In this article, learn about:
- What retail analytics is and why it matters
- 5 key steps to choosing the right provider
- Real world examples to guide your decision
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When suppliers begin using retailer sales data, it can often feel like navigating a new city without GPS. You may have strong products, loyal customers, and consistent sales—but if you can’t see what’s ahead (or behind), it is all too easy to misinterpret the signs and hit a roadblock.
Retail analytics bridges the gap between raw data and actionable insight. It enables suppliers to track what’s working, fix what isn’t, and plan more confidently for what’s next. However, there are as many analytics providers as there are questions they answer.
How can suppliers choose the right one? The first step is understanding what these providers actually do.
The Function and Impact of Retail Analytics
Retail analytic providers take unprocessed product and customer data from retailers like Walmart, Target, or Amazon and make it usable by organizing it into actionable insights.
For retailers and suppliers alike, leveraging data means more than just tracking numbers and reports. It’s about understanding what customers want, how they shop, and why they make certain choices. This information empowers businesses to optimize their supply chain, tailor their offerings, and make informed decisions to keep them ahead of the competition.
Gone are the days of manually sifting over spreadsheets and bloated reports to find one singular line of data—only to guess what went wrong. Now, with retail analytics, suppliers have a dashboard that shows real answers that come from accurate data. It’s like switching from incomplete verbal directions to real-time GPS.
Retail Analytics encompass a wide range of insights and can provide clarity around:
- Inventory optimization
- Sales forecasting
- Sales performance
- Pricing strategy
- New product launch
- Targeted marketing efforts
- Competitive advantages
- Customer retention
- Fraud detection
What analytics don’t do:
- Fix problems automatically
- Replace people
The tools and software that analytics providers use are each designed to turn unrefined sales information and customer behavior into actionable insights. The tools will typically fall into one of four main categories:
Descriptive—focuses on summarizing past and present data to find out how something happened.
Diagnostic—focuses on summarizing past and present data to find out why something happened.
Predictive—focuses on summarizing past and present data to predict what will happen in the future.
Prescriptive—a type of software that recommends specific actions to optimize outcomes.
Step 1: Do you Need a Retail Analytics Provider?
There are no two suppliers exactly alike. Some are working with one big box retailer and need help handling deductions. While others are working across many smaller retailers with dozens of SKUs moving across the globe and they need help forecasting. So, before you schedule demos and review pricing tiers, it helps to:
- Conduct an internal review
- Brainstorm specific needs/challenges
- Answer: What is the biggest pain point?
A SWOT analysis could be beneficial. Assessing internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as external opportunities and threats can clarify what your business already does well, where it falls short, what opportunities exist for growth, and what potential challenges are likely to arise.
This is the time for suppliers to create a shortlist of must-haves to make everything easier. Doing so will keep the conversation with potential providers focused and will help avoid paying for unnecessary features.
Suppliers should be sure to review these common areas of internal challenges and capabilities:
- Data overload—spending too much time gathering and organizing data
- Retailer compliance and deductions—chargebacks, shortages, and shipping
- Fragmented systems—single source of truth or scattered information
- Limited insights and forecasting—clarity around top performing SKUs
- Team capacity—technical expertise or stretched too thin
- Growth readiness—scaling manually and adding new partners
Related Reading: What is CPFR? Collaborative Planning, Forecasting and Replenishment
Step 2: Narrow Down the Options
Now that suppliers know what they need, it is time to browse the provider options. With thousands of registered retail analytic companies in the US alone, the options are great.
Some providers are super user-friendly. Some try to do everything and end up doing none of it very well. The key here is to compare providers based on what matters most to the business and not just what looks and sounds good in a demo.
A few things worth reviewing:
- Does this provider support all the key retailers? With full integration?
- Does this provider have strong data coverage? How often is the data refreshed?
- Is the dashboard easy to read and navigate?
- Is onboarding included?
- How is support handled?
