How to create a digitized sales process in your organization. At speed.

According to McKinsey, more than half of the 90% of B2B organizations which have moved to a digitized sales process in 2020 find it as or more effective than previous models. An enforced change to business-as-usual has revealed huge benefits to companies.

However, salespeople still see the value of face-to-face interactions and many customers still prefer the feel of a handshake deal. As we all adapt to the reality that our habits must change for the foreseeable future, salespeople are looking for tools that encourage clients to move online but retain the feel of the personal relationships they have always valued. The answer is in conversational commerce.

What is a digitized sales process and why invest in it?

If you are looking for a loose synonym for a digitized sales process outside of the B2B domain, then conversational commerce fits the bill. This term was only coined in 2015 but, in just five years, conversational commerce has become a fundamental strategy for increasing sales and customer loyalty in eCommerce. 

It refers to the system of direct communication between a brand or business and its customers. Conversational commerce uses instant digital messages shared on platforms such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, or iMessage, which incorporates the ability to make purchases online. It is a response to the real needs of 2.5 billion people who communicate using messaging apps on mobile phones for general communication and are coming to expect the same kind of easy and quick communication with their favorite brands.

In recent years, companies have started to use chatbots in eCommerce to open new sales channels and save significant amounts of money. This trend is growing fast. About 80% of businesses plan to use chatbots for their online businesses by 2020. Around half of shoppers say that they willingly interact with eCommerce chatbots; the next step is then to go beyond chatbots that answer questions and move to a more digitized sales process.

In spite of this rapid development, bots will probably never replace human to human interactions between the consumer and the brand. They are improving all the time but will likely not be fully able to build relationships, understand emotions, and answer complex questions about products. That is why we need tools like Meetsales, which combines the convenience of a digitized sales process with the value of having an experienced sales rep leading the conversation.

Why are digitized sales processes more common in B2C companies than in B2B?

Meetsales is essentially a new type of solution: a conversational commerce app that enables in-meeting sales in the B2B sector. While B2C companies like online stores and services have already embraced chatbots, why has the B2B sector been slower to embrace the potential of these technologies?

Resistance from sales

When salespeople hear terms like ‘digitized sales process’, they often feel slightly threatened by the prospect. It sounds like a euphemism for replacing sales teams with robots. Companies can then experience resistance from salespeople who believe that technology will cut into their earnings potential. In response, businesses don’t do enough to show salespeople how technology will increase their potential to reach clients and close deals. They need to make enough effort to explain the benefits of the suggested tech.

This is an internal communication problem that we encourage companies to face head-on. It is natural for people to push back against changes or to feel threatened by technology; make sure that you explain to your sales team that a digital sales process solution like Meetsales is not meant to replace them. In fact, it is specifically designed to let your sales teams continue business as usual but through a new channel. 

Resistance from the organization

Most B2B companies work in established, often very traditional, ways. Therefore, even if people are open to the idea of a new solution, the sprawling complexity of old technologies across fragmented departments makes it hard to know where to begin. Many B2B companies know that they need to undergo digital transformation but would rather stick with the status quo because of two inaccurate assumptions.

• “What we do has worked up to now, so we should stick with it”.
  Yes, it may have worked up to now but once competitors start implementing better technology, the business will fall behind.
  
• “If we change one thing, we’ll have to change everything.”
  We no longer use monolithic systems in companies in which every single process is connected at the core. It is possible to find SaaS solutions like Meetsales which you can test in one small area. If it works, you keep it; if it doesn’t add value, you can look elsewhere. The idea that digitizing one thing means you’ll need the budget for a root and branch reshaping of every piece of technology in the company is simply not true anymore. There is no need to worry about a domino effect on the company’s innovation budget.

How does Meetsales help your B2B sales teams?

Meetsales is the only conversational commerce solution that puts an interactive shopping cart directly into a B2B sales call. It lets sales reps build relationships and close deals as they meet clients online, show products, discuss prices, and add products to a live cart. It fuses the practicality and cost-effectiveness of a remote meeting with the personal touch of a traditional sales process. Meetsales is a tool for people, not a substitute for personal relationships. Its goal is to improve sales rep’s work and optimize sales through video. 

