We have moved from the age of collecting data on paper, entering it into systems and then analyzing what we collected. That was then when technology had a very limited role to play. We at Market Xcel saw this coming over 3 years back and since then have been doing Retail Audits using tablets with pre-programmed surveys on our app which resides on tablets. Paper based audits are not efficient, had possibilities of error both while collecting data and at data entry, was more time consuming and was an obsolete way of doing audits. The use of technology, on the other hand, is cost effective, time efficient and ensures high quality all at the same time, making data collection, analysis and reporting a highly efficient process.
Apart from the ones mentioned above about time and quality of data, technology also enables us to counter several other factors and turn things in our favor.
Market Xcel with its offices in 11 Indian cities reaches out to over 300 locations every month for doing Retail Audits. We cover over 10,000 outlets each month with a team of 130 auditors.
We understand that Retail sales are the primary measure of estimating consumer demand for both durable and non-durable goods. To reach this goal we need to know not only of what size the universe is but also where it is exactly, who is it and several other things. It helps us further in classifying them into categories by item they sell, on size by how much they sell. If you are looking for how distributed the category sales are across Urban and Rural areas of a state or India, what typically answers this question is doing an entire geographic scan of the region and identifying who is selling what all categories of products. Since this is a huge exercise, which involves a lot of logistic planning to ensure that the scan is 100% complete and the representation is of the entire universe. What you would look for is a partner with enough experience of successfully managing and completing such tasks. We at Market Xcel have enough experience of conducting large-scale fieldwork with the help of technology. We are proficient in the field of Retail Census and have reached out to a sample as large as 5,00,000 outlets across India, covering each state, representing both urban and rural areas. The data collected are of companies, units of companies or single unit establishments as per need or requirement of the client. Each data point is collected using tablets, ensuring the best quality as we get to know from where the sample was identified and enumerated using GPS coordinates for each outlet. Technology also helps us have photographs of the outlets, which are linked to each enumerated outlet. The collected data may have multiple applications as per the objective of the client who engages us, ranging from further use for Retail Audits, to plan their distribution network, to plan/correct or strategies their communication, etc. A regular audit may also reveal critical answers to growth or shift in retail across a region or overall. We understand that the applications are limitless and hence the criticality of data collection is equally critical and important. Our team of over 400 people has helped us to successfully deliver numerous projects. The technology we use works both online and offline and hence works seamlessly with the network challenges that we face not only in urban but rural areas as well. To know more about how we can help you plan and execute your next Retail Census, reach out to us at info@market-xcel.com.