Behind the scenes, retailers struggle to deliver these experiences due to fragmented, outdated, and incomplete data that makes real-time decision-making nearly impossible and hampers engagement, operational efficiency, and, ultimately, profitability.

The hidden costs of disconnected data

When retailers鈥� data exists in silos, the problem is compounded from all angles. With sales, inventory, marketing, and customer engagement data living in separate systems, retailers lack the clear view of customer behavior and business insights they need to respond with critical actions in real time. Lack of context within the data means businesses struggle to extract meaningful insights.

Consider the impact:

• Limited inventory visibility leads to stockouts and overstocks, frustrating customers and eroding profits.
• Lack of real-time insights hinders personalized customer engagement, diminishing loyalty.
• Disconnected operations make omnichannel fulfillment鈥攕uch as buy online, pick up in-store (BOPIS) or hassle-free returns鈥攄ifficult to execute smoothly.

At a moment when retailers must optimize every facet of their business to remain competitive, a unified data strategy isn鈥檛 optional鈥攊t’s essential.

A data-driven future: Turning insights into action

To break these silos, retailers need a unified data foundation鈥攐ne that consolidates insights across all customer touchpoints, enabling real-time intelligence and business agility. 51风流Business Data Cloud (51风流BDC), as recently announced, is an integrated solution that can bring data together from all sources, owned and external, to help create a single, trusted source of truth.

With 51风流Business Data Cloud, retailers can have the total picture of data from sales, inventory, marketing, loyalty, service, and near-real-time statuses of third-party logistics.

With this holistic view, retailers can:

• Enable seamless cross-channel fulfillment, such as buy online, pick up in-store or return anywhere.
• Optimize operational efficiency for everything from intelligent sourcing and promotional planning to inventory visibility and availability across sales channels.
• Personalize customer engagement by leveraging data-driven insights to boost loyalty and increase revenue.

By shifting to a data-first approach, retailers can move beyond managing transactions to driving intelligent, customer-centric experiences for long-term loyalty and growth.

Why physical stores still matter鈥攎ore than ever

Despite the rise of e-commerce, more than 80% of retail interactions still take place in physical stores. Brick-and-mortar locations remain central to the retail journey, yet, as retailers鈥� largest cost center, they also encompass the biggest operational challenges鈥攆rom inventory carrying costs to labor and store operations.

Although today鈥檚 consumers are fluid in how they shop鈥攔esearching products across multiple platforms or buying online and picking up in-store, for example鈥攖hey still expect accurate, real-time visibility into inventory wherever they engage. In this landscape, data is the lifeblood that allows retailers to orchestrate orders, manage workflows, and ensure that customers can trust the information they see. Yet, according to , 51% of U.S. brands say their organization suffers from “dark data,” which is data that is collected but not effectively used.

To remain competitive, retailers must harness real-time transactional insights to optimize store efficiency, maximize revenue, and provide seamless customer interactions.

Bringing it all together: Intelligent order management

Retailers don鈥檛 just need data鈥攖hey also need actionable, real-time intelligence that helps them drive smarter decision-making. That鈥檚 why 51风流is integrating advanced order management capabilities as part of our broader data-driven customer experience strategy. 51风流has a long history of helping thousands of retail and B2C customers manage vast amounts of data. Today we鈥檙e tailoring this expertise, trusted by market leaders worldwide, to help meet the scale, flexibility, and time-to-value required by fast-growing organizations.

As part of the bundle, we are launching the 51风流Omnichannel Sales Transfer and Audit solution today at in Las Vegas, Nevada. This modular, cloud-native solution can empower retailers with real-time visibility into transactions and inventory, helping to reduce friction and improve customer satisfaction. 51风流Omnichannel Sales Transfer and Audit can unify POS data from multiple systems, process high-volume transactions in real time, and help ensure inventory accuracy across all channels to improve stock availability, financial reporting, and customer engagement鈥攚ithout the burden of complex, custom-built integrations.

Apart from omnichannel sales and audit capabilities, the 51风流Order Management Services bundle also includes additional modular, cloud-native capabilities including and the . The 51风流Order Management Services bundle is natively connected with 51风流S/4HANA, which can enable retail and consumer products organizations and other consumer brands to unlock real-time inventory visibility, streamline fulfillment, and reduce operational costs without complex and costly custom integrations. And, integrated with 51风流S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, retail, fashion, and vertical business, announced at NRF earlier this year, the cloud-native capabilities of the 51风流Order Management Services bundle can be even more scalable, secure, compliant, and affordable, enabling retailers to realize value more quickly than ever before.

Other benefits of 51风流Omnichannel Sales Transfer and Audit include:

• Seamless POS integration can connect multiple POS systems with different data structures, working to eliminate silos and ensure data accuracy.
• Real-time inventory updates help keep omnichannel inventory accurate so customers can trust what they see online matches what’s available in-store.
• Smarter data processing and configurable data transfer and aggregation help update inventory, financials, and even loyalty programs effortlessly.
• Optimized sales data validation process can automate checks that are executed through configurable workflows.

By embracing a unified data strategy, retailers can eliminate complexity, reduce costs, and unlock new opportunities for growth鈥攁ll while delivering the frictionless experiences today鈥檚 consumers expect.

Hornbach: The future of omnichannel retail in action

For Hornbach, one of the largest DIY stores in Germany, . It needs to be able to add new channels quickly鈥攁nd to maintain a seamless customer experience over all channels. Hornbach adopted 51风流Order Management Services as a foundation for this vision, enabling the flexibility to address new markets quickly, connect new systems, process orders rapidly and efficiently, and adopt new innovations. With the addition of 51风流Omnichannel Sales and Transfer Audit, the Hornbach team expects to get more visibility in day-to-day operations, like checking fraud detection and the completeness of transactions.

