Digitalization
The unstoppable growth and digital business transformation is undeniable, a fact that has completely changed the existing relationship between companies and consumers. Currently, it is necessary to implement strategies and have the necessary resources to improve the customer experience. To do this, it is essential to ask the following question: What do customers want? With the answer, we can begin to prepare a strategy based on Customer Centric.
Recent studies such as that of the company Deloitte confirm that the companies that implement strategies based on Customer Centric are 60% more profitable compared to those that haven't implemented it. If you want to be part of that successful majority, keep reading this article and we'll tell you how.
What is Customer Centric?
The concept Customer Centric — literally translated as “Customer at the Center” — responds to the customer-oriented strategy through which an organization places the customer at the center of the company with the objective of focusing all processes and operations on users.
Thanks to the implementation of Customer Centric, with actions aimed at customer satisfaction and loyalty, among others, clear objectives such as loyalty are established and benefits such as increased sales are achieved. All of this stems from the idea of satisfying customer needs and, consequently, establishing a long-term relationship.
In short, the Customer Centric philosophy has been gaining more and more ground in companies, linking their customers to decision-making and subsequent development of the product or service, in order to offer a better value offer.
Customer Centric Benefits
· Increased user satisfaction: placing the customer at the center of the company's interests, as a key part of the operation, will make them feel much more satisfied due to their prestigious position.
· Customer loyalty: as we mentioned before, with the implementation of customer centric your customers will be more satisfied. As a result, by having happy customers, you will be able to make them loyal to your company.
· Improving the corporate image: placing your customers at the center of the company's activity or operations will significantly improve their image of your company.
· Positive publicity: taking into account good results in parameters such as user satisfaction or even the rate of improvement in the corporate image, it will be possible to obtain feedback in the advertising of our company. A satisfied and happy customer will be a company's best prescriber.
· Business opportunities: knowing in detail the concerns and needs of customers will not only help to increase their satisfaction but also to exploit all possible business opportunities. Through calls, surveys or even through support channels, we can detect all these needs and treat them as information that can be implemented.
How to implement the Customer Centric philosophy in your company
Taking action and implementing such a novel strategy and approach as Customer Centric is not easy. Therefore, below we show you by the hand of Zendesk What are the key aspects you should consider to carry it out:
· Take actions to receive Feedback from customers: measuring your satisfaction in addition to knowing first-hand what your feelings are regarding a service or product is key to being able to improve. Use the feedbacks as a premonitive formula for solutions to potential problems, it will make it possible to identify unmet needs in advance.
· Instant communication: as we mentioned before with feedback, having direct and instant communication with your customers is a key factor for their satisfaction and success, since you offer them security and transparency regarding your product. At SmartMonkey, we are very clear that communication with customers is very important and, therefore, we have our email platform. Thanks to the email platform, you can keep your customers informed at all times with the possibility of directly sending all the information necessary to monitor the full service in real time.
· Synchrony between departments: all departments of the company must be aligned with the continuous improvement of the customer experience; all must aim to provide the best possible experience to customers through support, information or improvements at the product level, among others.
· Loyalty programs: the most satisfied and loyal customers will be the best ambassadors of our brand. In this way, it is important to consider a loyalty strategy so that the customer feels part of a community as well as feeling the center of it.
· Appropriate interaction and support: it is essential to offer customers all the interaction and support they need with our company. Therefore, offering a multiplicity of channels to adapt to the needs of each user is key, since the objective will be to facilitate communication.
· CRM: it is necessary to have a customer data manager in order to be able to know in depth what the needs of each of them are; having the right tools will make customers have a better service and are more satisfied. In addition, with a CRM you can manage the analysis of all the information collected from your customers and extract, among others, buying trends.
Do you want to know other market trends? Go to our article Reverse Logistics: what it is and what are its benefits and discover one of the latest trends.
On November 26th, that is, in exactly 50 days, a new edition of Black Friday will be held. A commercial event of American origin that has managed to establish itself with great force around the world in recent years.
