Companies selling into the consumer and retail space have to deal with a variety of channels including private-label OEMs, distributors, retailers, etailers, resellers and DMRs. For this market much of the end-user demand is driven by time-limited and seasonal manufacturer’s rebates and promotions. The ability to track channel data in real-time to help prevent, for example, stock-outs is therefore crucial for companies targeting the consumer and retail sectors.
Industry-Specific Challenges
For Consumer and Retail Channel Management, key differentiators and revenue maximization opportunities come from judiciously managing the following processes:
- Aggregating and aligning data from different tiers in the channel (e.g. distributors, resellers, OEMs, retailers) for consolidated analysis.
- Normalizing and consolidating both reseller and named end customer accounts.
- Managing and validating multiple POS (back-end) credits (e.g. distributor price exceptions and reseller preferred pricing) for the same POS transaction.
- Complex sales credit assignments and commission splits based on arbitrary combinations of distributors, resellers, end customers, territories, product families, etc., net of back-end credits.
- Collaborating on and validating a plethora of marketing incentives such as SPIFFs, MDF, co-op, volume incentive rebates and loyalty programs.
- Consolidated channel control dashboard and analytics for complete channel insight.
- Sell-through revenue recognition, net of back end credits.