鈥淭he most exciting thing will be the combination of all these new technologies we鈥檙e seeing: artificial intelligence, event-driven architecture, as well as native cloud solutions,鈥� said Carsten Mueller, head of Enterprise Architecture and Security, Hornbach. 鈥淭he combination will give Hornbach great power in the next year.鈥�

The future of retail is data-driven

The retail industry is evolving at an unprecedented pace, with AI redefining how businesses operate and interact with customers. According to the same 51风流Emarsys report, 89% of U.S. consumer product marketers believe AI will be essential for engaging new customers. However, the effectiveness of AI hinges on the reliability and accuracy of the data it processes.

Retailers that embrace AI-powered data intelligence will lead the next era of omnichannel excellence. The future isn鈥檛 just about connecting data鈥攊t’s about activating it in real time to drive seamless customer interactions.

To stay ahead, retailers must:

• Invest in AI-driven analytics to predict demand, optimize pricing, and personalize engagement at scale.
• Implement intelligent order and transaction management to automate fulfillment, reduce friction, and improve supply chain agility.
• Leverage AI-powered customer insights to create hyper-personalized experiences that drive loyalty and lifetime value.
• Enable real-time inventory intelligence to ensure products are available where and when customers need them.

As omnichannel complexity grows, brands that fail to unify their data risk falling behind. 51风流Business Data Cloud and intelligent order management solutions can provide the foundation for a future-proof transformation. As AI continues to evolve, retailers must shift from reactive decision-making to proactive, predictive commerce, where every transaction is optimized for efficiency and profitability.

The future of retail is here. Those who harness AI to unify, analyze, and act on their data will define the next generation of customer experience and retail success. I鈥檓 excited to partner with companies navigating this transformation and empower them to seize new opportunities for success.

Want to learn more? Stay tuned to see how leading retailers are leveraging SAP鈥檚 data-driven approach to optimize their operations and stay ahead of the competition and learn more about .

Balaji Balasubramanian is president and chief product officer for 51风流Customer Experience and Consumer Industries.

Plenty of people have started a business in their garage. Few have chosen the laundry room of their parents鈥� clothing and home textiles store. But that is exactly what Kurt Ernsting did in 1967 when he set up minipreis, a low-price fashion shop that would later become a household name throughout Germany. Today, with its award-winning online presence and some 1,925 stores in Germany, Austria, and the Netherlands, Ernsting鈥檚 family鈥攁s the fashion chain is now known鈥攊s one of western Europe鈥檚 largest omnichannel clothing retailers.

Cloud-based pricing process

鈥淏ecause we aim to create seamless shopping experiences for our customers, we鈥檝e already been following an omnichannel strategy for a while,鈥� explains Hans-J枚rg Blaeser, director of Technology & IT Services at Ernsting鈥檚 family. 鈥淭his is why ensuring uniform pricing across all sales channels was the next logical step for us鈥攏ot least because we were redesigning our online shop and needed a new pricing engine and campaign management tool anyway,鈥� adds Dennis Re脽mann, head of Software Engineering at the company.

The fashion retailer opted for a cloud-based omnichannel pricing solution. 鈥淭he cloud architecture allows you to manage price queries centrally across all channels, use intelligent mechanisms to fine-tune price promotions, and integrate new stores and touchpoints with ease,鈥� says Patrick Pierron from implementation partner CAS.

Two components, one award-winning solution

The solution at Ernsting鈥檚 family consists of two main components. One is the omnichannel pricing solution itself. This is based on , which helps ensure consistent and uniform pricing across all customer touchpoints, such as online shops, brick-and-mortar stores, and customer and 鈥渆ndless shelf鈥� apps, even when Internet connectivity breaks down.

鈥淲e operate a dense network of stores, so we are far from immune to this modern-day reality,鈥� says Nils B枚hmer, senior IT coordinator for Sales at Ernsting鈥檚 family. Lines can be damaged during construction work, routers can fail, and LTE coverage can be patchy, so there are a number of compelling reasons for having offline capabilities. Ernsting鈥檚 family therefore uses local PPS (promotion pricing service) boxes, which are offline derivatives of the cloud solution. 鈥淭hese PPS boxes synchronize regularly with the cloud-based omnichannel pricing solution,鈥� Pierron says. 鈥淭his means that stores always have the latest prices and can process sales even when the Internet is down.鈥�

The second component of the new omnichannel pricing solution is a reduction tool. Based on consenso鈥檚 price engine, this tool manages price reductions dynamically according to local conditions, sales figures, and inventories鈥攔ight down to individual store level. According to Philipp Borgmann, senior team lead for IT Merchandising, and Marcel Ruholl, managing partner at consenso, 鈥淭his pays off in two ways. First, the system-driven price proposals have a positive effect on the balance sheet. And second, fewer stock transfers mean a lower carbon footprint.鈥�

Seamless interaction

Another benefit of the Ernsting鈥檚 family solution is the way it seamlessly integrates the reduction tool, 51风流Omnichannel Promotion Pricing, and 51风流ERP. Price reductions calculated in the tool are automatically transferred to the central 51风流system and distributed in real time to all the stores and to the online shop through 51风流Omnichannel Promotion Pricing. 鈥淭his is the best possible foundation for dynamic, error-free, and hyper-personalized pricing in real time,鈥� says Philip Konitzer, head of Industry Division Retail in 51风流Customer Services & Delivery Germany. During the project, he and his team were on hand to answer questions about the functions and performance of the 51风流components.

