Building ABetter WorkforceMobile Solutions Enhance Store Execution

And Uncover Better Store Data

Building A Better Workforce • 1

Mobile has changed everyday life for most consumers.

Now it is having a similar impact at work, driving

new opportunities for retailers and consumer brands

to create a more agile workforce, use labor more

efficiently and gain new insights into store operations.

Embracing mobile can change the game for retailers

and consumer goods companies in two key areas:

• Assigning and communicating dynamically with

front-line employees to drive efficiency, immediacy

and employee satisfaction.

• Using the internal workforce and/or crowdsourcing

to gain visibility into store environments and

individual brands.

The most exciting thing about mobile is its ability to

connect with frontline workers in a way that was not

possible before. That one-to-one capability means

retailers and brands gain unprecedented insight into

store activities and conditions and, most importantly,

the ability to direct actions to immediately resolve

issues and drive incremental sales.

“The most exciting thing

about mobile is its ability

to connect with frontline

workers in a way that was

not possible before.”

— David Hale, CEO, Gigwalk

Introduction

Using Mobile To Connect To The Workforce In New Ways

Retail stores are big, open, brightly lit places bustling

with activity. But from the perspective of a retail

headquarters or the offices of a consumer products

company, a store is a big black box. HQ has plenty

of information about what goes into stores: inventory,

promotional displays, labor schedules, planograms and

so on, as well as the data that comes out. However,

these executives have no visibility into what is actually

happening; they can only use data to infer what has

happened, creating a picture that is crude at best.

To gain this insight, retailers and consumer products

companies need to ask questions such as the following:

Was the display correctly set up and stocked in

time for the promotion?

Did associates stock the shelves neatly and

accurately?

Do store associates demonstrate effective product

knowledge?

Are products priced competitively?

Right now, the answer to many of those questions is

“no.” Billions are lost each year due to planogram non-

compliance, with estimates that up to 50% of POS,

display, demo and planogram promotions do not follow

guidelines. Those programs could deliver two to as

much as five times the sales lift if executed correctly.

Mobile devices in the store can change all that.

Building A Better Workforce • 2

Building A Better Workforce • 3

It has been decades since personal computers

and networks revolutionized white collar jobs with

fingertip access to information. But until now, most

store-level jobs — both retail associates and the field

salesforces of consumer products companies — have

been largely unchanged.

In this new age of mobile technology, retailers and

consumer goods companies can take advantage

of tablets and smartphones that enable a mobile

workforce to gain much more granular visibility into

store activities. They can tap staff already in the

store to capture much-needed data, and manage

these employees more efficiently than was possible

before. With 75% of U.S. mobile users now carrying

smartphones — and an even higher concentration

among millennials, according to comScore’s 2015

U.S. Digital Future In Focus — mobile devices

are becoming ubiquitous, and with them, new

opportunities arise.

“Retail Winners are more optimistic about the

marketing and operational benefits that mobile can

create for them,” according to the 2014 Retail Systems

Research (RSR) report Mobile In Retail: Reality Sets In.

Half of these “winners” are using mobile technologies

for in-store merchandise management, compared

with 44% of others. Just less than half of winners

(48%) also use mobile for both store management and

internal corporate communications, compared with

31% of others.

NOTE: RSR defines “Retail Winners” as retailers with higher-than-

average year-over-year comparative store/channel sales growth.

"Retail Winners are more optimistic about

the marketing and operational benefits

that mobile can create for them."

— Retail Systems Research

Building A Better Workforce • 4

What A Difference Mobile Makes

Coordinating the work of a distributed workforce —

matching workers to tasks, validating task completion

and reporting on those activities — has been a

challenge that retailers and consumer goods companies

have attempted to manage in a myriad of ways.

Strategies have included forming internal teams that

work across stores and outsourcing to third parties, as

well as developing applications to try to manage their

activities. But these systems often used pen and paper

or remote PCs, considerably limiting their accuracy

and efficiency. Their biggest flaw is the time delay in

reporting this information back to those who can use it

to correct problems quickly and spot trends.

Mobile removes those barriers. A mobile workforce

management solution can help optimize the store’s

workforce and a consumer brand’s field team by

improving management tasks from scheduling,

messaging and reporting to scorecarding, benefiting

both the employer and employee.

A large global staffing company needed to dispatch 1,000 people to 200

locations for a two-day task starting four days later. The only way to accomplish

this in time was to apply robust software algorithms to match available

employees to task locations and rapidly alert staff to their assignments, a goal

the company attained using Gigwalk.

