-serve. AI technology can benefit sales as well; nearly half of consumers respond that they would be more likely to purchase from retailers using AI tools in their supply chain management. The best part? This is the kind of holiday gift that keeps on giving!

The benefits of leveraging sophisticated inventory management solutions helps retailers to create next-generation omnichannel experiences – all year long. The benefits include optimized omnichannel fulfillment at the lowest cost-to-serve and real-time sourcing flexibility that makes better use of “at risk” and returned inventory. With clarity into the never-ending, always changing, big picture of commerce, retailers can optimize omnichannel decisions across commerce, merchandising, logistics, store operations and supply chain, as well as scale existing fulfillment capacity to accommodate more customer demands.

Source: ibm.com

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Amid back-to-school and holiday shopping supply chain concerns, consumers want improved transparency

Consumers weary from ongoing supply chain strains are demanding greater transparency and certainty from retailers and e-commerce sites as they undertake back-to-school and holiday shopping. With record spending anticipated for back-to-school season this year amid expected shortages and reduced inventories, just under half of parents are concerned about back-to-school supplies (42 percent) and availability of holiday gifts (46 percent) – according to a new survey of consumers conducted by Morning Consult on behalf of IBM.

The survey also found that millennials are most concerned about their ability to purchase back-to-school supplies (36 percent) and holiday gifts (42 percent) compared to other generations. Further, nearly half of all consumers stated they are more likely to purchase from a business using advanced technologies such as AI to help reduce shipping delays. To address a growing shift in consumer expectations, IBM recently launched Sterling Intelligent Promising to help retailers and e-commerce businesses make more accurate and reliable order delivery promising earlier in the process.

The recent “Intelligent Promising Survey” of 2,200 U.S. adults conducted by Morning Consult on behalf of IBM Sterling, respondents indicated that information at-a-glance and fast delivery speeds when shopping online were critical to their shopping decisions. Two thirds said they expect to have delivery (67 percent) and inventory (65 percent) options at a immediately available when shopping online, while 64 percent will go somewhere else to purchase an item if it is not available for delivery within one to two weeks. Parents of school-aged children are more likely to expect delivery and inventory options at-a-glance and will switch retailers if necessary to reduce delivery time, and are generally more critical of retailers — 71 percent indicated they will stop shopping at places that do not meet their needs compared to consumers generally.

Looking more closely at generational trends, the survey found that GenZers and Millennials care more about fast, convenient delivery options. GenXers and Baby Boomers are more likely to expect delivery and inventory options at-a-glance. Among men and women, 40 percent of consumers surveyed think two-day delivery is important while 38 percent responded getting an item shipped from a local store for faster delivery is important.

Helping retailers and e-commerce businesses increase their agility to meet these evolving shopper preferences, the new Sterling Intelligent Promising software helps provide greater transaction trust and transparency for shoppers. It also gives consumers more direct influence in tailoring their unique customer experience. By offering greater certainty of product availability and delivery estimates, choice of where and how to fulfill an order, and transparency about order status across the order journey, retailers can build greater brand affinity with shoppers.

The study also revealed a new trend, a preference among shoppers for more sustainable and environmentally-friendly shipping options. 56 percent of consumers under 35 years said they are more likely to purchase from a retailer using AI-based tools to minimize the carbon footprint of their order. Among GenZ respondents, 45 percent said that delivery options that reduce environmental impact are most important to them while 34 percent of women are more likely to care about sustainable shipping options.  However same-day delivery and curbside pick-up are more important to 30 percent of male respondents.

Supporting this shift to AI-enabled omnichannel fulfillment innovations empowering next-generation shoppers, the AI-powered Sterling Intelligent Promising helps retailers and e-commerce companies give shoppers increased control over their customer experience and the environmental impact of their purchasing preferences. Sterling Intelligent Promising is built on a modern, cloud native microservices-based architecture to easily integrate and scale with any order management system. The new offering helps improve order transparency with more accurate estimated delivery dates, while sourcing merchandise from the closest, fastest fulfillment point. This helps retail and e-commerce businesses keep costs down and reduce their carbon footprint with optimized shipping decisions with a new carbon accounting engine.

