SSR-Save is a national discount retail store chain with annual revenues of more than $1 billion. It’s a typical bricks-and-mortar operation with accounting software that records sales transactions in real time and tracks inventories on a perpetual basis. Management is considering an online store and will sell the same products as in the stores. Customers will be able to use credit cards only for online payments (vs. cash, credit card or debit card in the stores). The marketing manager is interested in learning about customers and using the information to improve both in-store and online sales.
a. Contrast the sales process of their retail store operation with the sales process in an online store environment. Would any of the events in the process change?
b. At what points do you collect data about customers and sales transactions in the retail store? In the online environment?
c. What data might you collect about retail store and online customers to improve your profitability? What data might you collect to improve customer satisfaction?
d. How is the sales process different for a public accounting firm? What data can they collect to improve customer relationships and grow revenues?