Month: February 2018

FDI in retail

FDI is investment which occurs directly across national boundaries. It means when firm of one country buys a controlling investment in firm of another country or where a firm sets up its branch in another country. A firm that engages itself in FDI becomes a multinational enterprise (MNE).

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is important because it gives facility to make investments in long-term profits which are in long-term projects working in other countries. The investment is done directly by foreign investors which can be any company or a group of persons who are looking for power in excess of the foreign ventures. It is also a major source of finance where the country can obtain finance from other countries to develop itself. f.

Recently, the government announces that the retail sector is partially opened for FDI. It means the foreign investors who are interested in Indian markets can invest up to 51% in multi brand retail and 74% FDI in single-brand retail. The government decision divided experts on the problem and on its prospects. Some says the decision will decrease opportunities, and will result in wipe out of local stores. The optimists, on the other hand, have seen decision as a large range of opportunities for farm products and more opportunities for the unemployed.

FDI provide benefits to small farmers by working together to form producer companies which will directly work with corporations to get higher revenues, or small farmers must willingly move into the new jobs directly or indirectly created by FDI in sectors such as retail, food processing and supporting industries.

The FDI offers a foreign capital and funds. It also extends an economy of a particular country where the investment is being made. It permits the move of highly developed technologies from developed countries to developing countries which helps in creating fresh jobs in a particular country and in turn the salary of the employee increases. The country where investment is done increases its human capital resource. It also brings new skills in a country & possibility of innovative research increases which helps in the growth of the country.

Now, global retailers are willing to sell their products by setting their own branch or franchises in another country which will again attract foreign capital along with better quality products in a large variety and advance services for the consumers and even consumers will get access of some global brands. This will in turn increase competition in the country and expands manufacturing units. To stand in a market, these global retailers have to lower their prices of foreign goods which need them to set up their manufacturing units locally or to handover the production assignments to domestic manufacturers on their specifications which brings a large number of employments in the country.

All this opportunities make, the Indian retail market a real happening place in the days ahead while at the same time it will be offering immense business opportunities and growth to the domestic entrepreneurs. In result, the Indian market will become the part of the global market.

How To Design Your Online Retail Store For Maximum Profits

How your online store design could determine the number of visitors who ultimately buy from you.

You may think that merchandising an online store is pointless right? I mean, its a website, upload some photos and add some description and you’re all set. Well, not exactly. How your online store design will determine the number of visitors who ultimately buy from you.

Here I’ll go over some proven steps to turning your virtual business into a selling machine.

Merchandising a brick and mortar retail store is key to pulling in passerby’ s as well as getting them to buy. But how do you “merchandise” an online store? The answer is simple. The same way you would set up your physical store. When an online visitor reaches your website the first thing they’ll notice is your home page (think of this as a front door of a brick and mortar). First impressions mean everything. We’ve all been taken back by a store (online or off) that is poorly merchandised and cluttered from one end to the other. Too many racks, merchandise on the floor and the whole place looking like it was hit by a tornado. Your online store could also be poorly merchandised and turning away potential sales.

Here are some key steps to cleaning up your retail internet business to help boost revenue and return customers.

1. Remove all the clutter from all web pages that only take away from your own products. This could be from having too many links (and broken links), too many affiliate ads and banners and finally – remove the multitude of photos that have nothing to do with your site.

2.If you are running a business- look like one. Don’t use backgrounds that are only really meant for social site profiles. The blinking stars background is not how you want to represent your business. Use a solid color background along with your business logo on top. Of course you’ll want to make it look great – but lets keep the social site backgrounds where they belong – on social sites.

3.Make sure your price points are clearly visible and are reflected correctly through-out your entire site.

4.Never use your home page as your entire “About Us” platform if you are a retailer. There should be another page dedicated for this. Simply inserting a paragraph about how you started the business and using the largest font possible on then placing that on your main page will only turn potential buyers away.

5.Use flash effects/animation sparingly – there is no need to use every flash animation you have come across and placing it all over your website. Its distracting – you want your potential customers to focus on your merchandise.

6.Organize your site and make it easy to navigate. Make it easy for visitors to find your contact information, shipping/returns and privacy policies, email newsletter sign-up and so forth.