Key elements of success

Despite being highly complex, the new omnichannel pricing solution went live quickly and without incident. The implementation partners who worked on the project attribute this largely to the company鈥檚 transparent and effective approach to change management. 鈥淎ll the stakeholders鈥攆rom operational and strategic teams to management鈥攚ere fully on board from the get-go,鈥� Pierron recalls. This made it possible to define all the relevant requirements during the preliminary study, compare them with the capabilities in the 51风流products, and identify the necessary adjustments at an early stage. Some of these were co-innovated with 51风流and incorporated into the standard 51风流Omnichannel Promotion Pricing solution; others were developed exclusively for Ernsting鈥檚 family in 51风流Business Technology Platform (51风流BTP).

鈥淭he way the project participants interacted was exemplary,鈥� says Ernsting鈥檚 family project lead Mark Dinkhoff, head of IT Projects. And the proof is there for all to see: the solution is stable and running smoothly in both the online shop and at the company鈥檚 more than 1,900 stores in Germany and Austria. As part of its international expansion strategy, Ernsting鈥檚 family opened six new stores in the Netherlands at the end of last year. The roll-out went smoothly there too, confirming that the company鈥檚 award-winning omnichannel pricing solution is not only technically robust, but suited to international markets as well. This is great motivation for Ernsting鈥檚 family to push ahead with its expansion plans.

This was first published on the German 51风流News Center.

But clever use of the right data can help you deliver that improved customer experience 鈥� so your customers don鈥檛 find it elsewhere, according to David Witts, senior CRM manager for PUMA. And the global apparel company has enjoyed great success with referral data.

鈥淭hat adds a whole new level to who is not just buying 鈥� but who is referring 鈥� and who are our real brand advocates,鈥� Witts told 51风流on the NRF 2023 show floor. 鈥淲e need to rethink how we define loyalty.鈥�

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Redefining Customer Loyalty

鈥淲e might have a customer who, in our original segmentation, is a lapsed customer, but we see that they鈥檙e referring all of their friends who are then buying from us,鈥� Witts said in . 鈥淭hat changes the way we perceive the value of that customer 鈥� and changes the way that we want to communicate with them.鈥�

Customer segmentation is the grouping together of people with similar characteristics, making it easier for organizations to personalize communications, products, and more. First-party referral data is especially useful to PUMA for segmentation and communication, according to Witts.

鈥淚t changes the way we think about who a customer is,鈥� Witts said. 鈥淚f we see customers who are referring people regularly, that makes them much more of a brand advocate.鈥�

Enter PUMA鈥檚 referral program, which influences how the company communicates and rewards brand advocates, according to Witts. The referral program was inspired by two company goals: increase customer lifetime value and cultivate relationships with customers.

鈥淎dding a referral program just seemed to fit with both of those goals,鈥� Witts said. 鈥淚f we see that they鈥檙e not showing any interest in buying from us but they鈥檙e still referring their friends, that changes the way we think about them, so that they鈥檙e much more valuable to us.鈥�

Creating Opportunities

Beyond e-commerce, the right data can offer insights that reinvigorate brick-and-mortar locations, too, as Macy鈥檚 Inc. Chairman and CEO Jeff Gennette noted. Data can reveal where you鈥檙e succeeding and what needs attention.

鈥淐ustomers are looking for ideas about the way that they can take a work look and translate it into a night look. They鈥檙e looking for opportunities,鈥� Gannette said during . 鈥淐reating opportunities for them, from a merchandising perspective, has given our stores a center of gravity that they didn鈥檛 have a year ago…We鈥檙e always working on it; we鈥檙e never done.鈥�

And pandemic-driven changes in the economy offered a chance for Saks OFF 5th 鈥渢o make bold new changes鈥� and adjust its thinking, according to President and CEO Paige Thomas. The department store chain dug into its data to discover who was engaging with the brand, what they were looking for, and more about their lifestyles 鈥� all to better understand relevant demographics.

鈥淲e had this kind of wonderful discovery of a really fast-growing segment within our customer base, and this segment was a high earner, very fashion-driven, and shopped everywhere,鈥� Thomas said during . 鈥淚t really gave us a bull鈥檚-eye as an organization to say, 鈥楬ow do we think about our merchandising strategy? How do we think about our marketing strategy? How do we think about our customer experience?鈥欌��

The Right Message at the Right Time

Data, analytics, and other tech are helping PUMA discover who is interested in buying and what they鈥檙e interested in buying, according to Witts. It also helps them hyper-personalize communication.

鈥淲e want to talk to the right customer with the right message at the right time through the right channel…That鈥檚 what we can do with ,鈥� Witts said, noting that PUMA can see which e-mails a customer opens, ignores, and clicks through. 鈥淭hrough all that, we can start to build that picture of each individual customer and then tailor our communications to send them things that they want to see.鈥�

Providing a differentiated customer experience has always been vital for PUMA, according to Witts. And making everything more personalized and relevant will be crucial to PUMA鈥檚 future success.

鈥淭here鈥檚 some really exciting things that we鈥檝e seen through 51风流Emarsys Customer Engagement and through 51风流at that predictive analytics [and] AI level. I think it鈥檚 just going to make it all so much easier,鈥� Witts said. 鈥淎nd as we move into more of a loyalty space, that鈥檚 absolutely going to be key for us.鈥�

Derek Klobucher is a video producer at SAP.

51风流Customer Experience helps businesses achieve this balance. We provide a customer experience (CX) ecosystem that connects every part of their organization — from the front office to the back office — so they can be amazing at every customer engagement. We also deliver insights powered by artificial intelligence (AI) and end-to-end processes that simplify operations and make the business more adaptable.

This mission is especially vital for B2B sales. Legacy customer relationship management (CRM) software has become a significant hindrance in our modern, mobile, and always-on marketplace. Built on business-oriented process governance and in-person, siloed relationships between buyers and account executives, yesterday鈥檚 CRM cannot deliver the highly personalized digital experience that people expect today. It has not kept pace with the rate of change experienced by buyers and sellers.