Sterling Intelligent Promising fulfillment software helps retailers and e-commerce businesses make more accurate and reliable delivery promising and optimization earlier in the ordering process. This helps develop greater transaction trust and transparency with shoppers to help increase in-store and digital conversion rates at scale. It also gives consumers more direct influence in tailoring their unique customer experience. As fulfillment operations complexity continues to increase with more purchases coming through multiple channels, doing so without purpose-built intelligent fulfillment can lead to sub-optimal experiences, missed sales opportunities and margin erosion. By offering shoppers greater certainty of product availability and delivery estimates, choice of where and how to fulfill an order, and transparency about order status across the order journey, retailers can build greater brand affinity with shoppers.

Sterling Intelligent Promising helps retailers and e-commerce businesses:

◉ Maximize inventory productivity by making enterprise-wide inventory available to shoppers based on business priorities such as reducing time or cost to deliver merchandise, or increasing profitability of orders. The solution enables inventory from across the enterprise, including stores, to be visible to shoppers across the entire online shopper journey including product list and product detail pages within milliseconds. This gives retailers granular control over online inventory availability at each fulfillment location and the ability to make better available-to-promise decisions.

◉ Make and manage accurate order promises to shoppers including any combination of deliver-by, deliver-on, deliver-during and deliver-at across their order journey. The solution influences promising from cart, to checkout and post order experience, supporting a wide range of fulfillment experiences such as BOPIS, ship-from-store (SFS) and curbside pick-up.

◉ Optimize fulfillment for improved profitability and sustainability by minimizing fulfillment costs such as distance, labor, capacity, carrier cost as well as profit impacts including markdown or stockout data. It includes AI-driven detailed optimization decision explanations.

Source: ibm.com

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How OMS technology can help distributors become value-added partners

With the modernization of technology, manufacturers have more tools at their disposal to serve customers directly — challenging the distributor’s role in the supply chain. Distributors should consider leveraging technology to enable and strengthen their customer and supplier partnerships, creating value that might not otherwise be possible. B2B order management solutions create opportunities for manufacturers and distributors to work together for improved sales, reduced costs, enhanced collaboration and stronger customer relationships.

Improve sales

The B2B market is restructuring and digitizing, with B2B eCommerce estimated to account for 17% of all B2B sales in the US by 2023. Distributors need technology solutions built for B2B that power their growing eCommerce footprint, with scalability for even their highest demand. Distributors relying on their ERP are not prepared to thrive in an increased eCommerce environment. ERPs lack the ability to harness real-time inventory and fulfillment data, and their disjointed processes lead to lost sales and backorders. By augmenting ERPs with advanced order and inventory management solutions, distributors can unify disparate data sources and provide a more accurate picture of what inventory is available to customers. With insight into inventory, distributors can optimize stock levels to guarantee fulfillment of orders.

Additionally, inventory visibility lays the groundwork for a successful customer eCommerce experience. A single, unified view of inventory makes complex orders easier to manage. This visibility enables delivery tracking so distributors can create a transparent customer experience, giving them confidence in where the order is and the ability to accurately promise when it will be delivered.

Reduce costs

Even with value-added services and self-service capabilities, distributors still struggle to expand margins, requiring a need for greater innovation. And, with COVID-19, business priorities are shifting to focus more on operational efficiency, with reducing costs at the top of the list. Distributors can use modern order and inventory management technology to reduce costs through several avenues:

◉ Reducing human error: By automating manual processes in pricing, ordering, processing and sourcing, distributors can avoid the costs of human error.

◉ Smart sourcing and fulfillment: Rather than relying on a person to select the best fulfillment option, use AI to analyze all fulfillment options to find the true lowest cost-to-serve option that still meets SLAs.

◉ Reduce inventory costs: With full visibility into inventory across the supply chain, distributors can spot redundancies and find opportunities to reduce excess inventory holding costs.

◉ Avoid contract penalties: Instead of traditional first come, first serve processes to determine how they fulfill orders, distributors can lean on smart supply chain technology to prioritize customers based on their contractual needs, so they serve the most critical customers first and avoid penalties.

Enhance collaboration with data sharing

There are clear trust barriers to sharing data between distributors and manufacturers, stemming from fear of unintentionally giving away valuable competitive data. However, there is real value in data sharing with manufacturers. It creates visibility across the value chain to enable all supply chain stakeholders to react more quickly, and improves trust and provenance across the value chain. Although this collaboration is only successful with clear value propositions and rationales for data sharing, as well as mutually beneficial agreements, it can provide significant benefits for both parties and the end customer.

