Leveraging retail data for brand growth

You’ve probably heard the phrase “The customer is always right” before even starting your entrepreneurial journey, right? However, that phrase is more than attitude, as it requires a keen understanding of how to adjust and improve your customer experience overall.

The ability to leverage retail data – everything from how your products are performing or the interests of your target audience – will be a big factor on how you can bring your brand to success and deliver on the age-old quote of doing right by the customer. Learn more about how Co-Founder and CEO of Phreshly, Paul Owusu, leverages retail data to help bring out the best of his brand and deliver to the customer in the process.

Different types of data, explained

Data for your brand can be measured differently depending on the needs of your brands improvement.  Here is a short list of data points to consider when beginning your retail data search:

• SKU performance
• Competitor performance
• Customer behavior and buying habits
• Inventory levels

Where to Access Data

There are many tools and platforms to utilize when wanting to access retail data. Some tools include:

• WeStock is a platform that you can use to create landing pages for different channels to hear where your customers would like to see you.
• Brij allows you to track revenue across different channels.
• Recart helps you increase conversions.

Paul and his team utilize IRI, which is a paid data resource, in addition to combine all retail and Direct to Consumer (DTC) data. Combining and referencing this data helps his team better analyze how each of their SKUs are performing amongst various channels and how to better market their product offerings.

Why leveraging data is so important

Leveraging existing data can help your brand identify gaps in your product offerings and develop new SKUs that meet customer needs. Additionally, this data can help you effectively forecast and track your performance across all your selling channels. Below are four reasons Paul highlights why it is important for founders to regularly access and review retail data for your brand:

• Understand how your brand is performing against competitors in your category to see what gaps you can potentially fill.
• Analyze the number of sales per SKU you sell per month to better understand your month-over-month performance.
• Learn what is and isn’t working from a merchandising perspective.
• Finally, utilizing retail data can help you successfully forecast to meet upcoming demand.

What’s next?

Now that you have all this data information around your brand, here are some questions to ask yourself as you continue to assess and track your data as you think about growth:

• What does your product lifecycle look like and where does it convert?
• What is the current spend per SKU per customer?
• Does it make sense to go into retail or stay within the DTC market?

Finally, as you think about using data differently and creating new routines to support metric analysis, here’s top three things to keep in mind:

• Keep it simple. Don’t overthink or overextend your brand. Data is key to understanding how you scale your company, where and when to scale.
• Retail data can add precision and scale existing strategies while helping you uncover innovative ways to reach new customers.
• Lean heavily into your community of existing customers for feedback, and to get a keen understanding how the purchase of your products make them feel – a pivotal step as you think about future growth and possible brand expansion.

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