7. View your store from a customers perspective, and step into their shoes and shop your own store.

8. Offer discounts in your virtual store, and make sure they are visible to the shopper.

9. Customers make an additional purchase when they are inspire to buy cross merchandise items.

10. Be seasonal and integrate current holidays such as Valentine graphics to sell merchandise for February 14th, etc.

By following these easy to apply merchandising tips to your virtual retail business, you will start converting more visits into actual sales.

Why Buy Shop Inn Retail Pos Software

SHOP INN is specifically designed to provide A-Z solutions to supermarket, groceries, apparel, footwear and other retail businesses of all size and scale. This POS System works wonders with retail businesses as it serves the purpose of a cash register which efficiently records all sales items with their bar codes.

A hassle-free maintenance of the Point-of-Sale is crucial to success of every small or large retail business. Shop Inn is ready-to-run software which is specifically programmed considering the growing needs of the retail trade. We aim to build strong Customer Relationship Management and hence our role doesnt end after selling you the product. We also customize our Retail software the way you handle your sales, purchases, taxes, inventory etc.

Inventory control is the most challenging aspect of any retail business. Inappropriate stock management could be a major hindrance in the path of your success. SHOP INN Retail Software is a program which automatically checks your stock levels and debits the amount as and when any stock is sold.

The whole POS System is integrated in this Retail Software to stimulate a smooth functioning of purchases and sales in order to increase your productivity with optimum utilization of business resources.

SHOP INN Retail Software claims itself to be one of the best POS available in the market as handles every single transaction at the front and the backend. At the Cash Counter the cashier only needs to scan the barcode and generate invoice to the customers.

SHOP INN aims is to channelize your operating costs and resources into the right direction to maximize your productivity and profits. The POS System of our software is easy and hassle-free. Unlike other it doesnt involve complex setups, high prices or lengthy training requirements for its POS System to operate. Rather, we claim SHOP INN Retail Software to be the easiest and most affordable available in the marketplace.

Salient features of SHOP INN –

Fully tried and tested POS System to minimize the errors; complete data security and data accuracy

Both Manufacturer and System Generated Barcode facility

Both Keypad and Touchscreen interface

Inventory Control and tracking various inventory movements from warehouse to store

Checks high volume inventory sales which is very difficult to handle

Point-of-Sale, Inventory Management, Payroll three main check points

Complete backup of various financial transactions and maintenance of bookkeeping records

CRM in the POS System for managing discounts, promotions, coupons etc.

Accurate stock audit, VAT, TDS and other Sales Tax records

Special Retail Software for shopping malls and supermarket environment

Ready-to-use Retail Software for Food-court, Jewelry, Apparel, Footwear businesses

Integrated POS that looks after your sales, purchases, payrolls and all other managerial and accounting activities so that you can simply focus on profit earning an decision-making processes

Finally, SHOP INN Retail Software makes sure you are always updated with the latest Account Receivables/Accounts Payables and Trail Balance

The Secret to Happy Retail Employees

Money Is No Longer Buying Happiness
Let’s face it. Today, building an effective team of retail employees is more challenging than ever. We all agree that the key to an effective retail operation are high performing and productive employees. Furthermore, in spite of a great location or a superior line of goods or services the behavior of every single team member well have a dramatic affect on the overall success of the operation. Every time the employee steps out onto the sales floor and interacts with a customer a change in brand equity is realized. In other words, the behavior and interaction of your employee with your customer will have an ongoing affect on brand identity and brand equity within the competitive marketplace.

Understandably great customer experiences create gains in brand equity while disappointing performance by your team members will create a deterioration in your brand equity. Exactly what is the secret to ensuring that each and every one-on-one customer experience in your store consistently increases brand equity in the eyes of the community? In other words, what makes a team member consistently delight and dazzle your customers so that long-term customer relationships with ongoing repeat business are realized?

The secret is a team of engaged employees. Why is employee engagement so critical in today’s retail landscape? In earlier times employee expectations were quite simple. Employees were happy to come to work and do as they’re told, collect their paycheck and go home at the end of the day. In contrast todays employee is far more sophisticated, educated and connected than ever before. Not surprisingly, the Internet has been instrumental in increasing knowledge levels and subsequently employee aspirations and expectations in the workplace. Unlike earlier times, countless surveys have demonstrated that compensation itself is not enough to satisfy employees over the long-term. In fact, in a ranking of 10 critical elements in one recent survey compensation for employees was rated 6/10!