Data sharing can improve resource coordination and visibility into value chains, ultimately delivering better customer experiences and accelerating profitability. When organizations don’t share data, they create blind spots. Sharing information helps select the best possible customer outcome- whether that’s a direct to customer delivery from the manufacturer, a drop-shipment, or a delivery from a distribution center. And, with data sharing, distributors and manufacturers can gain end-to-end visibility across the value chain, improving the ability to react quickly to unexpected events and reduce inventory.

With visibility across the supply chain, distributors are able to understand and act on changes in the market as they occur – to perfectly balance protecting margins, utilizing store capacity and meeting delivery expectations. These sourcing decisions can dramatically increase profits, especially during peak periods. Perhaps the manufacturer has inventory that could be delivered to the customer at a lower cost, but a distributor’s warehouse is much closer. With hasty delivery prioritized, the distributor and manufacturer both know they are serving that customer best by going through the distributor instead of direct to customer.

Closer customer relationships

With changing customer demands, distributors must rethink their supply chains to satisfy customers and drive profitability. Distributors must prioritize exceptional customer relationships and invest in improving customer experiences. Technology creates opportunities to make smarter, more insightful decisions to serve those people even better and improve customer retention.

Personalized eCommerce

Distributors excel because of their local, personalized services. Distributors can go one step further in tailoring the order experience by providing unique online sales catalogues or pricing options based on the customer themselves, providing more relevant and helpful eCommerce experiences.

Seamless self-service

Distributors are increasing their use of self-service tools to drive online sales. By simplifying their online ordering experience, distributors can empower customers to seamlessly complete complex orders across multiple brands.

Modern fulfillment experiences

By embracing automation and AI, distributors can deliver to customers cheaper and faster than ever before, enhancing the customer experience.

Enabling customer confidence

With today’s order and inventory management technology, distributors can give their customers the confidence to know that their order will arrive on time and in full, improving customer loyalty and repeat purchasing. Distributors can enable customer confidence by investing in technology that provides real-time inventory availability for sales catalogs and calculates accurate delivery estimates backed by intelligent insights.

With growing customer demands and changing technology, distributors need to navigate their complex commerce landscape with a customer-centric perspective, creating value from order to delivery. By augmenting existing supply chain applications with IBM Sterling Order Management, they can fill key capability gaps to enhance the customer experience and increase revenue.

Source: ibm.com

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Part 1: 3 ways retailers can gift themselves with enhanced inventory management this holiday season

The season of giving is quickly approaching retailers and consumers alike. With many merchants facing challenged supply chains and weakened operations as a direct result of COVID-19, this season may not be the happiest time of year for retailers – despite the holiday’s historic reputation to deliver just that. However, there’s still ample opportunity for retailers to proactively prepare for a successful holiday season.

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Bringing clarity to inventory management is the most valuable asset – or gift – a retailer can give themselves. This clarity is delivered by data, ultimately providing real-time visibility into inventory both accessible and not accessible to consumers at any given time and via any channel they interact with. Whether consumers are browsing online, shopping in a physical store or using a search engine to direct themselves to other sources of inventory, like marketplaces and more, retailers need to have the confidence that their inventory being shared with consumers is in fact available.

Expanding on this, here are three ways retailers can gift themselves this holiday season through inventory management.

#1: Eliminate multiple inventory tracking systems by introducing a single inventory system to help boost operations, customer experience and sales

Leveraging multiple, disparate inventory tracking systems creates issues with acheiving accurate inventory availability and thus, compromises consumer trust and retailer profit opportunities. Merchants lose dollars when they do not have up-to-the-second intelligence of their stock across their entire supply chain. As a result, this potentially puts them at risk of losing revenue. But they do not have to manage their business this way. With cloud-based solutions, such as IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising, retailers can avoid lost sales due to a lack of understanding accurate inventory levels, as well as avoid overpromising and unnecessary shipping charges. And all of this can be managed while meeting customer demands. This omnichannel effort is truly a gift that gives back year-round to merchants that welcome it into their operations.

#2: Gain a 360-degree perspective on fulfillment opportunities, challenges and all touchpoints that connect these avenues together

With 78% of U.S. online adults believing it’s important for retailers to offer real-time inventory visibility, it’s critical retailers have a single inventory tracking system in place to achieve this. Fulfillment promises are only achieved when inventory visibility is available in real-time, and this includes having clarity on upcoming deliveries, historic sales data, customer engagement with inventory and of course, sales. Collectively, these details enable merchants to be more proactive and more profitable in their immediate and future inventory planning activities – ultimately leading to strengthened inventory turns and increased conversions no matter where consumers prefer to make their purchases.