Even with the Covid-19 pandemic very present and its inevitable commercial consequences, especially the disproportionate rise in sea freight prices (with a notable impact on trade between China and Europe), the traditional Black Friday will go ahead, despite the “metamorphosis” of the situation.
In this article, we offer you the keys and key aspects of the last edition of the most commercial Black Friday so that you can learn first-hand about the expectations and forecasts of D-Day logistics.
Collapse and rise in prices in maritime freight: How does it affect Black Friday 2021?
Over the past year and a half, electronic commerce has been faced squarely with different problems affecting its good development. One of the first setbacks for the ecommerce it has undoubtedly been a consequence of Covid-19: during the lockdown, many online stores were unable to meet the huge demand, thus causing various logistical problems and even the collapse. In addition, the now popular stranding of the Evergreen vessel and the consequent blockage of the Suez Canal, whose consequences were serious delays for many companies worldwide.
In the same way, in recent weeks, the well-known container crisis has spread, whose impact has shaken the world economy in addition to causing the closure of some ports, such as China. For the Asian country, the closure of a terminal of what is currently the largest port in terms of container traffic on a global scale has caused delays, difficulties as well as an uncertain future for all ecommerce, especially for the next edition of Black Friday 2021 and the Christmas season, the two periods with the highest number of sales in the entire year.
It should be emphasized that all of these problems in the logistics network have consequences not only in terms of delivery times, but also in terms of the final price for users (with a longer transport time, the higher the cost of transport).
And what's the alternative? Companies such as Alibaba have found air transport as a temporary alternative to be able to maintain their logistics operations, an interim solution that has allowed them to maintain the delivery times of their customers in the European market.
Forecasts for Black Friday 2021
Thanks to the article Black Friday 2021 statistics: 10 numbers you should know with the help of the company Oberlo, we offer you below a summary of some of the most significant statistics for the logistics sector ahead of the next edition of Black Friday.
Sales forecasts
Many users choose Black Friday as a special date to advance Christmas shopping with great discounts given the proximity between the two dates.
In fact, in the 2020 edition of Black Friday, sales were so high that they even represented 30% of annual revenue.
Despite not yet having forecasts for the Black Friday 2021 edition, from companies such as In Markerter estimate that in the United States alone, the increase in online sales by that date will be approximately 11.3%.
A third of Spanish adults plan to shop on Black Friday 2021
For this next edition of Black Friday, approximately 13 million Spaniards are expected to shop on the famous “Black Friday”. Of all of them, it is estimated that 78.41% will make their purchases in person while 21.59% will make them through e-commerce. With regard to age groups, it is estimated that it is precisely the generation that expects to spend the most throughout the day.
Average spending on Black Friday 2021
According to the company Deloitte, the average expenditure among Spaniards will be 127 euros during the Black Friday weekend, also including the well-known Cyber Monday. Thus, this average expenditure per person would mean that Spaniards will already spend 23% of the budget reserved for Christmas on Black Friday.
It should be noted that in other countries, such as Mexico, the average expenditure per citizen is 279 American dollars, a significantly higher outlay.
The best-selling products
The products most acclaimed by users for Black Friday are, first of all, technological products, with a total of 39.2% of total sales. Secondly, another big star of this important date are fashion products and accessories, with a total of 33.74% of sales. And finally, leisure and entertainment plans, which win the bronze medal in terms of sales, since they account for around 7.55% of the total.
Do you want Black Friday to be a success for your company? We have the solution! Visit our article Ecommerce: 5 essential tools to survive in 2021 to learn about the most interesting applications for your company.
Logistics trends in ecommerce
It is well known that parcel delivery companies have a lot of difficulty offering a good service during these dates. Neither infrastructures nor personnel are adapted to such a sharp increase in operations. For this and other reasons, a trend is starting to appear in large e-commerce. The internalization of delivery processes in areas with the highest order density.
