Month: February 2021

Categories
Retail

Leveraging Local Intelligence In The Retail Industry

In this modern era of technological advancements, it would be wrong to say that the retail market isn’t seeing similar growth. The number of online customers is evolving swiftly, and demands for more personalization are emerging. Retail industries are becoming more powerful as they are integrating with the latest artificial intelligence tools.

In 2019, the global market size of location intelligence was valued at USD 10.6 billion, and it is estimated to expand at a CAGR of 15.2% over the forecast period. Moreover, according to GSMA, the total number of IoT connections accounted for 9.1 billion in 2018 and is estimated to reach over 25.2 billion in the same period. 

Location intelligence is becoming more crucial for retailers with every passing day in providing measurable offline results, scalable audience insights, and better audience targeting. 

Here are the five ways how location intelligence proves to be revolutionizing retail industries. 

Customer Insights

If retail leaders start utilizing location intelligence, this can prove beneficial for them by provoking valuable customer insights. Technology can be used for this purpose called geo-enrichment. This technology efficiently converts customer’s residential addresses into useful insights. This way, retailers can utilize modern geographic information systems to generate smart maps and identify customer’s popular locations accurately and effectively. Retailers can accumulate information about numerous customer demographics and their behaviors. This helps business leaders to develop a better understanding of customer localities that are loyal. Business owners can optimize staff performance and have a better customer behavior experience by incorporating location intelligence in retail industries. 

Indoor mapping of retail shops is another thing that can immensely help with customer insights. Using this technology, retail stores can learn buying patterns of customers and then use this data to push different kinds of products and promotions.

Trade Area Analysis

Trade area analysis is essential for retailers to select suitable locations of a new store, define sales targets, and study competitor strength. Retailers can choose appropriate stores where they can easily access their target audience with trade area analysis. Location intelligence helps business owners have real-world insights about different customer demographics and behaviors around prospective retail sites. 

Also, business leaders can better understand which other locations their customers will consider for shopping. Thanks to location intelligence, retailers can collect data to measure customer trends and whether the customer demographic is growing or shrinking in a particular area. Location intelligence can offer data-driven approaches for trade area analysis in retails. 

Asset Tracking 

Retail businesses require a wide range of products to meet the ever-changing demands of customers. Late product delivery set’s a wrong impression on customers. This immensely affects customer delivery and staff productivity. Retailers can continuously track the location of their delivery staff and for the management of supply chains. Thankfully, location intelligence can also immensely usher identity verification of retail store staff members during asset tracking. 

Retailers can develop custom location applications that can be easily installed on mobile devices of their delivery staff. Location intelligence helps with asset tracking and can prove to be beneficial for business retailers. Business owners can track the precise location of a delivery executive in real-time and calculate accurate ETA. This way, retailers can track the location of all delivery executives on a centralized system.

Virtual Geo-Fences

Retails can set up virtual geo-fence for marketing. Business owners have the liability to define a certain radius around their store based on their store size. By utilizing this, retailers can push notifications regarding ongoing product discounts, deals, and offers when customers get in and out of geo-fence. Retailers can alert their customers by using this approach about products and discounts when they are in proximity to the store. Moreover, retailers can utilize innovative machine learning and artificial intelligence algorithms to improve sales and product suggestions. 

Let us consider an example. Suppose a customer wants to purchase coffee. There’s a high possibility that the same customer wants sugar and milk. Location intelligence is utilized for enhanced product suggestions and allows retailers to prepare themselves for ever-changing customer preferences. 

Competitive Strength Analysis 

Analysis of the competitor market is mandatory for retailers and business owners before selecting a new retail site. Location intelligence proves to be a game-changer in this scenario. Location intelligence assists business owners in measuring competitor’s market share and perforation in a particular geographical location. Also, this helps retailers to understand customer’s loyalty to themselves and their competitors. If their customers tend to visit other stores, the retailers can utilize this opportunity in the best possible way and capture less loyal customers of their competitors. A retailer can use Data-driven approaches with the help of location intelligence. 

Invest Today For Long Term Business Protection

Location intelligence has great potential to protect your business against criminal acts and fraudulent activities in the long term. Today, everything is prone to digitization due to the rapid evolution of technologies. The utilization of data and insights from experts for efficient and accurate business decisions is becoming a new normal, proving to be revolutionizing the world. 