#3: Welcome an endless aisle into your inventory management that connects you to more customers, more often

Among the many advantages of retailers using a single inventory tracking system is that they gain more control over their future inventory planning efforts thanks to the real-time data it provides across all channels. As retailers look ahead to the holidays, it’s critical to have a single view of inventory via one dashboard that can be customized to meet both immediate needs and future inventory planning efforts. This can include drop-shopping, supplier management, traditional brick and mortar, and digital selling avenues such as ecommerce and marketplaces. With an endless aisle approach, retailers can welcome endless opportunities to drive business success.

As we look ahead to the holiday season, it’s important to reflect on past and current operational challenges you have had in order to overcome them in the months leading up to the holidays. With inventory management being at the core of all retail businesses, it’s fair to say that gifting your retail operations a real-time inventory visibility and management system is the best present you can give yourself to overcome these challenges. And the best part about this? More transactions should follow, which is ultimately the best gift of all –  increased sales.

Source: ibm.com

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IBM and Adobe strengthen collaboration for smarter supply chains

IBM and Adobe have expanded their strategic alliance, an extension of our successful 20-year services partnership, making IBM one of Adobe’s top global services and technology partners. Over the course of this partnership, we’ve collaborated to combine Adobe’s world-class digital business solutions to drive digital commerce innovation experiences for new and prospective customers.

To meet changing customer demands and expectations – and set a new bar for B2C and B2B digital commerce – IBM Sterling® Order Management and Adobe Commerce worked together to create a new connector that provides a direct integration between our solutions. Sterling Order Management and Adobe Commerce’s collaboration makes it easier for small and large customers to use the two technologies together, while also automating processes with extended intelligent workflows to increase business agility.

As businesses emerge from the shadow of the pandemic, gaining market share and customer trust are mission critical. Organizations that have already made the digital transformation of customer experience (CX) a formal business priority have already earned a competitive edge.

The latest IBM Institute for Business Value report, which surveyed companies using Adobe’s digital experience platform (DXP) applications, focuses on how organizations are exploiting their DXPs to digitally transform CX. The data reveals that Experience Leaders see their DXPs not just as a set of technologies, but as a strategic play for increasing profits and scaling rapidly.

Sterling Order Management and Adobe Commerce help companies make/structure/execute on digital strategic plays that increase profits while focusing on the customer experience. By combining the front-end capabilities of Adobe Commerce, with the back-end order management features of Sterling Order Management, businesses will be able to create engaging experiences that better manage orders and meet customer expectations, in real-time, to help instantly mitigate order fulfillment issues or customer experience disruptions.

With Sterling Order Management, businesses can track orders from inception to delivery, manage processes and data throughout the order lifecycle, and get real-time visibility into every order across channels. Our modern order management system allows organizations to enhance automation, accelerate operations, and reduce errors while optimizing the customer experience. Sterling Order Management Essentials caters to small-medium businesses who want a prescriptive model and quick implementation. All Sterling solutions provide with the ability to scale for unprecedented demand, satisfy customer needs across channels, adapt to new fulfillment methods, and provide quick time-to-value at a low cost.

IBM offers an extensive partner network trusted for their in-depth knowledge, customer-centric focus and ability to work with IBM and their customers. And IBM iX, the business design arm of IBM Services, is ready to help customers rapidly deploy this new integration and provide consulting and implementation services to Adobe customers to help accelerate their path to an exceptional customer experience.

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Sophisticated inventory promising: Your superpower for next-generation omnichannel experiences

Customer-centricity is the heart of every successful retailer. But as customers’ expectations quickly evolve, retailers are challenged with increasing sales and getting product out the door as quickly as possible – sometimes foregoing profitability and efficiency. As a result, a strategy initially designed to put the customer first, can often lead to over-promising and result in disappointed shoppers facing late deliveries or cancelled orders.

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Fortunately, it is possible to make promises that are reliable and profitable. And there’s no time to waste.

Why now?