Suppliers should reserve time to read real reviews and testimonials, talk to other suppliers, and ask for recommendations. Doing so can save a lot of time and frustration.
Step 3: Take the Demo Seriously
This is the chance to see how this tool will (or won’t) fit into the daily workflow. The best thing suppliers can do during a demo is bring real questions.
- What problems need solving?
- What reports need to be generated each week?
- How do things align across multiple retailers?
- Can suppliers export reports?
- How long will onboarding take? What does it include?
- Don’t be afraid to ask: what happens if it breaks?
If a supplier can’t see themselves (or their team) using this tool or if only a portion of your data is being addressed—then it’s probably best to keep looking.
Step 4: Evaluate Your Options
Suppliers should keep in mind that the right analytics provider will be a partnership instead of just another product that the team (sometimes) uses.
Pricing compatibility, future focus, ongoing support, and integration should all be seriously considered. Retail customer analytics should also be reviewed as this type of information can increase customer loyalty, provide a deeper understanding of customer behavior, and help successfully launch new products. These insights are essential for building strong customer relationships and enhancing overall customer experience.
Step 5: Choose a Retail Analytics Provider
After moving through the demo and evaluation stages, suppliers should then decide on a retail analytics provider. The right provider won’t just help fix problems and pain points they’ll help prevent them further down the road too. Choosing the right provider will lead to more efficient processes and support better decision-making.
Green flags to look for when choosing an analytic provider:
- Live support with real people (not bots)
- Access to tutorials or help centers
- Easy user management
- Regular improvements
- Proven track record of helping suppliers over time
Real World Example of Valuable Insights
Retail giant Amazon hosts roughly 9.7M total seller accounts, with about 1.9M actively selling and fulfilling orders. How many of those suppliers are accurately tracking and delivering their goods? How many are accurately forecasting? The answer is: not enough.
Suppliers see profits and financial performance grow when they are fully aware of their sales, inventory, purchasing patterns, and customer behavior. Playing to strengths and picking up slack when necessary are key factors to staying profitable in highly competitive retail environments. Data analytics, including retail predictive analytics, and statistical analysis, do just that.
Take for instance, SupplyBike. Last year, the business was really struggling. Conversion rates weren’t matching units sold, product demand was fluctuating for no apparent reason, marketing activities were flopping, and retailer invoices were only partially paid. The company also faced issues with high shipping costs and inefficiencies in the supply chain, leading to delays and product availability problems. They knew that if something didn’t change the business would be doomed.
Luckily, they did what any brilliant supplier would do. They found help. They hired an analytics provider who helped answer the questions that had been disrupting the supply chain. The retail analytics provider used teams and software to diagnose the issues and found:
- Conversion rates weren’t matching because there were separate SKUs for the same products.
- Product demand was fluctuating because there was a long delay with shipping/receiving, high shipping costs, and there was about one out of every four weeks in which products weren’t available.
- Marketing ads were scattered and weren’t reaching the right customers, missing out on targeting based on purchasing patterns and customer preferences.
- Invoices were only partially paid because deductions were being applied for products temporarily out of stock and for incorrect labeling.
Analytics data also revealed customer preferences which enabled SupplyBike to tailor offerings and marketing strategies. By leveraging the insights, they were able to improve, increase ROI, spot emerging trends, and increase brand loyalty.
Once they were able to fully understand the issues, they were able to implement solutions for them.
Turn Your Retail Data into Meaningful Growth
Manual processes and scattered reports can only take a business so far. With the right analytics solution, suppliers can bring together retailer sales data and internal systems to uncover valuable insights—all in one place.
- Gain a clear unified view of sales and inventory across all retail partners
- Understand product performance across channels in real time
- Identify trends and risks early with intuitive, ready-to-use dashboards
With SPS Analytics, suppliers get a complete omnichannel picture—empowering smarter decisions, streamlined operations and sustainable growth.