“Our mission is to provide the technology that allows sales teams to close more deals online. The tool was designed to facilitate the sales reps, not to replace them!  Meetsales fits perfectly into this idea. It is a solution that combines the values of video conferencing with eCommerce tools. Imagine Zoom-meets-Salesforce. It allows a video meeting between the customer and the sales rep, but with an interactive catalog and shopping cart. Meetsales, as a conversational commerce system, fully integrates with any PIM system so sales reps can guide their clients through the whole product catalog and close more deals.”

Tamara Boleswicz, Meetsales Product Owner at Divante.

Tips for introducing a digitized sales process at speed

With the current global climate, your sales teams might be working at less than their full potential. Most sales reps thrive on face-to-face contact and being able to use the skills they have honed over the years. Phone calls, email, Skype, or faxes might let them present your offers but they don’t let them present clients with the best face of the company.

If you are choosing Meetsales as the way to reinvigorate your sales team and kickstart your conversational commerce capabilities, here’s how to do it at speed (which is obviously essential in the current economic climate).

1. Download the app. It takes minutes, not days. And because it is a SaaS solution, there is no complicated contract process
2. Integrate it with your PIM. You can sync with your entire product catalog instantly.
3. Onboard your sales teams. This is a two-step process. First, you need to show people how technology will let them achieve better results. It’s not a threat, it’s a tool. Secondly, let them play with the solution and see how intuitive it is to use. Your sales team needs to know that their total focus during calls will be on the client, not on trying to work out how to use their new piece of technology.
4. Invite clients to calls. Clients don’t need to download any software. All they need is a simple widget. You can make your first sales calls within 24 hours of downloading Meetsales.

In essence, the most important thing is just taking the first step and breaking away from false assumptions such as “What we do has worked up until now, so we should stick with it” and “If we change one thing, we’ll have to change everything”. The best way to implement a digital sales process at speed is to choose a SaaS solution that doesn’t have a high entry bar and just get started. However, the key to ongoing success will be your sales teams. Show them how they will benefit from the change and show them the results from the stats dashboard later on to motivate them and prove that you’re all moving in the right direction.

If you want to find out how meetsales can help you get started, contact Tamara Bolsewicz and schedule a demo.

The post How to create a digitized sales process in your organization. At speed. appeared first on Divante.com Blog.

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Key Fraud Insights for the Holiday Season – 9th Forter Fraud Attack Index

I’ve lost count of the number of times a marketplace trader has had a chunky sale from a brand new customer with zero feedback and requested advice on how to deal with them. Should they take the sale, or is a zero feedback buyer too high a risk? Is this a scammer who’s just opened a brand new account or is it a potential customer for life who have opened an account specifically to buy from you? All is revealed in the ninth Fraud Attack Index released by Forter today.

And, the zero feedback customer is occurring much more frequently than in the past, both on marketplace and on websites. Since the start of the pandemic, consumers have flocked online and if their regular retailers don’t have a product in stock then they’ll be turning to marketplaces or your website to fulfil their requirements. New customer accounts now represent 30% of transactions, five times more than they did pre-COVID-19. This is good news for retailers, but merchants using legacy fraud prevention systems could miss out on some of this revenue potential due to high false decline.

The growth in transactions driven by the consumer shift from bricks-and-mortar stores to online purchasing is masking the fact that the number of fraud attacks has risen in real terms, leading retailers into a false sense of security. Plus, omnichannel fraud is growing: Buy Online, Pick-up In Store (BOPIS) fraud rose 55% as new customer service options are subjected to significant fraud – who hasn’t had an order placed only for the customer to message asking for a different delivery address? Forter’s ninth Fraud Attack Index warns that Account Takeover (ATO) and Policy Abuse such as returns abuse, promotion abuse, and reseller abuse are set to surge during the holiday season.

“A rapid rise in new customer accounts, coupled with having to pivot quickly from brick-and-mortar to online sales channels, put unprecedented stress on merchants as they tried to perfect the ecommerce experience. It is clear from what we’ve seen that some retailers were more agile and prepared for this than others, quickly introducing new services such as curbside pickup and Buy Online, Pick-up In-Store, in a bid to retain new customers.

