The digital revolution in retail is continuous. Customer expectations soar each time an innovation or new approach makes consumer lives easier or more enjoyable. When one retailer raises the bar on customer satisfaction, all others who wish to remain successful must follow or offer alternatives. This constant churn requires retailers to design agile systems and flexible processes, hire and train adaptable people, and maintain accurate and comprehensive data sources. Let’s explore the critical need for data quality in retail, considering the latest technology trends and evolving customer demands.
Good customer service in action
The need for flexibility and customer focus has never been greater. Customers increasingly expect same-day service, and nearly immediate support, installation, returns, refunds, alterations, etc.
My wife and I recently bought a new washer/dryer. It was on sale, and we needed it delivered the next day. The transaction was completed, and the delivery truck arrived during the specified period after having texted updates from various points along its delivery route. The crew unpacked the item and readied it for installation. Then they discovered the product was damaged; the dryer door was dented and scratched. They informed us immediately and gave us the choice of proceeding with the installation or rejecting the product. They communicated with the store and advised us that a replacement could be delivered the next day. We agreed to wait for the replacement.
The next day, a new delivery and installation crew arrived. They unpacked the new washer and dryer and found another flaw: the dryer door wouldn’t close properly this time. They contacted the store and repeated the same offer we had heard the day before. Again, we rejected the damaged unit and opted for a new product to be delivered the following day.
The third time’s the charm! The next day, a pristine washer-dryer arrived and was duly installed. Despite the potentially upsetting experience of receiving damaged goods, the stores’ staff and systems saved the day. The staff was proactive in identifying both the problems and the solutions. The systems were able to process the returns, find additional inventory, and schedule next-day delivery. The store staff were accommodating, friendly, and supportive when we called to confirm.
The bar has been raised
The store turned what could have been a customer experience disaster into an impressive act of customer support. We will use the store again for future purchases, and the next time we purchase, we will seek and expect the same service—or perhaps even better! For example, personalized follow-up asking if we were satisfied with our purchase, maybe videos showing how to get the most from the new machine, offers of idiscounted detergent or dryer sheets, etc. There’s always more that consumers want and need!
A July 2024 Morning Consult report, sponsored by Walmart, summarized the situation: “We’re entering a new era of retail where customers expect to be advised and guided throughout their shopping journeys. Shoppers want retailers to be ready for them—ready with hyper-specific recommendations, ready to adapt offerings to match needs, ready to deliver.”
The report was based on a survey of over 2200 US adults conducted in May 2024. The survey found that:
- More than half of respondents want tools that recommend the best products based on their actual circumstances or that can suggest items based on their preferences.
- 38% of respondents would like a virtual personal shopper. That number rises to 50% for both Gen-Z and parents.
Other findings include:
- In the prior six months, nearly 8 in 10 respondents had made an online purchase while focused on another task, i.e. while multi-tasking
- Nearly half want the ability to purchase an item within seconds of seeing it.
- While 44% of respondents report starting their general merchandise searches using online search, 38% use social media
- 43% of all respondents want to buy products in-store but have the retailer deliver and put the items away in their homes.
- 64% of respondents want a service where orders are delivered in 30 minutes without any extra delivery cost.
Consumer trust is a critical component of success
A key conclusion of the report is that as consumers become more comfortable with retailers' technology-powered capabilities, they will become more channel-agnostic, choosing the channel that best meets their needs at any given moment. This means that every channel must have direct access to the consumer's data to respond in the way that each customer prefers.
Consumers will need to trust in-store, e-commerce, marketplace, and social retailers with a significant amount of personal data to provide instant purchases, 30-minute deliveries, virtual shopper capabilities, product suggestions based on personal preferences, putting items away in people’s homes, and much more.
Today, many retailers hold consumers’ payment and location details to reduce time-consuming checkouts and enable rapid purchasing and fast delivery. Providing virtual shopper capabilities and personalized product recommendations will require consumers to share more data, not only about their purchase plans and needs but also about their living situations, their income and spending habits, gender and age, prior purchases, family affiliations, birthdays, holidays celebrated, and the location and content of their refrigerator and closets and cabinets!
Will consumers be comfortable sharing this amount of information? Probably, if in return, retailers deliver the promised services, keep the data secure, accurate, and up to date, and do not abuse their access to such data to push unwanted products. Getting it wrong will spell disaster! Poorly aligned recommendations, missed opportunities, lost trust, and lost customers.
Collecting such a broad swathe of consumer information will not be a single event. It would require consumers to complete a massive questionnaire. More likely, the information will be collected in stages over time as consumers interact with the various channels and apps that each retailer deploys. It will also be collected through partnerships with third-party channels such as marketplaces, via suppliers who have direct consumer relationships, and from third-party data sources (e.g., Experian).
How can retailers ensure the data they collect from these multiple sources is assembled into the correct record for each individual customer? How can they avoid data duplication? How will they continuously check the accuracy and completeness of the data as it’s passed from system to system or channel to channel? Maintaining data quality is critical to keeping customer trust.
Enter Experian Aperture Data Studio
Experian Data Quality (EDQ) offers retailers Aperture Data Studio to continuously manage data quality across multiple datasets. Aperture Data Studio provides a single platform where retailers can manage, analyze, and cleanse data from multiple sources, ensuring consistency and accuracy across datasets. The platform allows different departments within a retail organization to work with the same unified data, reducing discrepancies and ensuring that everyone operates from a single source of truth.
The platform automates the process of cleansing data, removing duplicates, correcting inaccuracies, and standardizing formats. This ensures that the data used across the organization is clean, accurate, and ready for analysis. Retailers can define their own data quality rules and standards within Data Studio or allow the platform to suggest rules based on the data. These rules can be applied across all datasets to ensure that data adheres to each business's specific requirements.
By ensuring high levels of data quality, Aperture Data Studio enables retailers to make more informed, data-driven decisions. Accurate data supports better demand forecasting, inventory management, and most importantly, personalized communications and marketing strategies. With clean, accurate, and well-organized data, retailers can generate instant insights, confidently provide rapid responses to customer needs, and deliver excellent customer experience.
