THE POWERFUL NEW CRM TOOL FOR RETAIL ASSOCIATES

PROXIMITY INSIGHT DYNAMIC CLIENTELING

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While online retail continues to grow rapidly, brick-and-mortar is the primary channel where people shop. In fact, 90% of all retail sales are transacted in stores and 95% of all retail sales are captured by retailers with a brick-and-mortar presence.1

But modern shoppers expect more from your brand in-store. Whether their objective is to discover, explore, or buy, customers want a great experience. Your associates are a key part of this experience as trusted advisors and as the faces of your brand.

When helped by a knowledgeable associate, 93% of customers make a purchase and 85% of customers purchase more2, but sadly experiences with in-store sales associates are often underwhelming. Two thirds of customers still wish store employees were more helpful and 90% of customers will leave your store if they can’t find the right person to help them.3

Having knowledgeable associates in your store to assist customers is so important and the bar has been elevated by the internet. 87% of consumers research before they walk into a store and 79% do so while they shop in the store4, meaning often your clients can be more informed than your associates.

HOW CAN YOU MAKE YOUR EMPLOYEES SERVE SAVVY CUSTOMERS BETTER?

To create an in-store experience that drives sales, retailers today need to empower their associates with in-formation that allows them to have a helpful and mean-ingful conversation with clients.

The right information can only be surfaced on clienteling systems that are open to all aspects of the customer journey, and not ones that focus entirely on a specific element of the customer journey like Point of Sale.

And the right information can only be surfaced by clien-teling systems that use true CRM to separate mass data confusion from the real insights. As technology compa-nies race to make big data accessible, the challenge is to make the data usable for associates who aren’t trained to be data analysts. Expecting store associates to sift through data and to figure it out when they have mere seconds to do so - a daunting and overwhelming task – is unrealistic.

Retailers need a clienteling system that is made for the whole retail experience. It needs to offer a user experi-ence that fits the retail customer journey, tackles on-the-floor challenges, is intuitive for sales associates to use, and is customizable to suit business needs instead of one-size fits all.

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1AT Kearney, On Solid Ground: Brick and Mortar Is the Foundation of Omnichannel Retailing, 20142Timetrade, Why shoppers are leaving stores empty handed, 2014

3KN Research, Retail Systems Research, Dr. Marshall Fisher/Experticity Research, timetrade 4Google, Digital Impact on In-store Shopping, 2014

Innovators are recognizing that the retail industry needs tools that truly fit the way consumers shop and how sales people sell. Retailers and consumers have embraced these reimagined tools, and these companies are seeing great success.

Square reimagined what the point of sale experience should be. They made accepting card payments more affordable for businesses and also provided data that delivers powerful business insights to merchants. More impressively, they looked at the shopper experience and reimagined the checkout process. Payments can now happen anywhere, authorization no longer needs to be on paper, receipts can be emailed, and customers can carry their credit card information from merchant to mer-chant without needing their physical credit card again. They implemented elegant hardware with the Square Stand being used for point of sale. After the associate enters the transaction details, the Square Stand spins around so the customer signs the same screen that the

associate uses. In 2014, Square processed $30 billion a in payments, up from $6 billion in 2012 all thanks to the advocacy of merchants and consumers.

Proximity Insight has likewise reimagined what retail CRM should be by considering the retail experience, what as-sociates need to succeed, and the shopper journey. The old CRM platforms were created for corporate teams, but not tailored to salespeople on the floor. The data that marketing teams may find helpful is not what asso-ciates and store managers need. Associates and store managers need useful information that allows them to make split second recommendations.

Proximity Insight has created a mobile application, uti-lizing best-of-breed CRM architecture and accessibility, that is tailored to the shop for the shop floor so associ-ates can access the right information about their cus-tomers instantly.

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5shopify, Social Commerce, 2013

1. HELP ME UNDERSTAND BOTH THE PAST, AND WHAT’S HAPPENING TODAY, TO FORESEE THE FUTURE. To make relevant recom-mendations, associates need to understand who the customer is. Proximity Insight plugs into any data source, from Salesforce or Microsoft CRM to POS to marketing automation, to surface what clients have bought in the past or their current preferences. Associates can use this information to come up with their own recommendations or use our algorithm. Algorithms like this have been shown to generate sales uplift. StitchFix, an online retailer, created a similar algorithm to help their 2,000 stylists recommend apparel. The well-informed stylists have a 70% success rate where customers purchase the recommended items. (Fbicgroup).

2. HELP ME BUILD AND RETAIN MY CUSTOMER BASE. Just because a client leaves the store doesn’t mean the relationship between the customer and associate should come to an end. Associates can continue to foster that relationship and get clients to come back into the store by providing additional personal touchpoints. With personalized email out-reach, associates can effectively maintain a brand relationship with their clients.

3. GROW MY PASSION FOR RETAIL. Brands can get their associates more engaged by empowering them to express their creative side. Being a sales associate shouldn’t just be a job, but it should be a career where employees can grow their passion. With Proximity Insight, associates can build their own fashion board where they can create styles and sets based on the brand’s inventory as well as third party products and share them with fellow associates or with clients. Think a Polyvore ecosystem created by your associates. In fact, Polyvore generates an average of $66.75 order value5 higher than any other social platform, and has a conversion rate of 0.58% (those who went on to purchase/visitors).

WHAT RETAIL NEEDS DOES PROXIMITY INSIGHT SOLVE?

4. KEEP ME IN THE KNOW. Associates constantly need to be informed about the brand to know what’s on their client’s minds. A product that was in the news? Corporate changing the return policy? Like other news feed that many of us use, Proximity Insight brings the most relevant news from all sources – website updates, blogs, social feeds, etc. - to the Clienteling App. Associates are alerted immediately when there’s something new so they don’t have to search for it. Furthermore, associates can leverage the platform to ask questions, provide tips, or discuss with each other in real time.

5. HELP ME TRACK MY GOALS. One of the most sought out pieces of information that associates want is how they are tracking on their sales goals. Store managers can easily set up their associates’ individual goals and allow associates to see how they progress. Seeing progress on a daily basis keeps associates informed, motivated, and creates own-ership of their goals. Win-win for all!

6. HELP ME STAY ORGANIZED. Associates are asked to do a lot. As their responsibilities and customer base grows, they need to stay organized and prepared. With Proximity Insight’s Clienteling App, managers can assign tasks to associ-ates and associates can manage their client appointments and schedule.

7. HELP ME COMMUNICATE. Digital internal communication should not be limited to supervisors, assistant managers, and managers. Associates need a more efficient way to solve problems and find answers to our questions. We make it easy to collaborate and share great ideas - all in one place, where all the things needed are easily searchable and rapidly accessible.

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HOW PROXIMITY INSIGHT CAN HELP

Proximity Insight understands that it’s not about how much data you can get, but how to surface useful information that helps associates succeed, and as a result makes clients love your brand. We can work with any CRM platform, or even with no CRM platform at all, to start turning your data into insights for your store managers and associates.

Proximity Insight has implemented clienteling for MatchesFashion.com, Max Mara, Diane von Furstenberg, and Jaeger, as well as other independent designers, to create an iPad Clienteling App that truly fits the re-tail experience. Working with their corporate marketing teams and in-store associates allow us to create a solution that meets the needs from top to bottom like no other vendor.

hello@proximityinsight.com | 817 Broadway, New York,, NY 10003 | +1 508 241 2130 | proximityinsight.com

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