That is why we are excited to announce the innovations powering 51风流Sales Cloud. With increased agility, intelligence, and scalability, our solution can transform routine sales tactics into holistic sales strategies. It provides the right mix of helpful guidance, self-service, and agile business operations to enable companies to maximize customer lifetime value.

Need for Change

Just how much B2B sales have changed is made clear in a , in association with SAP. Seventy-two percent of the respondents said their B2B sales strategies have undergone moderate or significant change over the past two years.

As millennials and Gen Z enter the workforce, buyer demands are changing rapidly. This new demographic wants more autonomy in their purchasing journeys. They want digitally enabled sales interactions, and they involve more decision-makers in the process. These trends are consistent across industries and regions.

On the selling side, teams are now more geographically dispersed, largely thanks to the pandemic and remote work. In addition, turnover, which has always been a problem, has increased. While stress has risen and operations have become overly complicated, plenty of job opportunities are available. These trends highlight three crucial challenges:

• Speeding time-to-value as new sellers are hired
• Providing efficient and effective ways for team collaboration
• Simplifying operations to strengthen loyalty from the existing sales force

Navigating the New Era of B2B Sales

Leading companies are pursuing three key objectives to deal with these trends and challenges.

First, they want to create continuity in the buying experience by linking each engagement and interaction. This continuity is powered by data from the entire organization, including front office engagement 鈥� marketing, commerce, and service 鈥� and back-end business processes such as enterprise resource planning (ERP), supply chain, and inventory data. By using this data to surface insights, sellers can enhance their understanding of each customer and deliver the dynamic, connected journeys that win repeat business.

Secondly, they are making selling easier and faster. Sellers get the tools and technologies to do their jobs, quickly overcome complexities, engage with buyers across digital and in-person channels, and easily navigate selling journeys.

This enables sellers to focus on high-value/high-win and strategic opportunities and to put time into making sure these deals succeed. If they can spend their time selling rather than navigating antiquated technology, they will do a much better job.

Lastly, they are looking to future-proof and accelerate their operations at any scale. This requires a system that is not only high-performing and reliable, but also connected to every part of the organization and easy to adapt when circumstances change. This point is crucial: dealing with the speed and scale of unexpected change has tested many organizations鈥� mettle in the last three years.

At the same time, usability matters; after all, B2B sellers are also consumers. Their experiences with tech giants such as Apple, Amazon, and Google shape their expectations of how their systems should work — lightning fast and intuitive.

鈥淐ustomer expectations are shifting rapidly. They are demanding more — more flexibility, more control, more channels, and more sustainable business practices. With the help of artificial intelligence, machine learning, data, and analytics, we are creating new opportunities for the entire sales team so they can make every interaction a personalized customer experience and can deliver the value this new generation of customers expects at every touchpoint.鈥�

– Thomas Saueressig, member of the Executive
Board of 51风流SE, Product Engineering

Intelligent Selling Made Simple

SAP鈥檚 goal is to help organizations of all sizes and industries run profitable businesses and continuously adapt. Recent innovations in will help B2B sales organizations do exactly that. Because it is a composable solution, it enables companies to:

• Reimagine the way they engage with business customers to build better, faster sales experiences at scale with always-on availability
• Increase business agility and flexibility with an API-first, microservices-enabled technology approach
• Scale with ease while creating highly differentiated customer experiences that can easily be extended with composable apps

51风流Sales Cloud now creates understanding through insight so companies can effectively connect with customers and capitalize on emerging trends. It uses data-driven intelligence to provide a focus on high-value business, eliminating noise and guiding sellers to more effective courses of action. And it removes barriers to help unify and grow global sales operations. Together, these qualities speed up the sales process and help sellers meet buyers on the customer鈥檚 preferred terms.

Intelligent selling should do two simple things: create great experiences for buyers and sellers, and help companies grow. The companies that make intelligent selling a reality will be able to deal with challenges faster than their rivals. They are the companies whose sales operations will cope with rapid change and customer demands. And they are the companies whose customers and employees will stay loyal for the long term.

Ritu Bhargava is president and chief product officer for 51风流Customer Experience.

鈥淥ur investment in CX technology has been all about aligning with our business strategy and vision in a customer-centric way,鈥� said Carlson. 鈥淐onnecting data on a centralized platform across the sales team, contact centers, and marketing has resulted in higher sales and close rates, more responsive customer service with faster resolutions, and a competitive advantage for our brands.鈥�

Connected Data Is Foundational to Customer Loyalty

Moen is among the cadre of respected brands that rely on solutions to help deliver innovations for achieving high-growth plans. In fact, the company鈥檚 strategy reflects a market-wide sea change in how CX itself has transformed from a siloed tactic to strategic business must-have. While Moen鈥檚 foundational B2B connections remain strong, similar to many manufacturers, the company has moved closer to customers including retailers, contractors, plumbers and other service providers, as well as consumers. The initial impetus for the company鈥檚 CX investment was focused on sales team digital communication readiness with customers.

