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RFID has been around for several years and my first introduction to it was several years ago when I had the pleasure of working with some visionaries at Simon Property Group. We were looking at RFID to track kids in the malls for their parents. RFID has come a long way since then and I am still amazed it hasn't really caught on.
If you read my last post on OPEN E-Commerce and you take that approach, implementing RFID in your retail locations and showing immediate ROI on it is within easy reach.
I read a really good blog post on the subject here: How to Implement RFID in a Store Quickly. They go over, in detail, how your employees can even install the system. They mention the big thing in retail which is reduced shrinkage. At the touch of a button, you can know where every item in your inventory is.
What would really make the ROI extreme though?
If your store is setup with a wireless internet connection (this can be done very easily even with a Verizon myfi), installing small, netbook type computers into the dressing rooms with the RFID sensor at the door will pay for itself in spades.
Scenario: Customer walks into the dressing room with some size 4 jeans and 2 medium t-shirts. The RFID will automatically sense how many items and what items are present. This can be displayed on the screen with ratings and reviews (which could also be added right there in the dressing room) as well as recommended cross sell and upsell items.
Lots of information can be garnered just from what a customer takes into the dressing room. For instance, we know she is a woman, looking for casual wear and she is a size 4. By feeding this information into an engine such as ATG recommendations, the system will use it's Artificial Intellegence (AI) features to call out what things would go with the items best. All of this information will also help you on-line as the additional information feeding into the recommendations engine will create better recommendations.
Talk about wow-ing your customers and making sure they know that you care about them and are giving them the most OPEN and transparent information they can get.
If you are in Retail, it's about moving the dial and nothing will move the dial like this will!
People always ask me about tying the new trends of the OPEN Brand or Social Commerce into what is reality in the technology world of E-Commerce. I found myself sitting at the Partner conference for ATG in January this year while the ATG leadership team was talking about the future of their platform and how it was the last platform you would ever need. This got me thinking how that would become a reality due to the cost ramifications when I know that my client’s best interests are my number one objective. It suddenly dawned on me this week as I was working through a myriad of E-Commerce issues as it relates to a number of my Retail clients that this new world of E-Commerce should be MUCH LESS EXPENSIVE, both to build and to maintain. Given budgets this year, this is extremely important.
The first question that comes to mind is just how can I do all things social and be where my customers are while maintaining costs? It seems we can’t touch our core E-Commerce solutions for less than 7 figures… That, however, IS the answer. You DON’T touch your core Commerce functionality.
Your CORE E-Commerce functionality should be these things and these things only: • Catalog • Checkout (Payment and Fraud) • Inventory Management • Fulfillment • Back Office Integration The things I find myself being asked to change the most are things like this: • Facebook Applications/Fan Pages • Path to Product/Checkout • SEO • Personalization/Scenarios • Search Implementations (Endeca, Google) • Advertising Campaigns The previous items are the most common pieces that drive conversion and sales for marketing organizations. Let’s face it, Back Office integration is more of a cost of doing business vs. something you can show true ROI on, at least in the short term. How do you DO IT? I have long been a fan of the acronym KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid). The running norm is to try and build everything into the Core Commerce system, which generally ends with everyone being less than pleased. Boiling the ocean is not something anyone should undertake. An E-Commerce solution can be broken up into 3 basic layers: • Front-End • Commerce Enablement • Back Office Segregating these layers allows for a scalable and organized approach to not just e-commerce, but commerce in general. Back Office pieces such as Data Warehouse, CRM, Inventory Management, Warehouse Management, etc. are all core competencies of your business. These areas would be managed and run as they are today, but with the new approach, there would be significantly more clarity about what needs to be done. Commerce Enablement is all about connecting these Back Office systems to your commerce system in a consistent way so that the inputs and outputs are always a known quantity. By settling on what these inputs and outputs should be, clear lines of delineation can be drawn, simplifying your organization and minimizing your need for overhead. Clients should focus on the only exposed items of your E-Commerce system to be your catalog being available and REST APIs being available for the following things: • Add to cart • Remove from cart • Check Inventory • Checkout • Get Confirmation These are the core functions necessary to be able to checkout a customer. Everything else is something extra and it can generally be done for a lot less than trying to build it all into the Core Commerce system. The separation will allow front-end applications to be built, upgraded, modified, and extended without affecting the core commerce experience. What does that end up meaning? Everything costs a lot less. This sounds too good to be true… There are some drawbacks to this approach. Personalization would not be done via the core commerce platform, however there are lots of SaaS based personalization services from ATG that are available for your promotions that are significantly easier to implement into your code base. The upsides are endless… Point of Sale registers can be easily replaced by a web based system that will eliminate long and difficult closing processes and it will allow for cross sell and upsells from the register and even in the dressing room.
I like to always say that a picture is 1,000 words. In this case, it's less than 1,000 :)
Next up.. RFID