Retailers can use inventory availability to drive trust and brand loyalty
Key takeaways
Make inventory availability information as specific as possible
Learn from the five mistakes we have seen other retailers make
Some retailers really make you dig for information. Others provide it up front. Can you guess which have more customers and repeat business? When you provide better inventory information to your customers, they will grow to trust and rely on you, but many companies are missing out on potential sales opportunities because their inventory information isn’t readily available online to customers. Below is a list of the top five inventory mistakes that we see retailers make and how to address them, starting with the easiest to address.
No. 1. Inventory availability shown too late
If your company has a high online shopping cart abandonment rate at the point where you show inventory, it’s crucial to address this. Customers feel let down when they add an item to their online shopping cart only to see the inventory is not available. Or worse, the availability changes after they add the item to their cart, and the item is suddenly gone. It can be tricky to show inventory availability—especially for fast-moving items—but try to at least show availability on the product listing or search results.
Adding inventory availability as part of your unified commerce capability can have significant payback, especially for retailers with multiple channels. A service that provides available inventory (on hand less on order) but also accounts for orders in process (allocated) can help a retailer manage this better.
No. 2. Not showing inventory in stores
Many retailers have good inventory controls. Despite this, their availability information is difficult to get intra-day. Although many retail systems are set up to trickle feed, inventory availability isn’t calculated as there’s a hesitancy to publish this information.
There is a great opportunity in this for retailers though. Increasing customer confidence for a store visit has significant benefits: more traffic, greater sales, increased loyalty and much more. Also, when products aren’t available to purchase online but inventory availability in stores is shown, this can save an ecommerce sale for a customer who is willing to go to their local store. This capability can be enhanced further with ship from store.
No. 3. Excluding inventory availability from (Google) product feeds
Product feeds that show availability information can help a business acquire new customers. This requires careful thinking of how to set up a product feed, including regionalizing results. Once set up, this information can be an invaluable tool in converting new customers. Since the information is available, why not make it easier to find outside of your own website?
No. 4. No ship from store
“Buy online, ship from store” is more involved to deploy but can have significant benefits. When ecommerce orders can’t be shipped from a brick-and-mortar store, an ecommerce warehouse has to carry more inventory to maintain service levels, and shipping times will likely be longer. However, when retailers have a store network that can ship, shipping times decrease, and they can reduce the amount of inventory that they carry in their ecommerce warehouse without impacting fulfillment. Customers often aren’t aware of how this increased service has been provided, but they notice when you have higher numbers of inventory in stock and shorter shipping times.
No. 5. Not showing available to promise
Back orders are just a fact of life for retailers. However, you can increase customer loyalty by indicating when new inventory is expected and by managing the availability of your on-order inventory. This requires careful planning, including knowing what orders have already been taken against the inventory and what orders are pending.
What happens next?
Inventory information is very valuable to customers. When you provide this information in a predictable and reliable way it can build brand loyalty and help you convert new customers. Start by gradually increasing the amount of inventory availability information you provide. Once you have established this capability, look toward implementing ship from store. This capability has significant operational and financial benefits.
Connect with us if you need help with inventory availability or any other part of your unified commerce journey.
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