Case In Point: Finding And Tasking Available Employees With Speed

Building A Better Workforce • 5

Red Bull, the world’s highest-selling energy

drink, has an annual tradition called “Back Office

Goes Front Office” in which more than 700

office employees visit stores to interact with

retail personnel, distributors and customers. But

these employees recorded their activities in

spreadsheets, so executives had delayed visibility

into the event’s impact. Now employees use

Gigwalk’s mobile app to view, select and then

report on activities in real time. For the first time,

Red Bull can measure an event’s impact, quantify

results and take action where needed in real time.

Case In Point: Acting Upon Instant Insights

Companies that leveraged mobile software

experienced more than twice as much improvement

in their ability to access business-critical information

within the required time frame, compared to those

without a mobile software initiative, according to

Aberdeen’s research brief Enterprise-Grade Mobile

Apps: Powering Organizational Transformation. These

companies doubled the improvement in employee

satisfaction and the percentage of their workload

completed on mobile devices. They also delivered

almost twice the improvement in operational efficiency

and employee productivity. “These results should put

at ease those executives who question the business

value of a Best-in-Class mobile app investment,” said

the report.

Companies that leveraged mobile software

experienced more than twice as much improvement

in their ability to access business-critical information

within the required time frame, compared to those

without a mobile software initiative.

— Aberdeen

Building A Better Workforce • 6

Whirlpool and joint venture partner Procter &

Gamble spent millions on promotional materials

to prepare for the launch of their brand-new

Swash Express Clothing Care System. Therefore,

it was critical to verify that displays and materials

were in place for the July 2014 unveiling. That is

a big undertaking for a campaign that involves so

many retailers and individual stores.

“It’s one thing to know the direction from the

corporate office, but what happens on floors

varies quite a bit,” said David Provost, national

sales manager for Whirlpool. “We spend a lot

of money educating people on the product and

getting it deployed, but some channels are less

disciplined in ensuring the information gets on

the floor the day the promotion starts.”

Whirlpool’s national sales team knew from

experience that using their customer relationship

management software to audit compliance on

thousands of showroom floors would not provide

the timely feedback they needed. In previous

launches, technical hurdles meant delays in

inputting data, impacting accuracy, timeliness and

ultimately the promotion’s potential.

So they turned to Gigwalk Enterprise for

help. Sales representatives supplemented

by Gigwalkers — independent workers who

sign up for assignments through the Gigwalk

app — fanned out across thousands of store

floors. They used the Gigwalk app to take time-

and geo-stamped photos and answer simple

questions about execution and performance of

demos via an intuitive mobile interface. Whirlpool

executives received these insights instantly via

dashboard. This allowed them to identify issues

and alert retail partners in real time, optimizing

the promotion.

When execution falters, “clearly knowing specific

issues with photos and locations is much more

actionable” than after-the-fact recollections,

according to Provost.

“What’s really of value to us is the simple, intuitive

interface, and the ability to set direction and

get confirmation of execution very quickly and

simply,” he said. “It’s valuable to have accurate

information when we’re making important

decisions with our brands.”

Whirlpool Puts A New Spin On Promotion Compliance

“We spend a lot of money educating people

on the product and getting it deployed,

but some channels are less disciplined in

ensuring the information gets on the floor

the day the promotion starts.”

— David Provost, Whirlpool

Building A Better Workforce • 7

The Mobile Advantage

Mobile-enabled workforce management applications

address store-level tasks in ways PC- and paper-based

systems never could, because of their immediacy and

one-to-one status. Here are four ways mobile makes

it better:

Mobile-Enabled Scheduling – Scheduling applications

are based on anticipated needs, but stores are dynamic.

Immediate access means managers can easily reassign

employees. Employees also prefer interacting with

schedules via a familiar mobile interface for tasks such

as picking up extra shifts and blocking out dates.

Mobile-Enabled Messaging – Mobile significantly

improves team communication. Employees can

collaborate with managers to resolve questions and

issues on the spot.

Mobile-Enabled Reporting – Mobile enables real-

time reporting to a single dashboard so issues can be

identified and new task alerts generated quickly to

boost compliance and drive incremental sales. Photo

verification, location and time-stamping of reports

enhances accuracy.

Mobile-Enabled Scorecarding – Via mobile, it is easy to

share benchmarks and incentivize associates and third

parties such as distributors.

A well-crafted mobile workforce management solution

transforms the retail store floor from a black box to

an open forum where retailers and consumer goods

companies can manage geographically specific store

tasks at scale. With this newfound visibility and control,

executives can ensure that stores execute back-end

planning and merchandising activities properly and fully

deliver the brand experience they have envisioned.

