Customer Counting Device

The Loss Prevention ROI Calculator Shows You The One Investment That Ultimately Costs You Nothing

 

 
Can Loss Prevention Be Free? – 3                                                                                WC Blog 815
Loss Prevention ROI Calculator – 3
The Loss Prevention ROI Calculator Shows You The One Investment That Ultimately Costs You Nothing
    Use a Loss Prevention ROI Calculator and you get to see what a Sensormatic Sensor will save you in reduced shrinkage. Can I tell you what a cool concept that is? When do you have an opportunity to do this with any other purchase you make for your store? Come to think of it I can’t think of too many times this can apply to any purchase. If I decide to purchase a new suit for a job interview I can’t pull out a suit calculator and tap in a few numbers and say this is going to increase my chances of getting that job by sixty percent. Now I will say if you are car shopping the dealer information will give you an estimated gallons per mile the car will get in the city and on the highway. It isn’t a true help in the sense that it won’t tell you what you will save over your current vehicle. You may drive more than you currently do and you spending may increase. Fuel prices may go up and you will spend more for a gallon of gas than you are spending today.
     Thinking about purchases you make for your business what other system or store fixture will you buy that will pay for itself over time. I would never say can a point of sale system be free? or can a new display fixture be free? No, I would not ask these questions but I would ask can Loss Prevention be free? A point of sale system may improve speed at the register or it may offer more functionality and those may help improve customer satisfaction but they don’t pay for your system over time. A new focal point fixture for a display may help to draw in some customers or drive some sales depending on what that is featured on that fixture but how do you measure that??? I have a clue that might surprise you…you actually can measure the impact of a new display, especially if it is set up as a window display for customers to see from outside your store. That display might pay for itself IF you can measure the impact it is having. You measure that impact with guess what…A SENSORMATIC LOSS PREVENTION SYSTEM! Go ahead, call me crazy but I am about to knock your socks off here. A Loss Prevention System can do more than prevent shoplifting and reduce shrinkage. Purchase a Sensormatic System and equip it with the people counting device. You start tracking the number of people entering and leaving your store. Set up you brand new window display fixture. Now look at your foot traffic data. Is there an improvement in the number of customers visiting? You wouldn’t have known that just from sales receipts, you can than your Sensormatic system for the confirmation. That is not the primary way to answer the question, “Can Loss Prevention be free?” but it does help pay for a system in a sense.
     Your Loss Prevention ROI Calculator is going to demonstrate how the installation of a Sensormatic System is going to pay for itself through shortage reduction. Type in your sales data, how much you want to spend on a system, submit and you get a result that shows how much you will save in reduced shortage and an estimate of how long it will take for your brand new Sensormatic System to pay for itself. Can Loss Prevention be free? You better believe it can be, I have seen more recovered merchandise from an electronic surveillance system than I can recall. 
     Remember that the Loss Prevention ROI Calculator is going to only show you how much it is going to save you in terms of money saved due to decreased theft. It is now going to show you that your instocks will improve and your customers will have more purchase options as a result. It isn’t going to tell you how much your customer traffic will increase with the new displays but the Sensormatic customer counting device will. It also won’t measure the increased safety that comes with a Sensormatic system. As the shoplifting decreases so does the other crime that often accompanies it. You can’t measure EVERY benefit a Loss Prevention System will provide but it will pay for itself and the rest is icing on the cake.
The Loss Prevention ROI Calculator is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
     

Use a Loss Prevention ROI Calculator and you get to see what a Sensormatic Sensor will save you in reduced shrinkage. Can I tell you what a cool concept that is? When do you have an opportunity to do this with any other purchase you make for your store? Come to think of it I can’t think of too many times this can apply to any purchase. If I decide to purchase a new suit for a job interview I can’t pull out a suit calculator and tap in a few numbers and say this is going to increase my chances of getting that job by sixty percent. Now I will say if you are car shopping the dealer information will give you an estimated gallons per mile the car will get in the city and on the highway. It isn’t a true help in the sense that it won’t tell you what you will save over your current vehicle. You may drive more than you currently do and you spending may increase. Fuel prices may go up and you will spend more for a gallon of gas than you are spending today.

