Better Omnichannel Experiences with RFID Tags

Omnichannel experiences are no longer a luxury for consumers today – they are expected! Customers want the freedom to shop at any time. To offer this service, retailers need an optimal overview of their stocks. RFID tags (Radio Frequency Identification) offer this possibility. Items marked with this technology can be identified at any time via radio waves. With this improved visibility, businesses can more easily track their inventory and offer a better omnichannel experience to their customers.

The world is changing – retailers keep their finger on the pulse of time
A few years ago, the use of omnichannel or RFID technology may have been uncharted territory for some retailers – now it is essential to address the subject. During the pandemic, the share of sales made through digital channels more than doubled. Customers decide where they want to shop – and retailers need to be able to meet those needs, on any channel.

Real-time transparency is a prerequisite
Transparency about all activities, in real time, is the basic prerequisite for this. In the past, retailers usually conducted a full inventory check once or twice a year. Over time, it became more than clear that this method had a very high potential for error. Nowadays, retailers can no longer work with inaccuracies of over 50%. Consumers use every opportunity to choose their sources of supply. If individual retailers are not able to provide reliable information on stock and availability at any time, they lose the order, and a competitor is in business. One step towards solving this problem is the use of RFID tags. Increasing inventory accuracy inevitably increases profit margins.

RFID tags not only improve transparency, but also ROI
By tagging boxes with RFID technology, retailers can quickly determine when certain items are out of stock and remove them from the list of available products. The right use of RFID tags enables businesses to establish effective omnichannel activities. Examples include click & collect, reserve & collect, mobile app purchases and home deliveries. The use of RFID tags is by no means a new concept. The first items were tagged with this technology in retail more than ten years ago. However, with the increasing popularity of omnichannel experiences, it has become more commonplace. The falling costs of RFID tags also contributed to their use by more and more companies over time.

RFID tags simplify omnichannel processes
The benefits are clear: by using RFID tags, retailers are able to track their inventory, avoid manual scanning and implement an item-level tagging system to further ensure inventory accuracy. Most importantly, RFID greatly simplifies omnichannel processes. In fact, statistics show that nearly seven out of ten retailers that have adopted the technology offer more than five types of omnichannel services to their customers, increasing their ROI by up to 20%.

Conclusion
As the world continues to change in the wake of the pandemic, RFID technology has a crucial role to play in enabling omnichannel experiences, reducing costs and increasing ROI.

Source: K3