Back-to-school operations: 4 keys to success

The back-to-school season is crucial for many businesses, especially retailers. It’s an ideal time to implement a robust strategy, draw in new customers, keep existing ones, and execute various commercial actions. To succeed during this pivotal period, starting off right is essential. How can you effectively prepare for the back-to-school rush? What are the secrets to offering your customers the best possible experience? And why is point-of-sale and store management software crucial for this operation? Here are the keys to mastering your back-to-school commercial operations.

1.Understanding Your Targets and Their Expectations

After the calm of August, retailers are gearing up for a busy back-to-school season. This period signals the restart of sports activities, with families flocking to stores to equip everyone with shoes, clothing, and sports gear.

Though Christmas drives the highest revenue for stores, the back-to-school season is crucial for sports equipment retailers. Many stores open at the end of August to take advantage of the influx and meet customers eager to invest in new gear for the upcoming school year. This period is ideal for new stores to showcase their offerings in the market area. Additionally, as activities resume, clubs and associations also replenish their stocks, leading to increased B2B activity.

These trends underscore the importance of deeply understanding your market to develop an effective commercial strategy. This involves setting clear commercial goals based on target demographics and leveraging collected customer data. By using management software with a CRM module, you can segment your audience to identify the needs and expectations of each group, allowing you to tailor your marketing strategy accordingly. Defining concrete actions that align with your objectives and targets, and are consistent with your store’s overall commercial and marketing policies, is crucial for effective customer retention.

2. Predicting the Future Based on Past Performance

Due to supply lead times, preparing for the back-to-school season starts the previous spring with stock management. This involves studying the sales and purchase histories from the past two years. Understanding past performance is an excellent basis for projecting future needs.

Key items must be well-stocked to meet demand, avoiding customer frustration and disappointment. There’s nothing worse than finding out that a featured item is out of stock on the second day of a sale! Analyzing by product family also helps refine your purchase budget, considering factors like sport types, weather, and trends.

Internally analyzed figures are as important as market studies, competitor analyses, or satisfaction surveys. Digitizing and tracking your commercial operations are vital for future success. Using your POS software to record purchases, receipts, purchase prices, and sales is essential. Key performance indicators (KPIs) such as exit rates, sales, revenue, margin rates, traffic, average basket, and conversion rates are crucial for closely monitoring your activity and making informed decisions.

3. Mobilizing an Available and Competent Team

Analyzing past attendance and detailed sales data by family and brand provides key insights: peak days, ideally down to the hour, and the items and areas in the store where to place your sales teams. Success in a back-to-school operation also depends on the service provided to customers during their visit, both in the aisles and fitting rooms.

It’s essential to mobilize a competent and motivated sales team. Your salespeople must have the necessary tools to perform their duties. Providing them with a mobile sales application on their smartphones allows them to stay in touch with customers, answer questions quickly, and navigate the aisles efficiently. This makes them a truly connected, mobile sales force, always ready to assist customers for a better in-store experience.

Additionally, optimize your aisles with effective merchandising techniques. For a back-to-school operation, present the offer prominently at the entrance, with decorations matching your communication. The items featured on your posters and other media should be instantly visible upon arrival. Also, highlight the promotional discounts in place. Setting up your operation properly in your store software in advance will be essential for a quick and smooth checkout process.

4. Communicating About Your Back-to-School Operations

Your CRM’s customer database is a valuable asset, enabling advance communication through email campaigns, SMS campaigns, and flyers. Better yet, personalize your marketing messages based on your customers’ purchase history!

Pairing a back-to-school operation with a contest can help you stand out from the competition and generate traffic. Additionally, social networks are excellent for sharing your message, and investing a few euros in sponsored campaigns in your market area can significantly boost your brand awareness.

Just opened your store? Your primary objective is to raise awareness of your brand, your offerings, and your location. Consider investing in multiple channels to maximize the impact of your communications.

However, the back-to-school operation is all about balancing the right stock, the right promotional items, and targeted communication to meet customer needs without false promises. Here again, your store software is an indispensable tool for proper planning, execution, and performance analysis.

A back-to-school commercial operation ultimately balances proper stock provisioning, effective promotions, communication channels, and the performance of your sales teams. Your store management software is essential for understanding your clientele, analyzing past commercial data, and ensuring future success.