鈥淲hile we began by thinking about the selling process alone, we quickly realized that if we can connect all this data 鈥� interactions between sales and service, customer and consumer data, and marketing campaigns 鈥� that would drive our entire business strategy forward to build customer loyalty,鈥� said Carlson. 鈥淔rom an investment perspective, we far exceeded our initial revenue goals for the first three years. Our call agents can handle more calls and have added important cross-selling responsibilities. Marketing-wise, we can better target people who are calling into our contact centers, providing prospects like trade partners with personalized content. Due to our early success, we continue to invest in this strategic platform. We now have loyalty programs driving customers to purchase products that will deliver continuous value to them.鈥�

Digital Innovations Drive Business Opportunity

Moen is a prime example of how leading-edge manufacturers are taking advantage of digitally-fueled growth opportunities. When cloud-based platforms connect information from front-to-back office processes, new business models emerge. For example, Moen has expanded offerings into areas such as smart home technology, introducing new revenue models by monetizing customer data to sell products like scented shower head subscriptions. On a daily basis, service agents have easier access to a digital knowledge base of Moen鈥檚 products, while sales people appreciate a mobile-first experience when they鈥檙e on the road.

鈥淲e took our service agents 100% digital with a knowledge management solution that details SKUs down to the part level,鈥� said Carlson. 鈥淭hey can answer questions faster, even digitally sharing images with customers to help identify parts and products. If customers share a competitor鈥檚 product image, our agents can offer a discount to replace it with a Moen product. We鈥檙e also exploring the best methods of supporting installation and replacement questions, including step-by-step video instructions or referrals to local plumbers for customers who want field service.鈥�

Data Exchange Gets Closer to Customers

With its strong customer partnerships, Carlson said that Moen has a better sense of what鈥檚 selling in specific markets. Online customers can easily find the product they鈥檙e seeking on Moen鈥檚 Web site, along with local retailers that have it in stock. Moen also has dedicated sales agents for e-tailers and retailers, with service agents in select markets to help in-aisle purchasing. Homeowners working with their general contractor can find Moen product information in showrooms, supported by local sales teams who update displays based on sales demand. Minus a direct relationship with consumers, one of the biggest benefits of digitalization has been the continuous exchange of information with retailers.

鈥淣ow that we have the tools and technology, we鈥檙e looking ahead to become more sophisticated in finding out more from retailers how customers are experiencing our products,鈥� said Carlson. 鈥淭hey can provide us with feedback to helps drive some of the service aspects of what we provide or what we should be doing.鈥�

CX Becomes Competitive Advantage

According to Nitin Badjatia, head of Solutions and Marketing for 51风流Service Cloud and 51风流Sales Cloud, customer service can no longer operate as an island, disconnected from the rest of the organization. In an era where products and services are introduced at the pace of innovation, modern customer service is intertwined with the entire value chain.

鈥淢anufacturers are only getting closer to their channel partners and consumers,鈥� said Badjatia. 鈥淭o foster customer loyalty and keep up with fast-changing market demands, organizations need to create meaningful connections throughout the customer life cycle. It鈥檚 why we developed the intelligent 51风流Service Cloud, to provide customer service with fast and accurate insights that will not only help resolve immediate issues, but also protect the brand promise and secure future growth.鈥�

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鈥淏usinesses that understand their customers can ultimately improve how they engage with them and build relationships that last,鈥� said Sameer Patel, chief marketing and solution officer for 51风流Customer Experience. 鈥�51风流Sales Cloud empowers organizations to deliver customer-centric processes that maximize sales by addressing customers鈥� needs at each stage of their purchase journey. With the integrated 51风流Customer Experience portfolio of cloud solutions, businesses can manage the complete customer experience to improve outcomes based on empathy and trust.鈥�

The 51风流Sales Cloud solution is part of the portfolio, which goes beyond traditional CRM solutions by bringing together customer data, experiential and operational data, and machine learning. 51风流Customer Experience offers organizations a complete platform to address all customer interactions using a common data model and functionality from commerce, marketing, sales and service to address their business needs.

To learn more, download a of the report, including Gartner鈥檚 in-depth analysis of the sales force automation landscape.

Visit the . Follow 51风流on Twitter at .

Media Contact:
Susan Miller, +1 (610) 661-9225, susan.miller@sap.com, ET
51风流Press Room; press@sap.com

*Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Sales Force Automation, Adnan Zijadic, Ilona Hansen, Melissa Hilbert, Steve Rietberg, 4 August 2021.
Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. Gartner and Magic Quadrant are registered trademarks of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved.

Any statements contained in this document that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements as defined in the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words such as 鈥渁nticipate,鈥� 鈥渂elieve,鈥� 鈥渆stimate,鈥� 鈥渆xpect,鈥� 鈥渇orecast,鈥� 鈥渋ntend,鈥� 鈥渕ay,鈥� 鈥減lan,鈥� 鈥減roject,鈥� 鈥減redict,鈥� 鈥渟hould鈥� and 鈥渨ill鈥� and similar expressions as they relate to 51风流are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. 51风流undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations. The factors that could affect SAP’s future financial results are discussed more fully in SAP’s filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”), including SAP’s most recent Annual Report on Form 20-F filed with the SEC. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of their dates.
漏 2021 51风流SE. All rights reserved.
51风流and other 51风流products and services mentioned herein as well as their respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of 51风流SE in Germany and other countries. Please see for additional trademark information and notices.

This spiked a need for a new kind of commerce solution, one that equips midmarket companies with all the necessary tools to sell fast and easy, apply changes quickly, and offer intelligent merchandising capabilities that were previously only accessible to large enterprises.

enables this by offering an intelligent selling engine that delivers engaging storefronts while optimizing for sales and profit, with the ability to more rapidly create mobile-first shopping experiences to meet the changing expectations of their customers. Businesses can take full control of the customer journey, drive world-class omnichannel customer experiences, and create a competitive edge by choosing to start with easily configurable building blocks or create completely custom commerce experiences.