Thinking about purchases you make for your business what other system or store fixture will you buy that will pay for itself over time. I would never say can a point of sale system be free? or can a new display fixture be free? No, I would not ask these questions but I would ask can Loss Prevention be free? A point of sale system may improve speed at the register or it may offer more functionality and those may help improve customer satisfaction but they don’t pay for your system over time. A new focal point fixture for a display may help to draw in some customers or drive some sales depending on what that is featured on that fixture but how do you measure that??? I have a clue that might surprise you…you actually can measure the impact of a new display, especially if it is set up as a window display for customers to see from outside your store. That display might pay for itself IF you can measure the impact it is having. You measure that impact with guess what…A SENSORMATIC LOSS PREVENTION SYSTEM! Go ahead, call me crazy but I am about to knock your socks off here. A Loss Prevention System can do more than prevent shoplifting and reduce shrinkage. Purchase a Sensormatic System and equip it with the people counting device. You start tracking the number of people entering and leaving your store. Set up you brand new window display fixture. Now look at your foot traffic data. Is there an improvement in the number of customers visiting? You wouldn’t have known that just from sales receipts, you can than your Sensormatic system for the confirmation. That is not the primary way to answer the question, “Can Loss Prevention be free?” but it does help pay for a system in a sense.

Your Loss Prevention ROI Calculator is going to demonstrate how the installation of a Sensormatic System is going to pay for itself through shortage reduction. Type in your sales data, how much you want to spend on a system, submit and you get a result that shows how much you will save in reduced shortage and an estimate of how long it will take for your brand new Sensormatic System to pay for itself. Can Loss Prevention be free? You better believe it can be, I have seen more recovered merchandise from an electronic surveillance system than I can recall. 

Remember that the Loss Prevention ROI Calculator is going to only show you how much it is going to save you in terms of money saved due to decreased theft. It is now going to show you that your instocks will improve and your customers will have more purchase options as a result. It isn’t going to tell you how much your customer traffic will increase with the new displays but the Sensormatic customer counting device will. It also won’t measure the increased safety that comes with a Sensormatic system. As the shoplifting decreases so does the other crime that often accompanies it. You can’t measure EVERY benefit a Loss Prevention System will provide but it will pay for itself and the rest is icing on the cake.

 

The Loss Prevention ROI Calculator is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
     

 

 

in General

Electronic Article Surveillance Impacts More Than Theft

I remember my time as a Loss Prevention Manager when I had to go through log sheets to decipher electronic article surveillance alarm events. What a headache that could be. Employees were supposed to write down dates, times and what set off the alarm towers. For example, if a security label had not been properly deactivated and the alarm sounded the responding employee was supposed to write that information down for Loss Prevention. My job was to see if there was a training problem, an equipment failure a label issue or perhaps even a recovery from a shoplifter. We all know that despite our best efforts rarely does anything happen exactly the way we want it to happen. In this case alarm testing wasn’t always recorded, alarm activity was not always noted or alarms were not notated properly. It was difficult to get actionable data from the information collected when it was inconsistent. When I would make a fuss about it to the front end manager he/she would address the situation. The employees would get back on the program briefly and the logs would be useful again for a period of time. It was an important part of my job to know when Sensormatic labels were setting off the alarm towers and when. When done correctly I could review corresponding video to see who caused the alarm and if the responder thoroughly tried to resolve the problem. This was useful for training and efforts to stop shoplifting.

 

 A lot has improved in Retail Loss Prevention since my days as a Loss Prevention Manager. Electronic article surveillance towers have become more advanced, Sensormatic labels have gotten much smaller and hard tags and wraps are continually evolving. In fact the use of Sesnormatic systems has expanded far beyond the reduction of theft they now are used to drive sales. Adding a customer counting device to a pedestal can enable a retail owner to understand shopper traffic patterns. That knowledge can be used to adjust work schedules to better serve clients. It can also help determine if a new product or display is having an impact on sales. Some pedestals have the ability to have signage added to them. Advertising as we all know can directly drive customer shopping habits and it is free marketing space. With all of these advances the necessity of paper record keeping has also become obsolete. Logs can still be used but they don’t have to be, electronic article surveillance has come that far in recent years.