A well-crafted mobile

workforce management

solution transforms the retail

store floor from a black box

to an open forum where

retailers and consumer goods

companies can manage

geographically specific store

tasks at scale.

Building A Better Workforce • 8

A large retailer wanted to increase its revenue for a new product line, but

it had received negative feedback on product quality and appearance. By

assigning Gigwalkers to make independent assessments, the company gained

invaluable, impartial feedback to help drive quality improvements.

Case In Point: Crowdsourcing ProvidesQuality Reporting

“There is potential collaboration with almost everyone

who is connected to the Internet — regardless of

whether they are ‘our employee’ or not.”

— Accenture

Tapping Crowdsourcing To Supplement Staff

Even when they are leveraging existing frontline

workers to perform new tasks, most retail and

consumer goods brands do not have the bandwidth

to evaluate all activities in every store accurately.

Asking internal staff to evaluate their own activities

can be risky.

Crowdsourcing has emerged as an ideal alternative

to accomplish store-level tasks with a willing fleet

of independent workers, using the same mobile

workforce management application used internally.

This approach is part of a growing movement called

the Gig Economy or the Collaborative Economy.

Up to 40% of the adult population in U.S., the

UK and Canada now participates in the sharing

economy According to Harvard Business Review’s

story, Established Companies, Get Ready for the

Collaborative Economy.

Accenture urges companies to tap this expanded

workforce. “There is potential collaboration with

almost everyone who is connected to the Internet

— regardless of whether they are ‘our employee’ or

not,” according to the report, titled, From Digitally

Disrupted to Digital Disruptor, 2014. Accenture

advises companies to plan diligently, be clear on

objectives and break down the larger mission into

clear tasks.

Building A Better Workforce • 9

A beer company wanted to incentivize its distributors to work with retailers

to set up displays of three different brands during Super Bowl week but

had no way of validating execution. Gigwalkers found that only 30% of

retailers had at least one brand product on display, enabling the company

to evaluate distributor self-reported metrics and pay only for performance

actually delivered.

Case In Point: Supplement Staff To Ensure Proper Execution

A pharmaceutical company needed to verify that displays were in place and

stocked for a massive launch of a new over-the-counter drug. Crowdsourced

Gigwalkers dispatched to stores followed up multiple times to check displays,

prices and voids – all documented via the Gigwalk app. Discrepancies were

identified and reported back to the pharmaceutical company in real time,

allowing it to alert retailers to correct the errors. Because of this sharply

increased compliance, the launch was one of the most successful in the

company’s history.

Case In Point: Verifying Merchandising Compliance

Building A Better Workforce • 10

Mobile Is The Key To Better Visibility And Value

The new age of mobile creates unprecedented

opportunities for retailers and consumer goods

companies. They can leverage mobile devices to

foster a more agile and efficient workforce. This will

help them gain badly needed visibility into daily store

activities, driving real-time task management and

operations efficiency while enhancing employee job

satisfaction. Perhaps best of all, they can use mobile

to increase promotion compliance, optimizing their

marketing dollars while delivering a more satisfying

brand experience for their customers.

Mobile devices

help retailers and

consumer goods

companies gain

visibility into daily

store activities,

driving real-time task

management and

operations efficiency.

Increased adoption of mobile technologies has

placed the retail workforce at the dawn of a new

era of productivity. Mobile technologies deliver a

positive disruption in current workflows by boosting

the efficiency of temporary and part-time workers.

Here are five ways mobile will change the way

retailers and brands work:

• Greater access to temporary workers by

crowdsourcing simple tasks in the store;

• Higher scheduling flexibility and visibility for

store associates, managers and HQ;

• Better employee engagement through

increased communication and collaboration

opportunities;

• Stronger task management with tools that help

managers evaluate how associates complete

tasks; and

• Delivery of real-time insight for in-store issues

that include sales and marketing execution.

Five Ways Mobile Technology Will Disrupt The Way We Work

Building A Better Workforce • 11

About Retail TouchPoints

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About Gigwalk

Gigwalk is a distributed workforce management platform that

efficiently connects people with work. By harnessing the power of

mobile technology, Gigwalk helps businesses better manage their

workforce to achieve better business outcomes and maximizes

human potential to make work better. For more information,

visit www.gigwalk.com.

539 Bryant Street, Suite 401

San Francisco, CA 94107

sales@gigwalk.com