How to use Retail Technology Effectively?

Manoj Bhanja

Co-Founder & CTO, Peddle Plus

A highly qualified retail technology expert with 13+ years of local and global experience in planning, developing and executing strategies for System Architecture.

In today’s age of technology, do Indian retailers (the country’s 2nd prime economy driver) use technology effectively?

The answer to this question is: NO

In the name of technology, most retailers have some sort of billing software or accounting packages implemented. If a few have some sort of ERP Software but most of the time that ERP is not used to the full extent or is not rightly integrated with their retail operations. What commonly happens in most retail cases? Either they use Software technology, which is not for true inventory management, margin controls, financial insights, or decision making. They just use the software for billing, stock updates, and extracting a few sales & purchase-related reports for book-keeping purposes.

Or some advanced retailers; use multiple technologies in the name of automation and in such a scenario the entire operation works piecemeal. And here are some common problems faced in real-time: A single transaction will be passed in multiple software leading to duplication of works (For example GRN/Purchase Invoice entry in the POS software for Stock Updates then again the same Purchase Invoice will be entered in Accounting/Book-keeping Software for Accounting Purposes); When entries are passed from one software to another, staffs usually miss some entries or errors occur and this leads to inconsistency of data between different software and the reliability of data is questionable. And this could be disastrous in today’s age of technology!

So, here are a very few basic but important aspects for retailers who are already using any technology or want to use technology for improving their business efficiencies. Single ERP software that covers most of the retail operations; Auto inventory replenishment for stores and warehouses; Auto PO generation or Periodical Alerts to Raise PO based on past stock movements to have just-In inventory; Item or Category Margin Verification (Planned vs Actual); timely alerts if Margins are not met. Bundle Bar-coding for faster GRN Stock entry in the system; Vendor payment alerts for timely payment to vendors which is a very important factor to maintain a smooth relationship with vendors/suppliers; Alerts on delay in good receiving from Suppliers; Auto Payments collection alerts for Credit Customers; Auto Sales staff incentive calculations based on sales made by individual alerts for timely compliance
Happy Retailing…