NetSuite Joins Leading Retailers, Thought Leaders at IRCE 2013

Staying on top of the latest trends in Ecommerce and learning how to improve your business is what the Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition (IRCE) is all about. Billed as the world’s largest Ecommerce event, the conference features hundreds of speakers and sessions as well as an opportunity learn and network with close to 10,000 other Ecommerce professionals.

Among those professionals will be NetSuite’s Andy Lloyd, general manager for commerce products, and Pete Isermann, CFO of Patriot Outfitters, a national retailer of tactical gear and a NetSuite SuiteCommerce customer. They will be presenting "Making the Web the Centerpiece of a Retail Organization” on June 5 from 1:45-2:30PM. During this joint session, both Andy and Pete will share how to deliver a consistent, high-quality customer experience across every customer touchpoint. You won’t want to miss it!

If you are heading to IRCE next month, we also hope you’ll take the time to visit us at our booth, #1210, to learn how our SuiteCommerce cloud-based platform is helping leading retailers, distributors and manufacturers, such as Williams-Sonoma, GoPro, Kitchenware Direct, Patriot Outfitters, and many more, seamlessly connect every step of their omni-channel, multi-location business — from Ecommerce, POS and order management to merchandising, marketing, inventory, financials and customer support.

Click here to schedule a personal SuiteCommerce demo during the event

When you stop by our booth, don’t forget to register to win a LEAP Motion Controller from Leap Motion, a cool NetSuite customer. The LEAP Motion Controller is the much anticipated device that lets you interact with your computer with hand motions (ever see Minority Report?). Instead of mouse clicks and taps, LEAP lets you point, wave, clap, drum, draw, sculpt, grab and slice your way through games and business applications. How cool is that?  

See YOU in Chicago!

Learn More and Connect with Us at IRCE!

• Learn more about NetSuite SuiteCommerce
• Schedule a meeting with us at IRCE
• Are you a reporter or analyst and want to connect with us at the show? Email Christine Major to set up a meeting with one of our executives cmajor@netsuite.com

Five Reasons Why eCommerce Provides a Competitive Edge for WD Companies

For most businesses, competing on price is ultimately a losing proposition. Instead, knowledge, selection and turnaround are the hallmarks of the profitable and well-positioned company. For wholesale/distributors, their customers demand a comprehensive, reliable inventory that they can reach whenever it is convenient for them. That means eCommerce.

It’s a realization many have already come to accept. In a survey of wholesale/distribution companies, "improving e-commerce capabilities" beat out the expansion or addition of any other sales channel as a strategy to build revenue over the next 12 months, with over one-third of respondents ready for enhanced eCommerce. Additionally, eCommerce tied with customer relationship management (CRM) in the top spot in response to a question which asked which technologies WD companies would explore in the next 12 months.

Yet, providing real differentiation means more than just static pages of inventory. That's why modern ecommerce platforms are the way forward—major trading relationships are being forged and maintained on powerful, yet user-friendly sites. Here are the five reasons companies are turning to innovative cloud eCommerce solutions to establish and maintain their next competitive advantages:

 

1. Whether they're buying MP3s or machinery, buyers prefer the ease-of-use and accessibility conventions of the eCommerce experience that grew in the B2C space. Rather than cling to old technology with green screens and trading hubs, B2B needs to not only provide B2C features and functionality but also the payment methods and processes of the B2B world like terms and volume discounts.

2. Powerful eCommerce enables you to reach parts of the world you just couldn't reach before. Staying wedded to a regional mindset can hurt your prospects for growth. In many industries, distributors have loosened or even eliminated their old regional exclusivity pacts. Take the example of distributor, Monterey Lighting Solutions which is able to compete with much larger businesses thanks to the flexibility of the cloud. A powerful eCommerce solution helps your business reach buyers wherever they are, without the need to add staff and overhead in satellite offices.

3. The depth and effectiveness of your product catalog is a competitive advantage. Building out your eCommerce experience doesn't mean simply putting up a data sheet and "add to cart" button for every SKU in stock. Modern eCommerce platforms give you the power to merchandise solutions personalized to your customers based on the buyer's profile, buying and viewing history, and even the search terms used to reach your site. This context-sensitive personalization gives companies a chance to demonstrate superior product knowledge and earn loyalty.

4. Organizations need reliable and real-time links between their eCommerce front-end and the equally powerful inventory management, order management, CRM, financials, marketing and reporting systems that power the back office. A stand-alone online store can't deliver thekind of insight to efficiently run and grow business.