 

 Now retail owners have the ability to use Sensormatic’s Shrink Management as a Service cloud based electronic article surveillance management system. This system enables retail managers to see reporting that includes retail traffic, electronic article surveillance alarm activity by date, and the alarm rate. Other information that can aid in controlling shortage is metal foil detection, jammer detections and potential dollar losses due to theft. By reviewing this data you can see the potential theft activity that is taking place and take steps to prevent it. Think about it if alarms are trending to be more frequent on a given day of the week according to reporting managers can position a “greeter” at the front doors. This person can be right at the doors ready to respond to pedestal alarms. The presence of this employee will also be a deterrent to someone who enters with the intention of trying to shoplift and changes their mind when they see a greeter. Couple the reports with a Sensormatic Synergy camera and owners/managers can capture pictures and video of alarm events and the suspects causing those alarms. And one other thing to keep in mind about your greeter they may be a deterrent to theft but the right person can also be an ambassador for your store. They can provide directions, store information and greet customers which gives a personal touch shoppers desire.

 

 Sensormatic labels and systems have made incredible progress over the years. The effectiveness in deterring and preventing crime has improved as the equipment has evolved. The multi-functionality of these systems has made them even more attractive to shop owners. Managing the systems through cloud based services makes sure reporting is accurate and easy to access. When you think about it there is nothing to lose by investing in a Sensormatic system so my question to you is, why aren’t you picking up your phone to get your own system now?

 

Get more information on electronic article surveillance, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 today.

 

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People Counting Systems Help You Hear What Your Sales Aren’t Telling You Part 1

For stores with no customers in it people counting systems would appear to be a waste of money. Why bother counting what isn’t walking in your store. Maybe you should be asking why aren’t people walking in your store. If patron counts are so low that you don’t need a device to keep track of them you need to find out what is keeping them out. There may be factors you haven’t even considered that are influencing customers and deterring them from coming in. They may even be telling you and you are not listening to them properly.

 

 For example, I work for a store that has a decent amount of foot traffic. The store even uses a customer counting device to measure customer conversion rates. The one question I often hear from shoppers walking in at night is, “Is the store open?” That is a question but it is also a clue, the store looks closed from the outside of the building. Why does it look closed? Because the front windows are heavily tinted to cut down on the sunlight glaring into the building. The sun shines directly in and can be overpowering and in the summer it heats the building. The tint cuts down some of that impact. The down side of it is that the store appears dark if one is looking at it from the outside. If you are a customer you might not bother trying to come in and visit. It leads me to wonder how many potential shoppers do we lose simply because of this one little issue. The solution in my opinion would be to have a bright neon light on the window that says, OPEN.

 

 Supposing company management listened to my suggestion and placed that OPEN sign so it could be viewed by customers, how would you know if it was working as you intended? That is where people counting systems are useful. Install it on your Sensormatic electronic article surveillance towers and track your foot traffic for several weeks. Afterwards put out your sign and monitor your counts at that point you will see if your solution works. If the results don’t bear out your suspicions then you use the customer counting device for other measurements. It doesn’t lose its usefulness to your store.

 

 Another purpose for the people counting systems installed in stores is the data they can provide to make it easier to see when the peak hours for a store are.  I can hear the chuckles now. “Foolish writer, I can look at my sales slips and final register read and see when my peak hours are, I don’t need to spend money on a customer counting device.” That, my friend, is not totally accurate. Yes, you can see when peak purchase hours are taking place BUT you cannot tell if that was when your peak customer foot traffic took place. How many people walked into your store and left without ever making a purchase? What are those customers telling you? “But wait Mr. Article Writer, they can’t tell me anything because they did not talk to my cashiers or make a purchase!” AHA! I have you again, they did tell you something. Those customers told you that something (or a lack of something) kept them from making a purchase in your establishment. It is up to you to figure out what it was that made them choose to leave empty-handed. Did anyone greet them when they walked in? Was assistance offered if they were looking for something specific? Did they have to wait for a salesfloor associate to open a showcase or fitting room and no one came to help? Is it possible your customers were in line at a cash register and got fed up with waiting to check out so they left? Was the appearance of the store attractive or did it look cluttered? ALL of these are thinks that can influence the decisions customers make while they are in your store. Your sales receipts won’t show this but a customer counting device can aid in seeing what isn’t happening…increased sales.

 

  “Okay Mr. Smarty-Pants, suppose I install one of these counters, then what do I do with the information, all I know is people are leaving without buying.” Boy, you really should not be calling me all of these names! However, I am not going to take offense I am going to offer some suggestions to help you but you are going to have to read those helpful tips in Part 2. But, please when you do come don’t call me so many names I’m really sensitive you know.

 

People counting systems are important and we can help you with them. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.

 

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