In this current competitive environment, if you want to enhance your business’s security, it’s high time to invest in location intelligence technology. The utilization of local-based data helps the identification of those areas where you are overspending and underspending. Moreover, it helps develop a better understanding of your business operations and identity area of enhancements and how your retail store operates. It is much more straightforward to prove your compliance to stakeholders and customers with precise and versatile map data. Just start investing today for the long-term protection of your businesses. 

Categories
Data

How Top Businesses are Using Geospatial Data in 2021

Uber, Google, Wendy’s, CDM Smith Inc, and Amazon – you couldn’t get a much more diverse set of organizations. A search engine, a fast-food chain, to an online retail store – these businesses might be diverse in terms of their operations, but they’re all linked by certain business practices. 

That is, these top business players all utilize geospatial data to optimize their operations for a healthier bottom line. In this article, you’ll discover what geospatial data is and how it’s used by these top 5 businesses to gain a competitive edge.

Ready?

Let’s jump straight to it.

 

What is geospatial data?

Geospatial data is also known as place-based or location-based data, such as longitudes, latitudes, stress addresses, and postal codes. Geospatial data analysis collects, displays, and manipulates GIS – Geographic Information System – data like imagery, satellite photographs, and historical data. The aim is to collect, store, retrieve, and display vast amounts of information in a spatial context.

For instance, can you imagine life without GPS?

In this vein, you’ll likely remember buying a paper map to plan your routes from one place to another. This system was slower, hard work, and vulnerable to human error. Today, geospatial data has been a game-changer when it comes to providing location/place-based information. Whether it’s MapQuest, Pokémon Go, Google Maps, or the in-dash car navigation system, everyday citizens use geospatial data more than they know. 

 

How do top businesses use geospatial data?

Just as we rely on geospatial information every day, leaders worldwide use geospatial data to guide them towards making the right decisions at the right time. With that said, let’s take a closer look at how Uber and other top businesses are using geospatial data to optimize their strategic decisions for efficient operations and sustained business growth.

 

Uber 

In 2019, Uber brought in $14.1 billion in revenue, showing exponential growth from 2013 (where revenue equals $0.1 billion). Founded in 2009 by Garrett Camp, the organization has since grown into a disruptive tycoon that’s ripped up the cab industry by storm. 

Central to its success comes geospatial technology. 

With the Uber app, the user can request a cab. This user’s location is then taken and matched with the closest driver. The driver accepts this match and is guided by applying it to the user’s location to transport the user to their chosen destination. This entire process draws from the application’s geospatial data. 

This isn’t the only way Uber uses geospatial data — there are countless others. For instance, the application identifies areas with the highest need for drivers and advises active drivers to be near those hotspots during high demand times. 

Without geospatial data, Uber would not be the business disruptor it is today.

 

Google 

Google is the goliath of the business world. In the third quarter of 2020, Google’s revenue amounted to $46.03 billion, up from $38 billion in the preceding quarter. Taking a good chunk out of this revenue comes from Google’s map application, which brings $4.3 billion a year.

Google maps has 154.4 million monthly unique users. And behind every map, there’s a much more complex system, the key to your queries but hidden from your view.

This more in-depth system contains the logic of places, all the left and right turns, freeway on-ramps, speed limits, traffic conditions, you name it. And to produce such a system, Google uses geospatial data provided by a third party to deliver digital maps and other dynamic content for navigation and location-based services.

 

Wendy’s

Square hamburgers, sea salt fries, and the addictive Frosty, this fast-food giant brought home $1.687 billion in revenue in 2020. 

What’s the secret to Wendy’s success?

I say geospatial data. 

Wendy’s carefully researches locations, leveraging mapping software and census data (population information). The fast-food chain searches for sites with a high population and potential customers and looks at household demographics, average income, and nearby businesses. 

But this analysis doesn’t stop when the right site has been found. Wendy’s continues to examine this geospatial data after construction at the given location. Before construction, prior construction results can then be compared to continuously tweak and improve their GIS analytics model and processes.

 

CDM Smith Inc

CDM Smith Inc is a global engineering and construction firm providing solutions in water, environment, transportation, energy, and other facilities. In 2015 the organization’s revenues totaled over $500 million, and one of the reasons for the success has been the organization’s use of geospatial data. 

That is, for CDM Smith Inc, geospatial data provides design and engineering capabilities to create plans, layouts, and maps. GIS applications for design and engineering make use of both imaging and planning functions. Such functions mean geospatial data is commonly used in industries such as landscape engineering, environmental restoration, commercial and residential construction, and development. CDM uses geospatial data for environmental engineering and remediation projects. 