Today, a retail employee is not just motivated by compensation. Above everything else there is a need to belong to the organization and have a sense of ownership. Ownership can be realized through employee empowerment. Trusting your employees and empowering them to make decisions close to the customer creates personal long-term relationships between your team members and your clients. Empowering your employees creates a climate of ownership and belonging for your team members and generates a great level of loyalty to the company.

Building a team of engaged employees that generates powerful long-term customer relationships takes a long time to build. However once realized the organization will enjoy greater productivity per individual employee, higher morale, lower internal and external theft rates and most importantly, lower employee turnover.

How does an organization that has traditionally operated through a regimented model began to create a more productive and loyal team of engaged employees?

1] Make sure that all employees are kept informed of new and relevant developments in the company. They should hear them first and they should hear them from their organization directly. There is nothing more demoralizing than hearing about new organizational developments last or hearing them from an outside source that was aware of the development before your team was.

2] Give staff increased responsibility and trust. Expand their decision-making powers even if you impose some limitations. Empower staff to make decisions close to the customer and give them the necessary support and Training to enable them to make good win-win decisions for all stakeholders.

3] Encourage staff to make decisions close to the customer and even when on occasion a bad decision is made, offer supportive training and refrain from chastising or punishing the employee.

4] Ensure that a structured process is in place to recognize exemplary customer service on a regular basis. Recognize and reward engaged employees who go above and beyond the call of duty to create a memorable customer experience. To keep momentum going, this strategy is most effective during weekly meetings where peer recognition is realized and small rewards are given to stellar employees. Rewards do not need to be extravagant. The recognition and appreciation is the key to effective leadership of engaged employees.

5] Create a formal and informal system that enables engaged employees to voice their opinions and help steer the future direction of the organization. Empower them to voice their opinions on a regular basis and contribute their ideas in a positive way that will make the company more effective and more efficient. Successfully implemented ideas also merit some form of recognition and a reward.

Building a team of engaged employees is the key to future survival and prosperity in every retail organization. Although this can be complex and protracted in time, the key to success is a change in leadership style that supports a greater level of empowerment, involvement and ownership of today’s retail employee. Start now and create the culture that generates higher morale, higher productivity and lower turnover. Rise above the competition in small steps today, and soar to being number one tomorrow!

For more information visit www.retailinstitute.ca

retail, employees, morale, productivity, engagement, empowerment,customer service, customer relationships

Security of ecommerce for Microsoft Retail Management System

Security is one of the basic aspects of an ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS. You may be a reputed seller with a big retail store running a retail management system like the one provided with capabilities with ecommerce for Dynamics RMS; there is no guarantee that customers will opt for your web store with ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS even though they have opportunities to purchase products at a discount. To ensure that online shoppers prefer your store with ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS, you will need to provide them with a secured environment to shop freely.

If you are using Microsoft Dynamics RMS to run your physical store, setting up a secured online store with provisions to do ecommerce for Microsoft Retail Management System will be a cakewalk for you. A reputed ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS such as 24Seven Cart can help you to set the online store and connect it with the entire system for ecommerce for Dynamics RMS using a web integrator. In this way, no mission-critical information will be compromised as you are always backed by a complete secured platform supported for ecommerce for Dynamics RMS.

Besides the overall security of your data synchronization, ecommerce for Microsoft Retail Management System provider will also ensure that the payment processing mechanism is also 100% safe. Unlike a free shopping cart, owning a proprietary-based ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS like 24SevenCart can give you the advantage of utilizing additional resources to reinforce the security. Besides complying with the industry-standards like PCI compliance system and data encryption features, the ecommerce for Microsoft Retail Management System provided through 24SevenCart can also customize the checkout region to put extra-layers of security.

Your retail management system, especially the one with ecommerce for Dynamics RMS is the nerve center of your business. When you connect it to the ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS, your resources will also be available online. With a secured setup to do ecommerce for Dynamics RMS, you can easily maneuver your resources to bring in more customers to your online store. By enabling the security features provided through the environment for ecommerce for Microsoft Retail Management System and using a payment gateway of repute, you will succeed to gain customers’ trust and gain frequent visitors to ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS.

An ecommerce for Microsoft Retail Management System like 24SevenCart can also ensure that your ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS is not affected by frauds or hackers. The service provider of ecommerce for Dynamics RMS can provide you with options to block IP addresses and prevent fraudulent activities. Usually, the firewall systems and security-layers implemented in these servers are of highest standards and what you will always get is an error-free and safe system in the form of your ecommerce cart for Microsoft RMS.