CEMOSoft Delivers Data-Driven Retail from the IoT Edge to the Cloud

CEMOSoft’s customer experience management platform for the cloud — enabled on an Intel® architecture based IoT edge gateway.

Executive Summary

Retailers, along with many other vertical industries, seek to take advantage of the benefits of the Internet of Things (IoT) to improve customer experience management. However, quickly analyzing relevant data to inform decision-making and respond effectively to rapidly changing customer behaviors is challenging. The CEMOSoft* platform is designed to create opportunities, while addressing shifting demographics and an evolving IoT landscape. It offers a mobile customer engagement experience that can be dynamically modified on the fly, along with the increased security and intelligence of an Intel® architecture based IoT gateway and Windows® 10 IoT Core. The result is an affordable, flexible, scalable platform that brings ongoing customer insight to many aspects of daily operations

Challenges

According to Gartner, customer experience management (CEM) is a top priority for retailers.¹ Says Roop Gill, a senior research analyst at Intel, “Shoppers’ expectations are evolving faster than the retail industry can deliver. The biggest challenge facing retailers is in fact knowing what consumer expectations are and keeping pace with them.” Sixty-one percent of customers are more likely to buy from companies delivering custom content.² Three-quarters of online customers said they expected help within fve minutes, have used comparison services for consumer goods, and trusted online reviews as much as personal recommendations.² Twenty-fve percent of customers will defect after just one bad experience.²

A survey of retail CEOs by PWC found that the customer engagement paradigm has changed signifcantly.³ Customers have unprecedented insight into how a product was produced or a supply chain crafted. They expect and have access to the C-suite, as well as to social platforms such as Yelp where opinions can be quickly shared. Trust and integrity at the C-level are an equalizing force, moving power from top down to peer to peer.⁴ Retail PR and executive communications divisions need to be fluent in social media to manage brands. At the same time, all employees are potentially involved in the customer journey.

Digitization and the rising use of smartphones are establishing new standards for fast, seamless customer service in all settings. Real-time responsiveness and easy to-use apps for daily banking chores or ordering groceries are setting a high bar for speed and ease of doing business in business-to-consumer industries, and these expectations are migrating to business-to-business.⁵

There’s no question that changing demographics, data-driven analytics, and the rapid rise of connected IoT technologies are creating a landscape in which reaching customers and maintaining loyalty presents considerable challenges. These range from the plethora of new, often incompatible systems and technologies to the speed at which customer demands change due to social media networks and e-commerce to the high cost of cybercrime. Legacy infrastructure and processes, from scheduling to inventory to customer rewards programs, can make the cost of an end-to-end IoT solution prohibitive, both in terms of bottom line and business models.

Solution

CEMOSoft has created an innovative customer management platform powered by an Intel® architecture based IoT gateway that allows retailers to get on board extremely quickly and reap the benefits of IoT—without disrupting business operations or replacing legacy infrastructure. The platform is flexible, scalable, customizable, and strategic, directly addressing the needs of retailers and enabling business transformation. It runs Windows® 10 IoT Core, a version of Windows® 10 optimized for smaller devices.

The platform enables key goals of retail and industry CEOs including:

• Understanding customer demographics and behavior patterns
• Integrating emerging technologies without disrupting business operations
• Managing and promoting brands
• Building trust with customers
• Engaging customers
• Innovating business models and services

The CEMOSoft platform includes three standardized, integrated products: Insight*, Rewards*, and Analytics*. Together, they allow retailers to interact with customers in near-real time. This nearly instantaneous data can inform myriad facets of retail management, including planning, inventory, scheduling, customer service, brand awareness, and loyalty programs. A new retail account can be set up by CEMOSoft in under an hour.

The platform is designed to create a mobile experience where customers scan QR codes, enter a minimal amount of personal information, and respond to a few targeted questions. The software automatically generates an instant response, rewarding customers with a relevant coupon or offer. At the same time, the data from the customer interaction is sent to retail staff associates and managers, who can respond in kind: addressing negative feedback, answering questions, or cross-selling based on customer preferences. These preferences are also invaluable for longterm inventory planning. Retailers have direct communication with their customers and, thus, more accurate information about consumer behavior patterns and trends.

Experiences are dynamic: questions and responses can be changed on the fly at anytime from anywhere. They can be broad or specifc, targeting an overall experience across a chain or a particular inventory item in a single store at a defined time.