 

Amazon

In 2019, the online retail platform, Amazon, reported a net income of $11.59 billion, up from a $10 billion U.S. net income in the previous year. To stay ahead of the curve, Amazon is always coming up with new and innovative ways of doing business. And one example is Amazon’s Prime Air drone project, expected to officially launch on August 31st, 2020.

By integrating GIS with Artificial Intelligence, it’s possible to fly drones over much larger distances than other previous attempts. Amazon has jumped on this bandwagon, delivering packages by drones. The aim is to deliver packages to customers in 30 minutes or less using unmanned aerial vehicles – drones – operational thanks to geospatial data.

 

Gain a competitive edge by using geospatial data

As technology advances, geospatial data is becoming more complex, with widening business potential. At the end of this article, we saw how Amazon is combining GIS software with Artificial Intelligence (drones) to expand the use of both. Does this represent the future of things to come regarding geospatial data?

Geospatial data analysis has the potential to: 

  • Match consumer demographic data with spatial information about the places they live 
  • Validate existing GIS data sets 
  • Monitor and report weather 
  • Survey habitats 
  • Model landscapes 
  • Assess disaster damage 

While these are just a few examples, by combining geospatial data with AI, the possibilities of its use are expanding. To grasp a competitive edge, and be a top player in the business arena, dig deep and see how you can leverage geospatial data technology for your business operations.

Categories
Business

How to Keep Track of All Your Business Expenses

When you run a business, whether large or small, one of the most important aspects of your success is the way you handle your finances. As a business, you’ll have expenses—there’s simply no way around it. However, the way that you manage them can have an impact on your profit. 

From paying your taxes to managing your payroll and keeping track of your travel expenses, there are a number of reasons why expense administration is paramount to the smooth running of your company.

Stay organized

While your individual home expenses may consist of tracking expenses through keeping all of your receipts, this won’t fly when it comes to your business expenses. Not only is it terribly hard to keep track of numerous receipts, but it can also be a nightmare to go through all of them when it’s time for tax season or staying aware of how much your business is spending. This is why automating how you track your expenses and using an online bill pay service is a game-changer. 

Use apps for tracking expenses

Along the same lines as the above-mentioned tip, using a receipt scanner and software helps you have all your business expenses in one place. Platforms like Spendesk even offer virtual employee debit cards to help keep track of your teams’ business expenses.  You can easily keep track of your money and where it’s going, which can go far in how you run your company and save for emergencies. From categorizing expenses to keeping track of the little things, being organized with your finances is key to the success of your business. Apps are a great way to achieve this. Learn more about your business’s debits and credits here.

Consider hiring a professional

If you simply don’t have time to take care of your business finances because you’re busy managing teams and networking with clients, hiring a professional can go far in helping you control business expenses. While it does mean making an investment, the benefits found in hiring someone to handle your finances can make a world of difference for you. Through their expertise, they can make sure the company is saving, only spending what’s necessary, and profiting as you should be. Hiring a professional accountant or best accounting firms investing in cloud-based bookkeeping software will provide you with an in-depth analysis of your expenses.

Have a business credit card

Most large businesses that have been around for a while already have a dedicated account for their expenses. If you’re a small business just starting out, chances are you’re still using your personal credit card. Maybe it’s been easier that way. However, this can become confusing and even detrimental to the success of your company as it grows because you’ll have all of your money and expenses lumped in one place. There are apps and websites that not only make it easy to open a business account, but to manage it all from one place. This way, keeping track of your business expenses is streamlined and you’ll know where your company money is and what you’re spending it on. 

Review expenses and accounting every so often

Whatever option you choose, it’s a good idea to go back to it and reevaluate how things are going. In some instances, what works for one company may not be the best for yours due to different kinds of products or services and ways of operating. With your financial health being one of the most important aspects of your business, it’s important to get it right. Even if you have hired a professional, it’s still a good idea to check in and make sure they’re helping you get your money’s worth.Learn more about efficient project accounting tactics and how it impacts your business.

The Bottom Line

Your financial health as a small business is important. Haphazardly keeping track of your expenses simply won’t cut it in this day and age. Fortunately, with the help of today’s technology and financial professionals in your area, you can easily track your expenses and make sure your small business is making a profit. 

How to Keep Track of All Your Business Expenses