Retailers have prioritized new omnichannel operations to meet customers’ needs, with just over 60% of retailers reporting that they are currently implementing curbside pick-up or BOPIS solutions, or planning to in the next 12 months. But in the rush to introduce seamless customer experiences and manage omnichannel complexity, many retailers haven’t considered their approach to promising and how it directly impacts customer experiences. In fact, 35% of retailers don’t have a well-defined omnichannel fulfillment strategy in place. Currently, retailers rely on what the system says is available for inventory and then calculate the shipping time to present a promise date. But without real-time inventory visibility, they can’t see what is actually available before they promise it to customers. Aside from inventory, there are many other nuances to consider before retailers can make profitable and accurate promises — labor and throughput capacity to prepare orders, node and carrier schedules, as well as cost factors and constraints.

Every retailer wants to increase sales and get products into shoppers’ hands faster. However, if you can’t do this in a way that is efficient and reliable for customers, revenue and profitability suffer in the long term. Visibility and trust throughout the process are critical to every shopper experience. Customers often face disappointment when inventory they believed to be in stock is really unavailable or backordered at checkout. In fact, roughly 47% of shoppers will shop elsewhere if they cannot see inventory availability before they buy. Providing customers with early into estimated delivery dates is also critical; nearly 50% of shoppers would cancel their cart due to a mismatch between their expectations for the delivery date and the actual delivery date.

What’s changed?

Retailers need a modern solution that brings together real-time inventory visibility and advanced fulfillment logic to balance profitability and customer experience. That’s why we are proud to announce IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising, a solution designed to empower retailers with advanced inventory promising for next-generation omnichannel experiences, from discovery to delivery. Retailers can preserve brand trust by providing shoppers with greater certainty, choice, and transparency across their buying journey. And, this solution empowers retailers to increase digital conversions and in-store sales while achieving near-perfect delivery time SLA compliance, a reduction in split packages and shipping costs, and an improvement in inventory turns.

What’s the impact?

IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising is your superpower to enhance the shopping experience by improving certainty, choice and transparency across the customer journey.

➥ Certainty. With real-time inventory visibility and advanced, cost-based optimization, you can deliver accurate promise dates throughout the order process – on the product list page, product details page and during checkout – so that customers know exactly when an order is arriving, with no surprises. When customers can see what is truly available with reliable delivery dates, retailers can reduce order cancellations, improve cart conversion, and feel confident about their bottom line.

➥ Choice. Empower shoppers to find and filter by store and products based on availability, delivery date and fulfillment method. Make enterprise-wide inventory available to promise based on easy to configure  business rules, enabling a faster delivery experience with more options for customers.

➥ Transparency. Provide clarity when items are low on inventory or backordered. With inventory intelligence and data from carriers and other processing and fulfillment factors,, retailers can manage pre-purchase expectations for any uncertainty around on time, in full delivery due to potential supply chain disruptions.

Improve digital and in-store conversions. If shoppers can’t see available inventory online, they’ll shop elsewhere. Improve conversion by providing an accurate inventory view up-front. Go the extra mile by proactively suggesting related products as an upsell opportunity without changing shipping, labor costs or delivery dates. Optimization logic influences promising across the order journey and supports even the most complex scenarios such as orders that include third-party services (like furniture assembly) and multi-brand orders.

Increase omnichannel revenue and profitability. As shopper expectations rise and omnichannel becomes increasingly complex, retailers need to be able to optimize fulfillment at scale – across thousands of fulfillment permutations in milliseconds. Advanced analytics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are essential to drive multi-objective optimization against configured business goals. Detailed “decision explainers” ensure that business users trust the recommendations, driving continuous learning and improving adoption. With this foundation in place, start making promises you can keep, while improving sales and profitability.

Early in the customer journey, prioritize business objectives like profitability and customer satisfaction while considering different fulfillment factors (distance, costs, capacity, schedules, special handling requirements) so you can determine the lowest cost for each customer in seconds. For increased accuracy, utilize aggregated data from carriers like shipping rates, transit times, and even cross border fees. Post-purchase, optimize cost-to-serve by combining shipping costs directly from carrier management providers and capacity across locations and resource pools, with predefined rules and business drivers. Use AI capabilities to predict sell-through patterns and forecast demand based on seasonality, reducing stockouts and markdowns to maximize revenue and improve margins.

As omnichannel continues to mature, make promises that are reliable and profitable. Start creating next-generation omnichannel experiences with sophisticated inventory promising. Get more details on how IBM Sterling Intelligent Promising can help you enhance the shopping experience and improve digital and in-store sales while increasing omnichannel conversions profitability.

Source: ibm.com

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What is BOPIS in retail?