5. A single eCommerce system that can facilitate supplier purchases and management as well as sell to end customers means businesses can operate efficiently, speeding delivery times and facilitating orders. As the lines between suppliers and customers blur, having one system to manage them all allows a company to react swiftly to changing business conditions.

We can help transform your business into a modern eCommerce contender. Register at this link for a webinar presentation and live demo of NetSuite SuiteCommerce, the world's only cloud commerce platform to provide a complete, customer-centric eCommerce solution. On Wednesday, February 20 from 10-11 a.m. PT (1-2 p.m. ET) we will have key capabilities on display, all of them closely coupled to the needs of the modern business.

–Ranga Bodla – Director, Industry Marketing, Wholesale Distribution and Manufacturing

What NetSuite’s Acquisition of Retail Anywhere Means for Retailers

In case you missed the news, NetSuite broke new ground today with our acquisition of Retail Anywhere , a leading provider of multi-channel retail management solutions. We’d partnered with Retail Anywhere for years, offering retailers a popular joint solution that spans brick-and-mortar points of sale(POS) to call centers to ecommerce over desktops, laptops, smartphones and tablets.

Joint NetSuite/Retail Anywhere customers we spoke with were high on the acquisition. Transition BMX, a multi-channel retailer of bicycle motocross bikes and gear in Edmonton, Canada has been using NetSuite in combination with Retail Anywhere to support track inventory and sales across its website and physical store.

“We were very excited to hear that NetSuite had acquired Retail Anywhere,” said Melissa Tomaszewski of Transition BMX.

“Our primary goal was to find a single solution in which POS, ecommerce and accounting would be all tied together and that could give us real-time inventory information,” Tomaszewski said. “With NetSuite, we always have consistency between online and in-store—from a management perspective, we have very good visibility into what’s going on in the business.”

Now with the acquisition, integration between the two technologies will tighten further. Based in Paso Robles, California, Retail Anywhere boasts 28 years of deep retail vertical experience, expertise in multi-channel retail operations and best practices in building rock-sold retail management solutions. The acquisition was a natural fit that expands the native capabilities of NetSuite SuiteCommerce, featuring a dynamic web storefront atop the core NetSuite ERP / CRM application.

It’s good news for retailers challenged to respond to the epic shift in the way that consumers browse, compare and purchase merchandise. We’ve seen strong demand among retailers for a single, integrated cloud solution that is purpose-built to support multiple touchpoints, drive revenues, open new sales channels and expand the business globally—meeting the demands of the multi-channel shopper.

Today’s leading retailers have their eyes on the multi-channel prize. Consumers expect a consistent, relevant experience across all touchpoints, from physical POS to tablet. For retailers, that means giving shoppers real-time inventory information for both online and in-store stock and achieving the 360-degree customer view that’s essential to offering personalized offers and service. Consumers expect retailers to recognize and reward them—and consumers will reward retailers in return.

For instance, the Deloitte 2012 Annual Holiday Survey found that U.S. consumers engaging with retailers across multiple touchpoints were likely to spend 78% more in the 2012 holiday season that those shopping in brick-and-mortar stores only ($1,585 vs. $888). Deloitte’s survey also found that consumers expect in-store associates at the POS to be knowledgeable about products (63%), facilitate a fast checkout (58%) and call out available discounts and offers (56%).

One highlight of the Retail Anywhere solution is its powerful, flexible POS that empowers in-store associates to deliver a superior customer experience. NetSuite Retail Anywhere offers extensive item search capabilities and real-time access to inventory information throughout a retail chain, helping drive sales while satisfying the customer. Built-in CRM functionality captures important customer information such as buying preference and purchase history, which enables future cross-sell and up-sell opportunities for multi-channel retailing.

Learn more at www.netsuite.com/retail.

-Andy Lloyd – GM of Commerce Products

Wholesale Distributor Retools for Growth with Next-Generation Ecommerce

Competing against the likes of Grainger and Fastenal, distributors with global economies of scale, is forcing mid-market whole sale distributors to adapt quickly.

Tacoma Screw Products, a family-owned company based in Tacoma, Wash., is aggressively
leveraging ecommerce to strengthen its competitive position, increase share of wallet among existing customers and attract new business. The company has recently gone live on the NetSuite SuiteCommerce platform in a wholesale retooling of its tacomascrew.com website.

