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South African digital signage firm launches retail analytics division

Moving Tactics Retail Analytics is a division focused on the gathering of data from brick-and-mortar retail environments through the use of a variety of technological and digital analytical tools to determine patterns and trends that can be used to make informed business decisions for retailers.

March 30, 2015

South African digital signage solutions company Moving Tactics announced the recent launch of Moving Tactics Retail Analytics, a division focused on the gathering of data from brick-and-mortar retail environments through the use of a variety of technological and digital analytical tools to determine patterns and trends that can be used to make informed business decisions to increase footfall and basket size for retailers.

Chris Day, managing director of Moving Tactics, said, "Retail Analytics in South Africa has until now consisted mainly of labor-intensive work with people physically counting and surveying customers to gather information. Not only is this costly, but it's also a 'dipstick approach' and doesn't provide the bigger picture analysis that is so crucial in turning data into revenue. Internationally, where retail analytics technology is already implemented in a number of environments, their main industry priorities have been perfecting the technology whilst finding the balance between the gathering of valuable and usable data, and consumer privacy."

A variety of technological and digital analytical tools are used to gather and analyze the information, the company said, with specific data gathering capabilities across different metrics that also create synergies when used together or with other data inputs:

• MT.Ask uses the incentive of free Wi-Fi to get customers to answer two survey questions to provide qualitative data on customer satisfaction, customer insights, database granularity and direct marketing;
• MT.Listen uses strategically placed sensors to gain insight to customers' movements and behavior in a location by using Wi-Fi technology;
• MT.Track, an automated audience measurement service, uses cameras to pick up people within its line of sight to measure viewers, traffic, and duration of stay, and uses algorithms to determine demographics such as age class and gender; and
• MT.Queue buttons allow cashiers to indicate to the next waiting customer that their till is available and gathers insights into transaction processing time, teller activity, total customers and busiest times.

"By leveraging analytics tools and models, retailers can boost customer loyalty by creating a personalized shopping experience that matches an offer to a customer's need," Matthews said. "However, customer privacy is important to us so the tools that are used don't gather information or details on individual customers and therefore they are compliant with consumer privacy laws in South Africa."

In addition, through the use of retail analytics tools, retailers are able to increase store efficiencies, introduce in-store added-value initiatives, and provide consistent and reliable service, thereby simplifying and improving the customer shopping experience, the company said.