By the end of summer 2020, the share of retailers offering these omnichannel options jumped to 44%. Leading brands like Sally Beauty launched BOPIS capabilities nationwide last year as part of its ongoing digital transformation. “BOPIS is one of the ways Sally Beauty is working to connect customers’ in-store and online experiences, by offering ways to shop that are comparable to big-box retailers, with the added benefit of accessibility,” says Sally Beauty President, John Goss.

What is BOPIS?

BOPIS is a retail sales strategy that has developed with the growth of eCommerce. It is an omnichannel retail tactic that offers shoppers the convenience of ordering and buying online or on their mobile device, and the ability to quickly pick up their purchase at a local store.

How does BOPIS strategy work?

BOPIS speeds order fulfillment, letting shoppers pick up their purchases much more quickly than if they were to opt for home delivery. Shoppers can have their purchases in a matter of hours, compared to several days or more. BOPIS can also speed up a shopper’s in-store experience if that is what they are seeking. BOPIS strategy boils down to improving the customer experience. Additionally, BOPIS can often drive in-store traffic and additional purchases with one study reporting that approximately 50% of all shoppers make additional purchases when picking up in store.

BOPIS strategy connects the online and in-person retail experiences – supporting a stronger omnichannel customer journey. It allows retailers to differentiate themselves and become more competitive. Ultimately, BOPIS empowers retailers to meet customer demands, lower shipping costs, and even up-sell/cross-sell products and services as shoppers enter the store.

What are the benefits and advantages of a BOPIS strategy in retail?

BOPIS has become an essential component of a modern omnichannel retail strategy. Let’s explore some of the benefits in detail:

Customer satisfaction and convenience: The simple fact is, shoppers want the BOPIS option. A recent study shows that 62% of respondents now expect retailers to offer curbside pickup from now on, and 71% expect buy-online-pickup-in-store (BOPIS) to be permanently available. Whether on a break from work or sitting on their couch at home on their tablet, shoppers spend a great deal of time browsing and researching a product online before they go into a store to purchase. And for those looking to have their purchase in their hands today, BOPIS is a great option. It not only offers shoppers more flexibility, but it helps maintain relationships with their favorite retailers.

Faster fulfillment: BOPIS offers quicker and often less complex order fulfillment, presuming the retailer has the necessary underlying technology in place. When a customer selects BOPIS, they gain greater control over when and where the product is picked up/delivered, in most cases allowing for immediate pick up. That beats the average 2-3 day delivery time for most online orders.

Eliminate shipping costs: BOPIS allows customers and retailers to eliminate shipping costs for an order. For some customers, eliminating the shipping costs is a driver to purchase via BOPIS. For retailers, BOPIS reduces time, cost and manual labor in picking, packing and shipping an order. When consumers pick up in store, companies get savings on last mile delivery, packaging and overall logistics costs. That last mile from the distribution center or warehouse often can be one of a retailer’s bigger costs.

Reduced, agile inventory: With the proper underlying order management or inventory visibility solution, BOPIS orders can be fulfilled from multiple channels, commonly from either a distribution center or retail location(s). With real-time inventory visibility, retailers can determine how best to fill the order and draw upon different inventory locations for fulfillment and replenishment, allowing them to lower overall inventory carrying costs.

Reduce costs, increase profits: BOPIS reduces shipping and fulfillment costs, as well as inventory carrying costs. There is strong evidence it also reduces returns, which saves processing costs and increases purchases – all contributing to overall increased profitability. Another revenue consideration: 60% of online carts are abandoned because of unexpected fees, primarily shipping fees. BOPIS can convert frustrated online browsers into buyers.

What are BOPIS best practices?

Customer satisfaction: Perhaps the most important best practice when employing a BOPIS capability and strategy is to ensure a positive customer experience. This requires  a smooth online experience that provides the customer with clear instructions about how to pick up in store. BOPIS is a feature that consumers desire and appreciate – don’t inhibit the experience. Make it easy and rewarding for the shopper.

In-store experience: Prioritize exceptional in-store experiences when executing your BOPIS strategy. In-store pickup should be as simple and quick as possible. As mentioned earlier, up to 60% of shoppers make additional purchases when picking up in store. But, don’t give in to the enticement of trying to force BOPIS into an in-store selling opportunity. Instead, create a dedicated, visible space for in-store pick up – and don’t place the BOPIS pickup location at the back of the store. Best practices for BOPIS are to put the pickup location at the front of the store, as well as potentially offering pickup lockers. Finally, be sure to train store associates in BOPIS protocols.