Mid-market wholesale distributors like Tacoma Screw Products are under increasing pressure from larger competitors. They’re threatened with declining market share as manufacturers move into direct-to-consumer sales. B2B customers, meanwhile, increasingly expect a superior online purchasing experience.

Next-generation ecommerce is a key focus area for wholesale distributors to address these
challenges and drive revenue. In fact, ecommerce was ranked the #1 technology initiative to increase business efficiency and growth in a NetSuite survey of mid-market North American wholesale distributors earlier this year.

Fueling Growth with B2B Ecommerce

Implemented by NetSuite solution provider partner NXTurn, the SuiteCommerce platform is at the center of Tacoma Screw’s strategic plan to fuel growth beyond its core market of Washington, Oregon and Idaho. where it operates 15 brick-and-mortar stores. That growth will come by offering its 45,000 products­—fasteners, abrasives, lubricants, tools, paints, bearings, construction supplies and more—over the web.

“It’s providing the next level of customer service,” said Eric McGregor, Ecommerce and Operations Support Manager at Tacoma Screw. “With SuiteCommerce, our customers can browse and purchase online, have more visibility into products and orders and do business more quickly.”

The new ecommerce capabilities complement Tacoma Screw’s 50-person outside sales force and its seasoned call center staff to provide the best of both worlds—the personal, knowledgeable service for which Tacoma Screw is renowned and the ease and convenience of B2B ecommerce. That gives Tacoma Screw a competitive edge vs. larger rivals such as Fastenal and Grainger, McGregor said.

Besides delivering full self-service capabilities to customers, Tacoma Screw utilized NXTurn’s expertise and SuiteCommerce customizability to offer innovative features. For instance, the platform enables B2B customers to specify purchasing authority by individuals. If a lower-level employee without purchasing authority at his or her company orders a product, an automated workflow routes the pending transaction to an authorized buyer for approval.

In addition, a natural language search engine SuiteApp from NetSuite partner EasyAsk was
incorporated to improve search precision. Real-time inventory availability—for the website and each of Tacoma’s 15 stores—is displayed through integration with the company’s back-end ERP. In-store pickup has already proven popular among customers who want to order online and pick up merchandise a day or two later.

Besides SuiteCommerce, Tacoma Screw is also implementing NetSuite CRM to replace a problematic Salesforce.com system and is readying an iPhone app to give sales reps and managers new mobile visibility and sales tracking capabilities. Already, Tacoma Screw’s investment in ecommerce and NetSuite cloud technology is paying off—average time on site has doubled since SuiteCommerce went live, according to McGregor.

With B2B ecommerce experiencing strong growth across industries—set to reach $559 billion in the US by the end of 2013, according to an October 2012 Forrester report—Tacoma Screw is poised to take advantage and carry its rich tradition of superior customer service into the 21^st century.

–Ranga Bodla – Director, Industry Marketing, Wholesale Distribution and Manufacturing

Relying on the Cloud to Succeed in Multichannel Sales

If the packed ballroom at the Raffles Hotel in Singapore during NetSuite’s recent stopover to officially launch its new SuiteCommerce platform is any indication, it is safe to assume that Singapore is indeed a strategic market for cloud adoption. A recentwhite paper by Frost & Sullivan established that Singapore is behind only Australia and New Zealand in the adoption of the cloud, and is ahead of most other countries in the Asia Pacific region.

Furthermore, ecommerce has been an increasingly important factor in Singapore’s economic activity. The Frost & Sullivan white paper suggests that the use of Internet to sell is already more advanced in Singapore than in Australia. Accounting for an estimated 28% of all customer interactions in Singapore, the Internet has overtaken other channels such as the telephone and mail. And although it trails traditional brick-and-mortar stores and field sales forces, the Internet is the fastest growing channel for customer and business interactions.

But given the continuously changing technology landscape, ecommerce adoption is bound to run into some complexities. Case in point—the growing range of digital channels customers use to access the Internet and to interact with suppliers (smart TV, smartphones, tablets, machine-to-machine, etc.) requires businesses to deliver an optimized customer experience regardless of channel, maintain security across all channels, create seamless and real-time integration of all customer touchpoints and link channels to internal systems such as ERP and CRM.

Running ecommerce in such a multichannel world creates opportunities for businesses to reach a wider market, but also introduces significant challenges that need to be faced head-on. And this is where Singaporean organizations’ fondness of cloud computing plays a big role. According to Frost & Sullivan, using the cloud to host ecommerce systems offers key solutions to such challenges.

