Video surveillance systems have historically been regarded as grudge purchase; a necessary evil offering no significant return on investment. But this is all changing as Industry leaders are seeing a new opportunity and a requirement for an integrated video system that allows the LP team to have a state of the art smart video solution offering unprecedented improvements in shrink whilst at the same time offering invaluable insight and business intelligence to many other parts of the retail business to maximize sales, reduce cost and ultimately improve the bottom line.
The guide below shows some of the key applications that a comprehensive surveillance-based video solution can achieve.
1: The IP Video System
Installing an IP video system is the first step in achieving all the extra functionality and analytics that’s becoming available. Investing in 360-degree cameras is highly recommended, because they allow a retailer to cover the whole store whilst at the same time delivering the meta-data and business intelligence that has a far-reaching impact throughout the whole business.
2: Business Intelligence Dashboard
Understanding your business objectives is key to making video analytics work for your business. Start by setting the right metrics for the areas of the business to measure and improve. The key advantage of a centralized dashboard is that it enables different stakeholders to access the information relevant to their own function. As well as serving as a convenient way to gain access to the reporting you need.
3: People Counting
Accurate footfall counting can be integrated into the video surveillance system with the added benefit of having the video to use to verify the count. Counting customers is crucial to produce conversion rate which in turn is arguably the most critical metric in understanding store and employee performance. Once uploaded to the Dashboard, Marketing and Sales teams can use this information to review campaign performance or to reassess customer service practices and perhaps develop further training.
4: Customer Behaviour
Whilst recording video for surveillance purposes, behind the scenes cameras with analytic capabilities can deliver valuable insight into customer behaviour within the store. Reports can be set up with direct links to the video to gain an in-depth understanding of the dwell, flow, and path that customers take through the different areas of the store. Having the video at the heart of these tools enables changes to be actioned based on the insight gained with far reaching benefits for VM displays, marketing and promotional material, store design etc. For instance, monitoring the wait time of customer lifts or the ease of navigating a store can give valuable insight into the number of customer penetration to all parts of the retail space.
5: POS Transaction Searching
Good video management solutions offer the ability to synchronize the POS transaction data with the video footage to enable searches of individual transactions by any criteria and provide direct access to the video at the point of sale. These searches can be configured to run automatically in the background and then deliver the video to the bespoke dashboard for review and action. Gone are the days of working through paper reports and then contacting stores to try to obtain a DVD of a transaction.
6: Live Customer Alerting
With the right cameras it’s possible to monitor a scene live and provide real-time alerts on customer dwell and occupancy in specific areas to provide a dynamic and accurate staff allocation and maximizing store performance. Most frequently used are alerts for till queue length and wait times at fitting rooms etc. and smart phones and smart watches mean that managers can receive live updates on the go.
7: Remote Access
IP smart video system offers remote access from Head Office or on the road from any device. This capability has far-reaching benefits for all areas of the retail business. Although LP has the most immediate and obvious benefit, departments such as VM can check the effectiveness of new displays, marketing can check the correct interpretation of a promotion or Legal teams can quickly review footage of a trip/fall incident. The need for different staff to drive around a region from store to store is dramatically reduced.
If you think that your business could benefit from these solutions, the good news is that ONVU Retail has a solution that does all this for you. Remember…
IF YOU CAN’T MEASURE IT,
YOU CAN’T IMPROVE IT.