Currently, only companies with a large number of warehouses (stores) and requirements such as the cold are betting on this change, such as Mercadona, which already distribute their own fleet of gas-powered vehicles. We will see this trend in big brands that are increasingly considering e-commerce. The objectives are clear, better services, lower costs, but also to achieve visibility in the offline world by being able to conspicuously label your vehicles that are constantly moving around the cities.
In these cases, we are looking at route planning tools such as Planner, are very useful for simulating different scenarios and finding optimal logistics performance and determining the return on investment in this type of project. Stay tuned, in future articles we will go into the details of this type of analysis.
E-commerce, or ecommerce it has only grown in recent years. And in 2020, it broke all records, largely because of the onset of COVID-19.
This trend, far from being one-off, is something that is here to stay. Forecasts suggest that in 2025 one out of every four purchases in the sector Retail will be online.
This change in consumer mentality has caused many traditional sales companies to switch to e-commerce.
This leap may be a bit dizzying, but there are many software companies that are doing their best to break down all barriers and make online sales available to everyone.
Therefore, if you want to sell online, and not die trying, here is a list of tools that will save you hours and hours of work:
1. Online trading platform
The most important thing to be able to sell online is (how could it be otherwise), a platform that allows you to display items and connect with potential buyers and make sales. An online showcase where you can include all your stock in an attractive way.
To do this, there are dozens of tools that will allow you to update your inventory, provide you with a secure payment gateway so you can carry out transactions and where you can find templates to create a personalized experience for your customers.
Here are some of the most interesting options:
2. Customer Relationship Management (CRP)
Customers are the core of your business. That's why it's essential to have tools that allow you to connect with them in an organic way and offer them channels where they can connect with you.
Having a CRP is an economic way to centralize all those communications, and also to obtain valuable insights with which to improve.
Here is a selection:
3. Shipping planning and management
One of the most important points of eCommerce is the delivery of products. A bad delivery experience can ruin the entire shopping experience. That's why it's important to make a good investment in logistics.
Depending on the type of eCommerce, we can talk about own logistics, outsourced logistics or a mixed profile.
In the case of outsourced and last-mile logistics, localized providers have emerged in recent years that offer quality services at reasonable prices.
In the case of having logistics within the company itself, it is important to have a service that performs route planning and optimization and that allows delivery people to capture evidence of delivery and track the route.
4. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)
Sooner or later, every growing company needs one of these. Enterprise resource planning software allows you to manage every aspect of everyday life. Consolidation of expenses, management of packing slips, personnel management.
In this regard, large companies opt for corporate solutions such as SAP, Sage... among others.
But there are also cloud solutions that, for a much more affordable price and with a simple configuration, will satisfy all your business requirements.
5. Warehouse Management Platforms (WMS)
If you have already gone through all the previous screens and your eCommerce has ceased to be a modest garage store and now you have your own warehouse, you probably need a warehouse management platform to have control of all your stock.
This type of software gives you a detailed view of all the available resources and a complete traceability of everything that enters and leaves your warehouse.
In some cases, this type of software comes as a module of the ERP itself. But there are also dedicated tools that will simplify the management and monitoring of your warehouses:
If you want to know more about logistics or ecommerce you can contact us through Of the chat and our team will be happy to answer all your questions.
I want to share a personal experience that matters. Smartmonkey.io is headquartered in Barcelona, the second region with the most Coronavirus infections in Spain. The second worst country in the world that is dealing with this virus.
Hospitals in our area are about to be overwhelmed by the demand for ICU patients. According to friends who work in hospitals, the capacity of ICU beds in the region of Catalonia is about 800 beds, of which 600 are currently occupied. But we are still a long way from the top. Studies suggest that it will be at the end of April . Even so, 4 long weeks with the exponential growth of infections and expected deaths. Tragedy is the smallest word we could find to define this situation.
But it's not all darkness and death. A few days ago, a guy from Canada was starting to use Highway, our route optimizer. Use was normal for new customers, Testing the examples , taking their first small steps in a very powerful tool, but at the same time easy to put into operation.