To fully realize this new revenue potential, merchants need more accurate fraud prevention that can distinguish between these valuable new customers and fraudsters. Merchants can have a false decline rate between 5-7x higher for new customers – typical of legacy systems that do not have sufficient data on new account holders.”
– Michael Reitblat, CEO and Co-Founder, Forter

As retailers prepare for a critical holiday season and aim to recoup some of the year’s earlier losses, Forter’s research indicates that ATO attacks, and returns and delivery fraud will surge as fraudsters seek to exploit the increase in online shopping. At the same time, customers will be more likely to take unfair advantage of promotions and abuse delivery and returns policies. Fraud and abuse trends that retailers need to prepare for include:

• Account Takeover fraud to dramatically Increase

  Forter’s analysis indicates that fraudsters will seek to operationalize the data they’ve stolen and collected through data breaches and social engineering scams conducted during COVID-19 disruption. Also, new customer accounts opened by less experienced users are likely to use weaker passwords, fewer security steps, and be more vulnerable to ATO. As a result, retailers need to prepare for increasing ATO attacks during the holiday season.

• Returns and Delivery Fraud will continue to rise

  Retailers increasingly offered flexible omnichannel customer service options such as Buy Online, Return in Store (BORIS) and BOPIS, to satisfy new customers during COVID-19. Fraud attacks exploiting BOPIS policies increased 55% compared to H1 2020, as merchants offering frictionless experiences are less likely to ask for customer identification. Forter anticipates fraudsters will increasingly target and exploit returns and delivery services as online shopping surges over the holiday season.

• Policy Abuse Set to Spike

  Merchants courting new customers with aggressive promotions and user-friendly omnichannel options, will expose themselves to greater abuse risk, including returns, promotion and reseller abuse.

You can download the full 9th Forter Fraud Attack Index here.

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Google My Business Account to inform consumers of open/close times

People are researching their visits to local stores and restaurants online before they go. For example, searches for “pick up” have grown globally by more than 3,000% year over year and searches for “takeout restaurants” have grown globally by over 5,000% over the same time. If you’re not using Google My Business to assist consumer then you’re missing a trick.

If you’re business is open to the public, them make it easy for them to find you and any services you offer such as “pick up” as well as your opening hours. You can engage with customers on Google for free and with a Google My Business Account, you get more than a business listing. Your free Business Profile also lets you easily connect with customers across Google Search and Maps.

You can post photos and offers to your profile to show what makes your business unique, and give customers reasons to choose you every time.

Google My Business is a also great way to keep customers up to date with the most accurate business information, especially since that information often varies by location. You can add service attributes about your business, like “In-store pickup” and “No-contact delivery”, which appear on Google and the Business Profile page , so customers know how you’re operating when planning their visit.

Google My Business user generated content from consumers

Consumers can also assist by suggesting edits to the status of a Google My Business entry. Plus of course they can add reviews and access you contact details if they want to phone or message you directly to arrange a pick up, double check opening times or check stock before visiting.

Mark a business temporarily closed

• Open Google Maps Maps.
• Search for a place or select it on the map.
• Select Suggest an edit and then Close or remove.
• Under ‘Reason’, select Temporarily closed.

Mark a business reopened

• Open Google Maps Maps.
• Search for a place marked as temporarily or permanently closed or select it on the map.
• Tap to expand the ‘Closed’ banner.
• Select Suggest an edit and then Reopen this place.

Google My Business is a free tool, so if you’re not yet using it and want to connect with customers then open an account here.

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DHL Express riverboat parcel delivery service launched in London

Once upon a time, the UK’s waterways were the only way to transport goods around the country and none more so than the Thames which servecd London. Now, DHL Express has launched London’s first 21st Century riverboat parcel delivery service, which aims to ease congestion and provide a reliable and efficient way of transporting deliveries across the capital.

The riverboat parcel delivery service has been introduced as part of DHL’s commitment to using blended transport modes to improve access to urban areas and is an important step towards exploring the use of the river for small scale freight transport.

“With traffic and poor air quality becoming an increasing problem in urban areas like London, we’re committed to finding a better blend of transport. This new and unique service, combining electric vehicles, riverboat and last-mile bikes creates fast and efficient access across the capital.”
– Ian Wilson, Chief Executive UK&I, DHL Express

The riverboat service, operated by Thames Clippers Logistics, will run daily at 7:30am, transporting packages into London. The shipments will be loaded from electric vehicles onto the riverboat at Wandsworth Riverside Quarter Pier before travelling at high speed along the Thames into central London, docking at Bankside Pier for final mile delivery on DHL courier bicycles.