The cloud provides the agility organizations need to power whatever channels their businesses require, as well as access to these channels wherever business needs to happen. The cloud also provides high levels of security and reliability, while reducing capital and operational expenses.

With NetSuite’s successful launch of SuiteCommerce in Singapore, it surely is safe to say that Singaporean companies are seeing the importance of the cloud in effectively running their ecommerce efforts, and that NetSuite has the ideal platform for such an important task.

Read more about NetSuite SuiteCommerce and download the Frost & Sullivan white paper to find out more about how the cloud answers the challenges of running ecommerce in a multichannel world.

-Andy Lloyd – GM of Commerce Products

 

For UK Wholesale Distributors, a £16 Billion Opportunity in Direct Sales

High Street footfall continues to decline
thanks to the damp squib of an English summer and the Olympics did little to
console retailers. It seems that business leaders in the UK wholesale market
were right to think conservatively about their sales growth, with recent research by the Centre for
Economics and Business Research (Cebr) showing that over a third of wholesale distribution (WD) companies expect
growth to remain static or shrink over the next year.

However,
there is light on the horizon as the Cebr research predicts that the wholesale
distribution industry can add £16 billion to its turnover over the next year
through direct sales—a strong growth opportunity for those willing to think
outside of the box.

As WD companies inhabit a very different world from
that of retailers, business models and internal operations should be analysed
before thinking about adding a direct sales channel. Margins need to be
re-evaluated and price points set for direct-to-consumer offerings that
compensate for the additional administrative burden of managing direct sales.
The business model that allows a company to sell 1,000 units at £1 each doesn’t
allow it to profit from selling the same product for £1 each individually.

It’s also important to consider the effects of an
additional channel on operational efficiency. Nearly one-third (30%) of WD
companies admit they still place orders with suppliers manually or by telephone
ordering, and it seems many of these suppliers feel that ordering and information-sharing
could be done more efficiently. 

A
wholesale distribution
company NetSuite worked with, Justoffbase, previously
maintained stock, order information and accounting information in multiple
systems (an inventory spreadsheet, separate accounting system, paper files)
while managing orders from customers and to suppliers via email and phone/fax. By placing all of this into a single system and building
dynamic integration into its suppliers, Justoffbase enjoyed five-fold growth in
their business without the manual integration pains its staff experienced in
the past with legacy systems.

The goal should be to take a holistic, ‘one system’
view of all aspects of your wholesale and ecommerce operations—integrating automated order processing, inventory management, demand
planning, shipping, financial management and sales force automation
capabilities.

Once
you’ve got all of your internal ducks lined up, it’s time to develop a
professional online presence. The average WD company spends just over £100,000
on its ecommerce site, whilst the average retailer spends double this amount.
Amazingly, over a third (36%) of wholesalers don’t even have a website! If you
want to compete in a world dominated by Amazon and eBay, then it’s vital to get
this right.

There’s
no need to spend a fortune implementing a world-class website. The advent of
pre-built ‘Commerce as a Service’ systems make developing an ecommerce site
that integrates into your existing systems much more cost effective, preserving
your margins for your direct sales channel, while protecting your wholesale
revenues as well.

The
figures suggest that savvy WD business leaders should be exploring
multi-channel sales strategies in pursuit of growth. The challenge will be to
do this in a way that evolves their business model, streamlines and automates
their workflow and delivers profits alongside that growth.

Whilst
their retail counterparts have been leading the way in ecommerce and
m-commerce, the WD industry is starting to wake up to the potential of those
channels. With the potential boost of direct-to-consumer sales worth up to £16
billion, it’s urgent that the wholesale distribution industry evolves its
approach. 

Omnichannel Commerce: Are You Ready?

Welcome to the age of omnichannel commerce. Just a few years ago, shoppers who used multiple channels did so one at a time, usually for separate transactions. But today, they move fluidly across websites, smartphones, tablets, social media, call centers and brick-and-mortar stores, giving rise to the omnichannel phenomenon that is here to stay.

Case in point: 45% of U.S. online retail customers plan to shop by combining online, mobile and physical touchpoints in 2012, according to a recent survey by Experian’s PriceGrabber price comparison service. Forty-two percent said they would shop mostly online—more than three times the 12 percent who will shop mostly in brick-and-mortar stores.[1]

The rise of omnichannel shopping has clear implications for retailers, and for B2B, B2C merchants as well. Companies need to satisfy customer demand for a seamless, consistent experience regardless of the touchpoint used for product research, purchasing and service. That requirement for seamless consistency takes two forms.