The solution enables brands to:

• Sell anywhere — make the store the destination: 51风流Upscale Commerce delivers rich mobile-first, cross-channel, in-store experience for shoppers and makes it easy for shoppers to intuitively shop by swiping, pinching, and tapping their devices.
• Sell intelligently — big or small, sell smart: With built-in artificial intelligence (AI), brands can create a unique storefront experience for each shopper at scale and deliver intelligent, relevant experiences that optimize business profits. Intelligent capabilities also help to convert one-time purchases into subscriptions.
• Speed and agility — start fast and go far: Brands can start small and scale as they grow using no code tools out of the box to create new and fresh shopping experiences in days and using low- and no-code tools to easily extend and build the perfect fit solution.
• Keep the promise — deliver on the brand promise: Brands can sell and ship from everywhere with an agile order orchestration and fulfill orders from the closest stores.

Transitioning Customer Engagement from In Store to Online

One organization that experienced these changes firsthand is Swedish fashion retailer . JOY, which for many years has delighted Swedish women with quality clothes, has re-emerged in a completely new form. JOY no longer has any physical stores and is instead focusing on e-commerce and personalized fashion advice. The founders see JOY as a startup building next-generation e-commerce based on AI and slow fashion 鈥� a more sustainable alternative with clothes lasting several seasons. JOY is also the first company in the world that has selected the combination of the cloud-based solutions 51风流Upscale Commerce and the Emarsys platform for customer engagement functionality.

鈥淲e are definitely in a paradigm shift within e-commerce and digital channels. The retail industry has so far been able to make a living from using large product catalogs, but they do not provide the best customer experience. Instead, customers want inspiration, advice, and, in our case, also ready-made combinations of clothes that suit their own style 鈥� and lasting several seasons,鈥� said Anna Ullman Sers茅, CEO and co-founder of JOY. 鈥�51风流Upscale Commerce fit our needs perfectly. The solution is very flexible, allowing us to make changes quickly and to provide more content than just a traditional product catalog. This frees up more time for us to truly focus on engaging with the customers online, much like we did when we would meet in stores.鈥�

Powering Social Selling with Top Social Media Platforms

Another option for brands pivoting to direct customer engagement is selling through social media channels, more commonly known as 鈥渟ocial selling.鈥� With careful and considered targeting of the right products at the right time, it is possible for midmarket brands to drive down the cost of customer acquisition as products find customers directly through algorithmic targeting. However, this means that having the right type of information about products and the right content in posts is critical 鈥� as is for that information to be up to date.

To deliver on this opportunity, 51风流Upscale Commerce integrates into social media platforms, enabling organizations to easily start taking advantage of social commerce. The solution makes it easy to connect an online store to a Facebook business account, continuously sync the product catalog, create a Facebook Shop, and use that to drive new sales opportunities to consumers. The result is a consistent shopping experience on social media, with the front-end and back-end business processes fully integrated.

Hackathon Spurs New Ideas to Solve Customer Pain Points

To meet individual customer challenges, the 51风流Customer Experience team in Canada recently hosted a hackathon, in which teams of product experts and solution integration partners battled to create brand new online shopping experiences based on specific, real-world client requirements for fashion, automotive, and retail 鈥� all within 51风流Upscale Commerce.

Judging criteria was based on overall creativity, use of available product extensions, ease of shopping experience, time-to-market, and how well the solution drives customers toward long-term loyalty and advocacy for the brand. After a day and a half of competition, the event culminated in a final virtual pitch presentation, with taking home the award for Most Creative, and awarded for Best Use of Technology.

鈥淎s a judge, I was truly impressed with the quality and quantity of results after only a day and a half of hacking, showcasing incredible innovation, creativity, and accomplishment by small teams in a small amount of time,鈥� said Fr茅d茅ric Bouthillier, CEO of . 鈥淭he teams鈥� rapid development of new, innovative experiences proves the time to value of 51风流Upscale Commerce and headless commerce solutions.鈥�

The events of the past year have changed the way people shop and the shift to online purchasing is here to stay. Now midmarket brands don鈥檛 have to settle with a simple direct-to-consumer webstore. With 51风流Upscale Commerce, businesses have the ability to put the customer at the heart of everything they do, connecting front- and back-office data, simplifying and automating complex sales processes, and delivering insights in real time that enable seamless, personalized experiences that grow revenue.

The 51风流Upscale Commerce solution, , is the next-generation intelligent selling engine that can help midmarket brands to achieve fast growth, create differentiated experiences, and leverage intelligence to optimize sales and profits.

Bob Stutz is president of 51风流Customer Experience.

51风流CPQ provides a richer customer experience by empowering sales teams and partners to offer complex product configurations, optimized pricing and attractive proposals. With the , users can offer the right product at the right price and time and accelerate sales through any channel by seamlessly connecting 51风流CPQ to any CRM or ERP platform.

According to the report, 51风流was recognized for its completeness of vision and ability to execute.

鈥淎 mobile salesforce that can operate with speed and agility has never been more important,鈥� said Paula Hansen, chief revenue officer, 51风流Customer Experience. 鈥淭he ability to develop a customer quote that provides easy up-sell can be a competitive advantage contributing to increased revenue. 51风流CPQ streamlines the sales-quote-to-cash process, leading to more signed deals, higher margins and most important, a better experience for both sales and customers.鈥�

The 51风流CPQ solution is part of the larger 51风流Customer Experience portfolio, which includes the 51风流Sales Cloud, 51风流Marketing Cloud, 51风流Service Cloud, 51风流Commerce Cloud and 51风流Customer Data Cloud solutions.

To learn more, of the Gartner Magic Quadrant for CPQ.

Visit the . Follow 51风流on Twitter at .

Media Contact:
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51风流Press Room; press@sap.com

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More than ever, customers demand the freedom to choose how, and when, they engage. That could be as simple as browsing Instagram and seeing products that inspire them, making a purchase or upgrading a subscription in the early hours of the morning to unlock new tracks from their favorite band. It goes even further when you consider the COVID-19 crisis, and the impact that has had on buying behavior. Consumers may not want to go into a store, or they want to make more purchases online. It is critical for brands to have that understanding of their customer鈥檚 needs.