Customer confidence: Consumers want choices and know the options available in the market – whether it’s standard shipping, same-day delivery, in-store shopping or curbside. Make your available fulfillment options clear to them throughout the buying journey. For a successful omnichannel strategy, you must meet customers when and where they want to buy.

Real-time inventory visibility: A successful BOPIS strategy requires real-time visibility into inventory across your entire network. Without such visibility, BOPIS can go wrong quickly. For instance, a customer might order online to pick up in store, only to find when they arrive that the item was sold to another customer and the store is now out of stock. Real-time inventory visibility not only eliminates this problem, but it also provides you flexibility to move and replenish inventory from different channels to support BOPIS and sales in general.

Modern technology: Real-time inventory visibility can be achieved with a standalone solution to enable BOPIS and drive business value. However, to be best-in-class in omnichannel retail, businesses should have modern order management technology combined with an inventory visibility solution  to streamline the entire order management process and information flow. A modern, single platform for order management can accelerate transformation by simplifying technology and implementation complexity to deliver omnichannel order fulfillment capabilities from BOPIS to curbside pickup and ship from store (SFS).

What are the challenges associated with BOPIS?

As with any undertaking, there are challenges with BOPIS, as well. The most notable challenges relate to ensuring inventory accuracy and availability, which requires real-time visibility. For many retailers, this is a hurdle to overcome if their supporting technology is dated or siloed. An order management and inventory visibility solution goes a long way in eliminating hurdles and establishing a platform to accelerate BOPIS and other retail strategies.

There are in-store challenges to overcome, too. Dedicating prime, visible and easily accessible space for BOPIS pickup shoppers, and ensuring associates are trained in BOPIS protocols, are both essential for success.

Auburn University has developed a scorecard to evaluate retailers on their execution of omnichannel and BOPIS strategies and outcomes. This can be a helpful tool to fully understand the capabilities required and benchmarks against which to measure BOPIS performance.

It’s important that retailers understand and overcome these challenges because BOPIS is here to stay. BOPIS is not only good for business, but for customer satisfaction. More than 43% of the top 500 retailers are now employing a BOPIS strategy – and 56% of consumers report that they use BOPIS, a number that surged during COVID-19 pandemic.

Technologies that enable retail and BOPIS strategies

Having the right underlying technology is key to successful execution of BOPIS, particularly in ensuring the right product is in the right place at the right time to satisfy a customer’s fulfillment preference. One of the most essential solutions is real-time inventory visibility, complemented by a modern order management solution. A comprehensive order management platform, further enhanced with Artificial Intelligence (AI) capabilities, will provide added advantages that optimize the overall omnichannel experience. Working with many of the world’s leading retailers, IBM offers a portfolio of solutions to help modernize and extend retail strategy and capabilities:

IBM Sterling Inventory Visibility provides a real-time, accurate view of your inventory and demand across warehouses, distribution centers, including what’s in-store and in-transit, allowing you to protect margins, increase customer satisfaction and grow sales. The cloud-based solution leverages your existing systems and data sources to provide a single source of inventory visibility and analysis, processing and updating inventory information at extremely high speed and volumes.

IBM Sterling Order Management accelerates transformation by simplifying technology and implementation complexity to deliver omnichannel order fulfillment capabilities such as curbside pickup, BOPIS and SFS. Empower your business to maximize results by managing business rules that are right for your customers and your business. With real-time inventory management, you can appropriate stock for demand and manage inventory turns. The solution provides an intuitive interface with easy-to-use functionality, so you don’t have to rely on help from IT support staff. Use configurable features for order capture, including real-time inventory through to fulfillment, to power customer experiences that grow sales while improving profitability.

IBM Sterling Fulfillment Optimizer with Watson is an AI-enabled fulfillment analytics solution that elevates existing order management and inventory visibility systems to provide deeper fulfillment intelligence and capabilities to assist you in understanding and evaluating the factors impacting fulfillment performance. The solution, with its personalized dashboard, breaks down data silos to help you monitor developments and trends in demand, inventory and fulfillment. With Sterling Fulfillment Optimizer, retailers are better able to understand and act on changes in their channels and the market as they occur – and take actions to protect margins, utilize capacity, meet delivery commitments and exceed customer expectations. The solution can dramatically improve productivity and increase profits, especially during peak periods.

Source: ibm.com

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