First, the web storefront needs to adjust on the fly for optimal display to the customer’s device of choice, be it an iPhone, iPad, Android, typical laptop or other device to avoid poor rendering that prompts the shopper to click away. Secondly, a complete, real-time record of customers, orders and products needs to be available to both personnel and the company’s customer-facing systems to ensure accurate and timely response to inquiries across any touchpoint.

Responsive web design, the latest trend in website development, lets you deliver a website that adjusts dynamically to the user’s device, platform and screen resolution. So as your users switch from laptop to iPad to iPhone, your website will be automatically arranged for the resolution, image size and scripting abilities of each device.

The best thing about the concept of responsive design is that it reduces cost by eliminating the need for additional design and development for each new gadget that is out on the market, or to run separate website instances for each device. This method ensures you don’t miss traffic, regardless of what device your target audience is using. Importantly, responsive design and your underlying commerce system should be geared to future-proof customer interactions for touchpoints not yet envisioned—in other words, adapting flexibly as new touchpoints and interaction technologies emerge.

Responsive web design is a hallmark of NetSuite SuiteCommerce, which also addresses the second requirement of a single view. Operating directly on the core NetSuite business management application, SuiteCommerce consolidates all customer, order and product information into a single data set that spans touchpoints, empowering your personnel and systems to have real-time information at their fingertips whenever and wherever it’s needed.

The stakes are high. In our age of discriminating and connected consumers, missteps in the webstore experience or customer service can lead to not just customer dissatisfaction, but to an unflattering review on social media. Find out more about what NetSuite SuiteCommerce offers.

 

Andy Lloyd – GM of Commerce Products

[1] PriceGrabber, “2012 Shopping Outlook: Consumers plan a steady budget equal to 2011, according to PriceGrabber survey,” press release, February 28, 2012. 

Outdoor Retailers Thrive with the Cloud

These are incredibly exciting times in the outdoor retail industry. Innovative products, high consumer demand and an almost audible buzz on social media are driving growth in all sorts of outdoor markets, from bicycles to camping and mountaineering gear to sleek and richly functional GPS units and audio-visual equipment.

The industry’s exuberance will be on full display on August 1–5 in Salt Lake City, Utah, at the Outdoor Retailer Summer Market trade show, with hundreds of vendors showcasing their wares. NetSuite has more than 30 customers that are exhibiting at the show – impressive! NetSuite will be there as well, sponsoring the event for the fourth consecutive time and meeting with dozens of our OR customers. Why is a cloud ERP software vendor sponsoring an outdoor retail trade show?

It’s simple. Cloud business management is the ideal solution for up-and-coming outdoor brands, as well as established brands, as they compete in a fast-paced industry that puts a premium on business agility, efficiency and customer engagement. In fact, NetSuite is the business management platform of choice for more than 40 outdoor retailers exhibiting at the event.

For all the opportunities in outdoor retail, the challenges are sizable. Firms scramble to manage overseas suppliers, adapt to constant fluctuations in cost, margin, availability and demand, and expand market penetration through large retail stores, Amazon and eBay marketplaces, and direct-to-consumer website sales. At the same time, they’re committing precious resources to product development, brand awareness, customer service and a superior web storefront.

There’s no room in the success equation for running a large and unwieldy IT shop. Nor can outdoor retailers afford poor visibility into business dynamics or time-consuming manual labor in rekeying data across disparate systems for order management, CRM, financials and more. That’s why dozens of OR exhibitors run NetSuite, capitalizing on the agility that comes with a single, integrated cloud solution that covers ERP/financials, CRM, ecommerce, order to cash, inventory and more. Hydro Flask is just one example. A fairly young company, HydroFlask was recently featured on Good Morning America for their innovative products.

Since deploying NetSuite in September 2011, the Bend, Ore.-based maker of double-wall, vacuum-insulated stainless steel water bottles, has doubled its revenue. NetSuite is the “backbone” of Hydro Flask’s business, running everything from third-party logistics to the consumer ecommerce site. HydroFlask will be exhibiting at the show and will be at booth BR335.

“NetSuite is a big part of our growth strategy and helps us integrate with our partners and streamline our supply chain,” said Scott Allan, Hydro Flask CEO. “We’ve been able to reduce lead times across our supply chain and that makes a huge difference in our ability to grow.”

Ranga Bodla – Director, Industry Marketing, Wholesale Distribution and Manufacturing