I was on sales call in Sun River Oregon, and a client at a Ski Shop (un-named) said to me; "but why would I need automation?"
Unfortunately, that was his excuse to leave the discussion and send me on my way. I sat back after and thought about this questions. I was annoyed and confused that somebody working with customers would not have a better understanding of business.
The ski industry has traditionally been behind the technology curve, depending on paper collection of customer data. By adding an automated Kiosk we eliminate errors caused by bad handwriting, employee reading errors, etc. But that is just the start of the process.
By using an automated system, we are capturing customer data: age, skier type, state, zip code, mobile phone #, email address, etc. If all we captured was this data, you would be able to have a deeper understanding of your customer, have the ability to market to them via email, newsletter or text messaging. You can't see the value yet?
If we are using the full system capabilities, we are capturing the boot size, ski type, ski size snowboard type, snowboard size, etc. We can look at each day of the season, and see what your ski and snowboard usages are per day, did you run out of stock on any particular size (help you in your buying goals for the next year). Do you have an abundance of size 7.5 women's' ski boots, why not send a targeted newsletter to all women that wore a size 7.5 boot?
Why do you need automation?
Unfortunately, that was his excuse to leave the discussion and send me on my way. I sat back after and thought about this questions. I was annoyed and confused that somebody working with customers would not have a better understanding of business.
The ski industry has traditionally been behind the technology curve, depending on paper collection of customer data. By adding an automated Kiosk we eliminate errors caused by bad handwriting, employee reading errors, etc. But that is just the start of the process.
By using an automated system, we are capturing customer data: age, skier type, state, zip code, mobile phone #, email address, etc. If all we captured was this data, you would be able to have a deeper understanding of your customer, have the ability to market to them via email, newsletter or text messaging. You can't see the value yet?
If we are using the full system capabilities, we are capturing the boot size, ski type, ski size snowboard type, snowboard size, etc. We can look at each day of the season, and see what your ski and snowboard usages are per day, did you run out of stock on any particular size (help you in your buying goals for the next year). Do you have an abundance of size 7.5 women's' ski boots, why not send a targeted newsletter to all women that wore a size 7.5 boot?
Why do you need automation?
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