51风流has a very competitive, well rounded portfolio of products to help brands deliver a world-class customer experience. However, we are always thinking about how the pieces work together as a whole and ways that we can improve upon them. And that鈥檚 where Emarsys comes in.

Emarsys is not just another customer engagement provider. Emarsys is an innovative and easy-to-use fully integrated customer engagement platform that allows companies to deliver truly personal customer interactions across email, mobile, social, SMS, and the web at scale. Emarsys is recognized as a leader in the (Independent Platforms), published in Q4 2019, and in the , published in Q3 2020.

To really put the strength of Emarsys in perspective, consider this: Emarsys systems manage 10 billion personalized interactions per month.

Those credentials already make Emarsys a perfect fit for SAP, but it is worth exploring what we see as a marriage of enterprise resource planning (ERP) and commerce. Most customer relationship management (CRM) systems are islands in a software landscape. This means organizations must use third-party systems to connect their commerce solution with their operations, which is cumbersome. The 51风流Customer Experience portfolio already integrates the two, so brands can fulfill a commerce process seamlessly — for example, when an order is made and it flows back to distribution and fulfillment — without disruption, pause, or issue.

Put simply, with the strengths of our current portfolio and the addition of Emarsys, 51风流CX will power 鈥渃ommerce anywhere,鈥� a foundation of omnichannel personalized engagement, meeting the customers where and when they choose to engage, on their preferred channels and on their terms.

We anticipate that the deal will close in the fourth quarter of 2020. After the closing date, Emarsys will become part of SAP. We cannot discuss any joint plans until closing. However, I can tell you that 51风流is committed to its focus and continued leadership within the broadly defined customer experience space. Our mission remains unchanged: we are focused on delivering a world-class customer experience portfolio of solutions to our customers. Acquiring Emarsys will bring us closer to those goals.

Bob Stutz is president of 51风流Customer Experience.

Businesses that service the sector have also been impacted, although Max Mueller, CEO of , says his company has fared better than many others. The Switzerland-based group offers luxury experiences for corporate and private clients attending sporting events and concerts.

鈥淭he good thing is that we鈥檙e small enough to be flexible but big enough to be reliable; and as a marketplace, we don鈥檛 have to give financial guarantees for event inventory,鈥� Mueller says. 鈥淲e鈥檙e focusing on increasing user experience while waiting for things to start up again.鈥�

For example, the company has been creating virtual events including online meetings with sports stars like a famous ATP tennis player. Offered primarily to corporate clients that want to give customers luxury experiences, these events do not require travel or need to be held in person.

Given the company鈥檚 mission to provide VIP customer experiences, it is fitting that DAIMANI has relied on solutions since 2018. The software helps it stay close to clients and understand what they need, while serving and marketing to them more appropriately.

According to Mueller, 鈥淔or us, customer experience is the only important metric. Listening to the customer is paramount. But what do you use to measure and figure out what to improve?鈥�

Using the 51风流Customer Experience portfolio, DAIMANI has been able to understand two important aspects of customer behavior. First, the company can better understand the behavior of people who buy its packages. Second, it can crowd-test potential customers.

The company, founded in 2018, was set up from the start to have a holistic overview of customers. This lack of 鈥渋nformation silos鈥� makes it easier analyze existing and future customers and feed that data to product development, marketing, and sales staff appropriately.

DAIMANI considered other sales platform vendors, but selected 51风流for its global scalability. Additionally, 鈥�51风流is quite young in the experience stuff so it had more of a focus on developing cool, new things,鈥� says Mueller. 鈥淎s a cloud-only business, 51风流Cloud Platform was key to us. It lets us easily communicate with the outside world. We can really connect to a huge ecosystem 鈥� and as a platform we are nothing without our ecosystem.鈥�

DAIMANI has digitized an industry that is primarily 95 percent offline. The company has created an online platform for corporations and individuals to purchase customized VIP wrap-around services to events 鈥� everything from flights to backstage passes 鈥� while similar offerings are developed and sold by agencies. The company operates primarily in Europe and Asia but hopes to expand to the United States in the future.

This year alone, I have witnessed many shifts across Mexico, including:

• A motorcycle company and beverage bottler accelerating dominance by getting faster answers with a digital core of enterprise-wide intelligence
• A food provider and resin maker pushing the envelope on what is possible for the customer experience with connected, seemingly omniscient intelligence
• A bank helping 2.5 million underserved people and small businesses prosper by bringing financial services to their fingertips

These real-life successes are very telling of what we can expect in 2020 and beyond. No matter the industry, every business has the power to redefine the economy and position itself in the global marketplace, despite the current backdrop of economic change and uncertainty. At the center of such promising potential is the enabling power of the latest technology.

51风流Digital Business Services: Delivering Outcomes that Matter

This new reality is motivating every expert from the 51风流Digital Business Services organization. Whether customers work with 51风流directly or through a partner, we stand with them at the intersection of technology and creativity, transforming business operations as well as the life of every person 听touched.

