BlogPost Title Four
Business Problem
The client’s national field salesforce previously visited retail locations on an ad-hoc schedule, discussing product placement, stocking, promotions, loyalty programs, and compliance issues as they independently deemed necessary.
Sales leaders wanted to direct salesforce to prioritize locations requiring immediate attention and tasks that drove the most business value.
Our Approach
As a first step, we worked with sales leaders to categorize tasks into ‘strategy-driven’ or ‘value-add’, giving their salesforce line-of-sight into the rationale for each task.
We utilized the client’s existing data lake and Databricks compute infrastructure and then constructed a data pipeline to extract, transform and consolidate data sources and maintain history for compliance purposes.
For each value-add tasks, we used all available data sources, including sales, shipment, and store image data, to calculate a projected business value for ranking purposes.
We then built out a data platform and process that prioritized all available tasks for the salesforce, including suggested product assortment, out of stock prediction, goal tracking, new product launches, compliance requirements, inconsistent ordering, etc.
The salesforce now receives a personalized sell-sheet (full list of tasks) during each retailer visit, saving time and increasing efficiency.
Finally, the value-add scores are tied directly to cost savings or incremental revenue, allowing sales leaders to track the overall program benefits.
Results
The program was renewed and expanded after the initial trial year and is now in year 3 of operation.
Client has seen reduced out-of-stocks and improved store-level assortment optimization, driving an overall increase in revenue
Client is exceeding key KPIs for ongoing new product launches, driven by an increased focused on priority retailers and a consolidated strategy across an extensive salesforce.
Other Case Study