“We’re thrilled to be facilitating this service alongside DHL. The river is a widely under-used natural source of transportation and as we have demonstrated over the last 21 years with our passenger services, the river has opportunity to innovate and evolve – this new high-speed parcel delivery service is a great example of this. As a business we strive to maximise the uses of the river as a mode of transport and will continue to reduce congestion on London’s roads.”
– Sean Collins, CEO, Thames Clippers Logistics

DHL has proven the effectiveness of combining land and waterways through its established canal delivery network in Venice, but the service in London represents its first high speed service.

“This project opens up the movement of small parcels as a new and potentially substantial area of river use. The shipment of bulkier freight by river already takes more than 200,000 HGVs off the capital’s roads every year. A river boat and emission free last mile delivery is a great innovation and the ideal combination for the city’s next evolution.”
– Robin Mortimer, Chief Executive, Port of London Authority

Whatever part of the country, or world, you’re in, if you’re sending documents and parcels into central London, they are likely to now reach their final destination via the new DHL Express riverboat parcel delivery service.

“Without the Thames London would not have become the city it is, so it is great to see it playing its part in the city’s economy in this new and innovative way. The reduction of lorries on the road complements our existing measures to improve road safety, and we are pleased to be part of an initiative that provides the consistent journey times that are so crucial to the successful delivery of parcels.”
– David Panayiotou, Head of London River Services, TfL

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Volo Know Your Data Series – Refunds Analysis

In our monthly ‘Know your data’ series, penned by Scott Bagnall, Head of Product at Volo Commerce, we are looking at how you can use data to grow your business. Detailed in a webinar earlier this year, if you’re a Volo customer then the reports are all available to you in the Vision reporting and analytics module, but for non-Volo users you should still be considering the same factors in order to scale and grow your business. We are collating all of the articles here so if you missed one you can find them all in one place.

So far in this series we’ve looked at data analysis and reporting for best sellers, your product sales velocity, your slow or dead stock, your margins and stock forecasting. Today we’re going to talk about refunds.

Refunds Analysis

Refunds are rubbish, there’s no way around it. Partial refunds, full refunds, cancelled orders and returns – they kill profits. Even credit notes with their silver lining of retained income mean a hit on your finances now and further down the line. It’s critical you manage refunds, returns and credits as closely as possible.

If you’re a distributor of motor parts, tools and accessories, for example, you’ll be well used to high returns in your traditional B2B routes to market, since the garage or dealership will regularly order a couple of parts, fit the one that works the best and return the other. Your distribution operations are modelled for this daily to and fro. If you’re selling direct to consumers via Amazon or eBay for example, they’re generally going to buy the part they think they need and if it’s not right it’s coming back. Refunds and returns for automotive aftermarket ecommerce is a different kettle of fish, and a kettle you need to avoid.

What I’m not going to talk about is your own business policies: under what circumstances, at what value and within what timeframe you deal with refunds, returns (at your or the buyer’s expense) and credit notes. These are down to the best practices of the marketplaces, your own approach and the guidance of your advisers. Instead, I’m going to focus on the things your data is telling you – or that you should be looking for from your data – in this area.

Analysis

To start with, how big is your refund problem? What percentage of your overall revenues end up being refunded? How many refunds and returns are you having to process? Can you estimate a cost for processing a refund, or processing a return? Over what timeframe are you looking? Can you compare timeframes to see if your returns picture is trending up, staying constant, or trending down? Can you draw any conclusions about your general business situation to account for this, like seasonality for example?

Then you need to get into the detail, and for this you’re going to need the raw data and some filtering options. Look at your refunds by supplier, by product line, by web store or marketplace, by region, by shipper. What patterns are emerging? Then drill into each specific refund or return to pinpoint the problem. Separating your analysis for refunds, returns and credit notes will give you further granularity.

For example, let’s say you’ve recently launched a new product line. You’re going to want to know how well it’s selling, where, and to whom. You’re also going to want to know if buyers aren’t happy, and the extent of the problem. Figuring out early whether it’s down to the product, listing (as in misrepresenting the product) or the shipping will help you fix the teething issues and grow from there.

