During the apogee of the pandemic, 38% of global consumers were willing to return to in-store shopping with retailers they viewed to be technology innovators and 12% would spend more in stores using technology to improve the customer experience. Retailers noticed and invested in technology such as:

• Self-serve kiosks at store entrances customers can use to look up relevant information 
  
  
• Handheld scanners to help verify product pricing 
  
  
• Smart shopping carts that keep a running total of the cost of everything placed in them
  
  
• Mobile point of sale (mPOS) for easy anytime, anywhere checkout  

Deploying technology for consumers to use is only part of the equation. Technology and devices also must be managed to ensure they are working as expected, protected against the latest security threats and delivering a positive return on investment (ROI). 

For organizations that haven’t used a retail Mobile Device Management (MDM) solution, check out the following infographic with five reasons retailers need an MDM or Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) solution or scroll down to keep reading.

1. Enhance Security

The amount of personal and business data stored on retail devices is staggering, including names and addresses, payment or credit card details, inventory information, delivery schedules and more. 

Customers trust retailers to keep their personal information safe. When a credit card data breach occurs, for example, it costs a business an average of $4.24 million USD. However, the loss of trust is even more devastating as 83% of consumers in the U.S. and 58% in Canada would stop spending with a retailer immediately after a security breach. 

2. Reduce Downtime

Self-serve kiosks, scanners, smart shopping carts and mPOS devices only benefit customers when they work. When they go down – and there’s nobody on site who can fix the issue – it can lead to a poor customer experience or keeping surplus replacement parts on hand, and that can be costly. 

Consumers want to get in and out of stores as quickly as possible. But when the average downtime incident for 87% of retailers lasts approximately four hours, customers aren’t going to wait around for it to be resolved. They will abandon their purchase, especially if they’re waiting in the checkout line. Globally, retailers have lost $555 billion USD because of shoppers leaving due to long checkout lines. 

3. Integrate Systems

The retail supply chain stretches from the warehouse to the customer’s front door – and all points in between, including: the delivery truck, the distribution center and the store shelf. The technology required to manage these different systems needs to “talk” to each other to ensure access to the latest data regarding inventory availability or delivery times. 

Customer data can be found everywhere. It’s estimated that 62% of U.S. retailers have over 50 different systems containing customer data, and it’s imperative that data across all systems is consistent and up to date. It could be disastrous for a retailer if, say, their website had the customer’s correct address for delivery but the warehouse where the order is shipped from doesn’t.
 

4. Prevent Device Misuse

Whether it’s a mounted tablet that customers can use to look up product information or a smartphone associates use to check available inventory levels, there’s always a possibility the device could be used for something other than its intended purpose. In fact, 80% of organizations have discovered employees misusing device and data access. 

That could mean downloading apps, playing games or browsing websites. Although it sounds innocuous, it can lead to big problems. First, employees can be distracted from the task at hand. And second, device security can be put at risk if something malicious is downloaded on the device. 

5. Boost Your Brand

A retail MDM solution can help you boost your retail brand and make it instantly memorable and identifiable, no matter where or how customers interact with it. That could mean ensuring your brand logo and colors appear consistently or that digital signage is constantly updated with the latest and greatest information your customers need to know. 

Equally important is that you can build the seamless, personalized shopping experiences 50% of customers are asking for across the omnichannel. This could mean providing multiple delivery or pick-up options or making product recommendations based on a customer’s previous purchases. 

The SOTI ONE Platform Handles Your Retail MDM Needs 

Get devices into the hands of your retail workers and customers faster to ensure they’re always protected, online and working with all your systems to deliver premium shopping experiences. 

Check out these resources to learn how SOTI ONE can help manage the business-critical mobile devices your retail operations count on: 

• Read customer success stories for retailers like you
• Visit our retail industry page

Download the latest SOTI retail industry report, The Tech Effect: Strengthening the Omnichannel to Meet Consumer Demands