The CEMOSoft platform combines with the Intel® architecture based IoT gateway and Microsoft Windows® 10 IoT Core OS to deliver a seamless, dynamic, and smart consumer experience

Platform Benefits

With CEMOSoft, retailers can integrate emerging technologies within the framework of existing enterprise systems with minimal or no disruption to business processes.

• Take advantage of the latest Intel® technology and Microsoft’s IoT operating system
• Attract and retain current and new millennial and gen X customers
• Build brand advocates
• Deliver personalized experiences and customer service
• Get near-real-time insight
• Simplify customer rewards and loyalty programs
• Engage in “reciprocity commerce”
• Process data from the device edge to cloud
• Engage digital consumers and customers via mobile smart devices
• Help protect customer data and privacy

A Smart Way to Connect with Customers

CEMOSoft* Platform with the Intel® Architecture Based IoT Gateway and Windows® 10 IoT Core

CEMOSoft Insight* - With Insight, retailers determine questions they would like customer input on. Questions can be open ended or specific (e.g., yes/no). They can be used to rate experiences, products, and offers. Most important, questions can be changed on the fly, as retailers identify information that would be useful in a given venue or time period. In addition to being technology savvy and mobile, research indicates that millennials want to participate and have a voice in their interactions. The CEMOSoft paradigm is a conversation between retailer and customer that allows millennials to be heard.

CEMOSoft Rewards* - As with the interactive questions, rewards can be shaped to suit the circumstances. They can be seasonal or time-based, offer related merchandise, or shareable with friends and family. Rewards can be shared in the form of coupons or a newsletter.

CEMOSoft Analytics* - Near-real-time analytics send customer information and data directly to designated staff associates and managers. Both short- and long-term data and reports are available from the platform to support immediate responses and extended planning based on more accurate business intelligence

How it Works in Brief

1 The CEMOSoft platform integrates emerging big data, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), cloud, and mobile technologies into a small form factor, giving retailers the value of analytics without requiring a large footprint in venues with limited space. The CEMOSoft application runs on an Intel® architecture based IoT gateway with Windows® 10 IoT Core.

2 CEMOSoft business manager dashboard simplifies management and analysis: allows account management for the Insight, Rewards and Analytics modules.

3 Rewards can be quickly shared with participating customers through coupons: Questions and alerts are set up on Insights, coupons or newsletters uploaded to Rewards, and analytics viewed via Analytics.

The Foundation for IoT: Intel works closely with the ecosystem to deliver smart IoT solutions based on standardized, scalable, reliable Intel® architecture. These solutions range from sensors and gateways to server and cloud technologies to data analytics algorithms and applications. Intel provides essential end-to-end capabilities — performance, manageability, connectivity, analytics, and advanced security — to help accelerate innovation and increase revenue for enterprises, service providers, and vertical industries. Intel can help organizations use data to monitor, control, optimize, and benchmark, as well as to share historical and near-real-time information to improve decision-making.

Conclusion

Together, the CEMOSoft platform and Intel® architecture based IoT gateway have the potential to transform retail business models. With the platform’s focus on near real-time exchange and engagement between retailers and customers, whether online or in brick-and-mortar stores, it allows a more agile approach to service and more personalized customer experiences. It is above all a tool to support a process of continuous, relevant feedback well suited to a constantly evolving consumer climate. Running on the IoT gateway, it brings the performance and reliability to support near-real-time processing in a small form factor, help secure customer data and transactions, gather and filter data, conduct analytics at the edge, and scale to meet changing requirements.

The CEMOSoft platform can also be used by a wide range of vertical industries to effectively understand, engage, and serve customers, from healthcare and government to hospitality and consumer packaged goods (CPG).

About CEMOSoft

CEMOSoft is committed to excellence in product management and customer services. Its experts bring broad, diverse, and hands-on experiences across industries, businesses, and processes.

Learn More

More about CEMOSoft   More about the Alliance

Reference

1. Magic Quadrant for CRM and Customer Experience Implementation Services, Worldwide, Gartner, 2016
2. The Cost of Crappy Customer Experiences Infographic, July 5, 2015, thunderhead.com/the-cost-of-crappy-customer-experiences-infographic/.
3. Total Retail Survey 2017, PWC, pwc.com/gx/en/industries/retail-consumer/total-retail.html.
4. Four Concerns that Keep CEOs Awake at Night, World Economic Forum, 2017, CEO Survey, Davos, Switzerland, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/01/4-concerns-that-keep-ceos-awake-at-night/.
5. mckinsey.com, mckinsey.com/business-functions/marketing-and-sales/our-insights/improving-the-business-to-business-customer-experience.

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