Refund Reasons

Recording why an item was rejected by the buyer before or after pick-pack-ship is vital intelligence. Your ecommerce system will either let you pick from some pre-set drop-down list, or allow you to fill in a free text field, or you can record it in a spreadsheet. Clearly there’s a bunch of possible reasons – not as described, wrong item packed, wrong item ordered, faulty, damaged, to name but a few – and analysing your refunds by reason will again point you in the right direction.

Let’s say you’re receiving a lot of refunds from a specific region you’re shipping to and they’re the wrong item ordered. Is this a cultural thing with returns behaviour that you need to understand better? Or perhaps there are some localisation or translation issues that are leading to the confusion.

Another example: you’re getting a lot of a specific type of refund because the items are damaged on receipt. You think this might be a supplier issue and a component part is faulty to start with, but then you realise that it’s the same shipping agent every time. They might not be handling the goods very well, so you need to have words or else look at your packing processes for those items.

Furthermore, if you’re getting a lot returns with ‘not as described’ as the reason, it’s a good idea to review and updating the listing. Consider adding more pictures so the customer can get a better look at the product. For a big ticket, big-selling item like a car part, you could also offer a link to a video showing how to use or intal the item. Updating the listing description to point out the more about the product and include answers to frequently asked questions will also help. Remember: driving down returns is the goal of reading your returns data.

A word of advice here: if you allow refund reason descriptions to be filled in by free text on your system, it’s going to mean more work to manually group them into meaningful headings to do your analysis. A drop-down list forces the answer but is less work for you and generally more illuminating.

Margin Modelling

I talked earlier about estimating your costs for refunds and returns. I also covered margins in a previous article in this series. These are additional costs you can model on your analysis, along with the other costs, to arrive at a true picture of your margin for each product or product line. This is preferable to applying a general margin figure across all your products, since then it’s likely you’ll end up selling some products that you’re actually making a loss on without knowing it.

Refund processing cost, return shipping cost, whether the marketplace charges fees on refunds, whether your ecommerce system does; these are all important cost elements that will help you understand your margin picture and protect your profitability. As with many things, this is a risk-return call. You can either do this manually, or you can invest in a reporting system with flexibility to allow you to build the model and automate your analysis.

To discuss how you can improve your business with a better handle on your refunds, please send us a note.

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Amazon reveals Singapore date for Prime Day

read the original version on: www.retailnews.asia

After a delay of a few months, Amazon has officially confirmed when its Prime Day shopping event is taking place. Amazon Prime Day 2020 will, once again, actually run for two days. Following a postponement from the usual mid-July period, the first discounts will launch at 00:01 on Tuesday, October 13, with offers running until 23:59 on Wednesday, October 14. It’s been confirmed that Prime […]

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The joke is on consumers as Liquid Death raises $23 million more

In what began as a kind of funny, savvy marketing stunt that has since gained traction, a nearly three-year-old, Santa Monica-based startup that sells water from the Austrian Alps under the brand Liquid Death, has raised $23 million in Series B funding. Backers in the round include an unnamed family office; Convivialité Ventures, which is Pernod Ricard Group’s venture arm; the musician known as Fat Mike; and earlier backer Velvet Sea Ventures.

The company, originally incubated with the help of the L.A.-based startup studio Science, has now raised a little more than $34 million altogether.

We talked with Liquid Death founder Mike Cessario, who was formerly a West Coast agency exec, not long after he launched the company to the public, and he argued at the time that canned water could give sugary energy drinks like Rockstar, Monster and Red Bull a run for their money if it was also named like a heavy metal act.

Indeed, our favorite part of the product has long been its promise to “murder your thirst.” (It’s water in an aluminum can, after all, so other differentiators are hard to come by.)

Clearly, plenty of other people are amused enough by the company’s inventive marketing that its products are selling, including at Whole Foods. It put the cans on its shelves back in February, around the same time that Velvet Sea led the company’s $9 million Series A round.

Liquid Death also sells at more than 1,000 7-Eleven stores in California, and it sells, as it always has, directly to customers, who can select either mountain water or sparkling water, and buy a T-shirt or hoodie from a growing merchandise store on their way out of its online store.

A 12-pack of tallboys costs $16. A “Hydrate or Die” T-shirt can be had for $26.

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