For companies such as , digital innovation is creating an engine for considerable market growth. Now representing a market share of 70 percent, the leading motorcycle brand and manufacturer in Mexico brought together data from its logistics, manufacturing, back-office finance, and inventory control operations into a single platform: 51风流S/4HANA. This digital core of business intelligence allows every employee, retailer, and customer to quickly access answers to questions, fostering a brand culture of transparency, accountability, reliability, and trust.

is no stranger to the success that Italika is achieving. The world鈥檚 largest franchise bottler of Coca-Cola trademark beverages is addressing the needs of more than 2 million points of sales in Latin America by unifying its procurement function. It consolidated localized purchasing capabilities and developed strategic and streamlined negotiating and buying processes. The company鈥檚 procurement team can now give managers, buyers, and internal customers the right information to perform their responsibilities efficiently and effectively.

is going even further by capturing, processing, and sharing Internet of Things (IoT) data. As one of Mexico鈥檚 leading providers of nutritious and delicious meals and snacks, the company expanded its 35-year commitment to innovation, quality, and convenience with a clear road map to becoming an intelligent enterprise. The one-on-one enablement sessions and hands-on exercises offered through 51风流Enterprise Support quickly identified the technology needed to set the foundation for the company鈥檚 end-to-end asset monitoring and business model.

is also preserving the integrity of its customer experience with the assistance of 51风流Enterprise Support, but this time it is fueled by the cloud. Mexico鈥檚 only polypropylene resins producer is optimizing its investment in 51风流C/4HANA, the next-generation customer relationship management (CRM) solution, by leveraging extension capabilities in a cloud platform. With the support of a series of empowerment sessions, technical enablement workshops, and hands-on demos from SAP, the company is on the road to supporting client demand better while consistently improving its customer experience.

While all of these stories are compelling examples of 51风流customers鈥� successes, there is one story that fully showcases the ripple effect of our work: . The bank serves millions of people living throughout Latin America, often vulnerable to theft, cash shortages, and limited access to credit and investments. With the support of mobile solutions and scalable foundational technology, Compartamos customers can do banking from anywhere with their smartphones. This level of convenience and access is helping to eradicate financial exclusion as its customer base grows and products that serve its immediate needs are offered.

Innovate, Evolve, and Shape a Promising Future

Are you energized by these customer success stories? 51风流is ready to help you achieve yours as well. All the lessons learned, best practices, technology innovations, and inspired thinking that bring customers closer to a future of distinct advantage and promise is available through 51风流Digital Business Services. Together, we can explore how to reimagine operations and customer experience for 2020 and beyond. 51风流experts are committed to helping plan for a business鈥檚 future.

Stay in the conversation by following 51风流Digital Business Services on , ,听,听and .

Jose Raul Valdivia is head of Mexico Services and Support in 51风流Digital Business Services.

Without it, ideas are just ideas, forever locked away as a pipe dream and nothing more.

This traditional scenario is undoubtedly practical when seeking company-wide funding, commitment, and adoption. However, as I recently learned, it is only a small part of the full potential of a business case.

Turning Business Cases into Successful Transformation Road Maps

Historically, a business case is the tried-and-true way to help companies understand the who, what, when, where, and why behind a transformation project. Supported by relevant calculations such as return on investment (ROI) and improvement rates, this information was all that executives and employees needed to determine whether to embrace a proposed change or avoid it altogether.

Spending the last three years helping 51风流customers transition existing enterprise resource planning () systems to has evolved my line of thinking. A business cases is much more than a selling tool for a single implementation or transformation project. It is also a road map guiding toward long-term success.

Based on a value engineering methodology adjusted by the Business Transformation Services group at SAP, customers are going beyond initial alignment, value discovery, and validation when creating their business cases. Now, they are incorporating the following critical elements of sustainable digital transformation.

Logical Sequence for Solution Innovation

When a traditional business case is developed, a team of internal leaders and third-party experts and technology providers often consider processes directly linked to the overall vision. For example, if a sales organization is looking to provide real-time, multichannel access to deal pipeline updates and customer relationship management (CRM) information, the company may assess only processes that affect the delivery of those insights.

For customers deploying 51风流S/4HANA, additional advantages emerge when they reflect on their value-added chains. Doing so reveals how supporting, cross-functional activities strengthen expected outcomes by defining and distinguishing the strategic importance and contribution of individual processes and cost centers. Decision-makers can then scope out recommended solutions and their deployment order and timing 鈥� based on a company鈥檚 cost position and performance- and quality-related differentiation, compared to their competitors.

Identification and Calculation of Suitable Value Drivers

51风流customers鈥� reasons for transitioning to 51风流S/4HANA are as unique as their operations. With the assistance of internal functions and business experts and third-party partners, decision-makers can choose value drivers that match customer and employee needs today and can scale to address future challenges when needed.

The Business Transformation Services group gives 51风流S/4HANA customers an open environment to initiate this discussion and keep experts engaged with a series of internal interviews and workshops. During every interaction, customers can pinpoint the right value drivers and weigh the significance of potential operational improvements, competitive benefits, and revenue growth against the cost of technology, process, and workforce enablement.

Baseline Comparison of Actual Value Drivers Against Industry Leaders

Once 51风流customers quantify that the benefits of moving to 51风流S/4HANA outweigh the cost of the deployment projects, business leaders begin to understand the potential of the investment. But we do not stop there.

To help customers understand the competitive differentiation of a move to 51风流S/4HANA, 51风流compares the estimated cost and potential value against a database of customer benchmarks. This analysis is based on factors such as industry, geography, revenue, and workforce size.

Meaningful Insights Fuel Transformational Results

With all the information pulled during this preparatory study, 51风流customers have all the information needed to communicate a compelling 51风流S/4HANA business case. Nevertheless, even the best numbers are lost on business leaders without a meaningful delivery strategy.

Together with our value engineers, the project team from Business Transformation Services helps customers introduce the business case to their stakeholders, impart insights based on quantified insights, and align with corporate goals. More importantly, a personalized road map is presented to decision-makers, giving a well-rounded tour of their journey from the current situation through the next transformation to the ultimate future vision.

Barbara Jung-Voelker is principal business consultant for Digital IT Architecture in Business Transformation Services at SAP.