We always like it talk to our new users . Not only is it very useful to know more about them, but being able to provide the best possible customer service is priceless. Sometimes you find incredible projects behind @gmail .com accounts like Ahmed Sagarwala's father-in-law in Canada.
It is helping not only the poor, but also people who have decided to isolate themselves to prevent the spread of the virus. Delivering medicines to these people is not just worrying about them, but doing everything they can for society. We are very proud that yesterday 16 people received help thanks to Ahmed's father-in-law and Highway. He told us that next week it will increase to 50 or more. We'll be here helping them.
If you read this and know someone, we could help. Spread the word. We know how difficult it can be, #quédateEnCasa and support Ahmed and others around the world.
Xavi Ruiz, CEO of Routal
Today we live in a new era of transformation in human history. We are impacted by the digital revolution that is redefining many aspects of modern life around the world.
And Artificial Intelligence is playing a fundamental role in several fields. From transportation and logistics to healthcare, customer care and home maintenance.
Evolution of Artificial Intelligence and its benefits
From sci-fi movies to real life, AI has come out of research labs to become an environmental part of our personal lives:
Nearly 60% of organizations use AI in one form or another and it's predicted to affect every segment of our lives by the end of 2025, with notable implications for industries.
For example, by analyzing patient data, AI can make predictive diagnoses in the field of healthcare; what's more, by analyzing student data, it provides teachers with information about their performance and advice on how to improve them and improve studies, to name just a few.
And then you can see how AI evolved from being just a term coined in 1956 to focusing on specific problems in 2016.
Therefore, if there is a conclusion to be drawn, it will be that AI will greatly benefit all industries; it will make life easier in certain areas where data analysis is necessary. Already today, AI is closely connected to customers, to the functions of companies, to online and offline retail, and is making its way into the field of logistics that is beginning its journey to become an industry driven by AI, as Routal has demonstrated in its different products. That's why there's every reason to believe that now is the best time for the logistics industry to adopt AI:
-First, technological advances in various fields such as machine learning, big data and connectivity have improved performance, accessibility and The costs of AI are more favorable than ever.
-Second, the network-based nature of the industry provides a natural framework and a good opportunity to implement and scale AI. -And last but not least, let's not ignore that all companies are moving towards the use of AI, so not adopting it will put your company at risk of long-term obsolescence.
Artificial intelligence and logistics
In a deeper approach, logistics companies are particularly positioned to benefit from the application of AI in almost every aspect of the supply chain thanks to the large volume of data that is generated daily and that allows AI to exploit it to provide the company with detailed information. In addition, logistics companies rely on networks and routes that must work harmoniously between large volumes, low margins and urgent deadlines; AI offers logistics companies the ability to optimize the composition of the network to degrees of efficiency that cannot be achieved with human thought alone. It also helps the logistics industry to redefine current practices, taking operations from reactive to proactive, planning from forecasting to prediction, processes from manual to autonomous, and services from standardized to personalized. Here are some examples to prove this:
-Increased real time Decision making: Logistics teams are often faced with repeatable actions and a wide range of operations that require the entry of a large amount of data, so combining between potential candidates fit to take responsibility for that, routes and schedules will take time, but with AI, supply chain professionals can automate the analysis and limit their selections to just two or three in a matter of seconds.
-Predictive analytics: When will customers be ready to order? This is a question that every seller asks himself, but it also represents vital information for logistics, supply chain and transportation planning to be ready when the time comes. With AI, the sales team and the logistics team will determine when an order will be placed, the route to follow, and the deadlines.
-Strategic Optimization: Where, When and How? Making the best decision in terms of transportation assets, knowledge, points from origin to customer location, schedule and savings in time, kilometers and fuel will require the intervention of AI.
Here are some examples of how AI and machine learning can process data and then present a variety of scenarios for optimization. With sophisticated tools that continuously learn and improve, industry professionals can make better and more up-to-date decisions, as well as more informed long-term strategic options, such as fleet size, optimized routes, etc., but the future is still fraught with challenges to overcome and opportunities to exploit.
Move the world smarter
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