NEW PRACTICES FOR NEW OPPORTUNITIES

FOR THE RETAIL SECTOR

1 INTROduction

GOOGLE ENTERPRISE IS A DIVISION OF THAT IS DEDICATED TO PROFESSIONAL SOLUTIONS. ITS MISSION IS TO HELP COMPANIES CREATE, SHARE AND FIND INFORMATION.

Google Enterprise solutions transform the way people work on a day-to-day basis thanks to tools intended for team collaboration and designed for the web.

GOOGLE ENTERPRISE PRODUCTS ARE GROUPED INTO THREE MAIN CATEGORIES

applications (Google Apps)

SEARCH ()

GEOLOCATION ( / )

As a recognised partner of the retail industry, working with customers like Ahold, Brand Alley, GANT, L’Occitane, Rituals and Specsavers, Google Enterprise has identified a number of trends and opportunities in this sector. …

2 AN INCREASINGLY COMPLEX COMMERCIAL ENVIRONMENT AND COSTLY SUPPLY CHAIN, PARTICULARLY FOR RETAILERS WITH AN INTERNATIONAL PRESENCE..

“Faced with increasing competition over prices and the growing cost of raw materials, profit margins are shrinking away to nothing.”

Source : Accenture, 2011.

TEAMS ARE SCATTERED WITH LIMITED MEANS OF COMMUNICATION AND COLLABORATION, PARTICULARLY AT POINTS OF SALE.

«At Best Buy, only 2000 of the 180,000 employees work in collaboration with one another.»

Source : Jacob Morgan, Chess Media Group, 2011.

THE EMERGENCE OF ONLINE TO STORE (O2S), WHICH CONSISTS OF SEARCHING ONLINE THEN BUYING AT THE SHOP.

Faced with an increasingly wide choice of products, consumers are becoming more and more demanding and better informed. 64% of consumers carry out online research before visiting a shop to make a purchase.

Source : Commission Européenne, 2010

3 OPPORTUNITIES

ATTRACT CUSTOMERS, WIN THEIR LOYALTY, IMPROVE THEIR EXPERIENCE both online and in the shop

FOSTER COLLABORATION AND PROMOTE INNOVATION within your teams within your teams

IMPROVE WORKING PROCEDURES

GOOGLE ENTERPRISE OFFERS SOLUTIONS TO CAPTURE THESE OPPORTUNITIES RIGHT NOW with simple yet powerful tools like Google Apps, Google , Google Search, Google Commerce Search and Google Maps.

4 OPPORTUNITIES

ATTRACT CUSTOMERS, WIN THEIR LOYALTY, IMPROVE THEIR EXPERIENCE BOTH ONLINE AND IN THE SHOP

Google Enterprise offers a richer customer experience thanks to tools that promote teamwork and are designed for the web, like Google Apps, Google Commerce Search, Android and Chromebook for Business.

These solutions put brands in touch with new customers, improve online profitability, increase levels of traffic to points of sale and enrich the customer’s in-shop experience with new dimensions that bring together sales advice and the sensory experience.

Search: generate interest before the sale

Internet users decide in an average of By bringing together the data relating eight seconds1 whether they are going to online products and the speed and to stay on a site or not, so it is crucial to familiarity of Google Search, GCS help customers find the products and provides visitors with the information services that meet their needs quickly. they need to make their purchasing Google Search Appliance and Google decisions, all in a response time of Commerce Search (GCS) encourage just a few milliseconds and with une- the discovery of new products and offer qualled precision. The repercussions a better online shopping experience of this enhanced user experience are thanks to the speed and intuitiveness that it increases website conversion of Google’s search technology. Google rates, increases sales and develops Commerce Search is a high-perfor- customer loyalty. mance search solution specifically designed for online or multi-channel 1 Source : « Eight Seconds to Capture Attention: retail. Silverpop’s Landing Page Report » (2007)

5 OPPORTUNITIES

« L’Occitane is unique in that our beauty products centre around ingredients such as lavender, shea butter and verbena. As our customers visit our re-designed website to shop and research our products, we’re excited about the speed and accuracy of on-site search results that will be provided to us through Google Commerce Search.»

Christine Burke VP of International E-Commerce, L’Occitane.

Other online traders have reported impressive returns

Woodcrafts has seen its search-driven revenue increase by 34% and its online conversions increase by 28%. Searches on BabyAge.com have risen by 64%. HealthWarehouse has recorded a growth of 19% in its online conversion rate thanks to Google Commerce Search.

TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT GOOGLE COMMERCE SEARCH ANDGOOGLE SEARCH APPLIANCE, SEE THE “RESOURCES” SECTION OF THE GOOGLE APPS RETAIL SITE.

6 OPPORTUNITIES

Generate traffic

Mobile local advertising is naturally internal websites. To give an example, complemented by geolocation tools. Carreofour offers geolocation of all With Google Maps API Premier, com- its shops, along with personalised panies can easily integrate interactive routes. Apple and McDonald’s also Google Maps into their public or use Google’s geolocation functions.

Improve in-shop customer experience

Shops set the stage for the purchase and the customer relationship through styling, a well-defined selection and layout of products, a particular ambiance created through lighting and music. The spirit of the brand must be apparent at first glance and consistent with the web and mobile channels.

Offer advice and interactivity Access multimedia content

Customers are increasingly in pos- centralises and securely session of smartphones and tablets, streams multimedia training all over so sellers owe it to themselves to offer the world. a rich, interactive in-shop experience. Information relating to sales and Using mobile terminals, tablets, management is accessible from any phones and laptops, directories of point in the shop or stockroom via videos and demonstrations hosted a Google Android mobile device or on Google Video can be accessed and Chromebook, Microsoft Windows presented directly to customers in Mobile, BlackBerry, Apple iPhone or the shop. iPad.

7 OPPORTUNITIES

MOTIVATE TEAMS AND FOSTER COLLABORATION

Despite the geographical distribution of employees, rotation of staff and seasonal changes, there are ways of motivating teams and stimulating their productivity.

Promote collaboration and increase productivity

Many departments have to work in totally web-based and can be accessed collaboration: such as merchandi- securely, at any time, from any place sing, marketing, logistics and pro- and via any wired or mobile device duct management. Collaboration is connected to the Internet. fundamental to a brand’s success They simplify the sharing and distri- and is facilitated by the different bution of information, and real-time functions offered by Google Apps. collaboration at regional, national These professional applications are and international levels.

« A very intuitive tool that won our employees over very quickly. With Google Apps, we have been able to link up teams from the central departments with those in the regions by giving them a tool that allows individual work and common management. »

Cyril Guillemain Head of organisation and change management in Kiloutou’s IT department

8 OPPORTUNITIES

Communicate in real time and in all languages

Google Apps enables real-time mana- disappear thanks to the translation of gement in a multilingual environment. instant exchanged through It is a simpler process which replaces Google Apps. Furthermore, the exchange of emails with documents offers 25 GB of storage, so it is no longer that are shared and jointly edited in necessary to regularly delete emails real time, selectively and securely, by in order to free up space. The Google the various people involved, who make search function allows you to easily comments through instant messaging find these messages again without or in the discussion thread within the needing to spend time organising document itself. Language barriers them.

« Thanks to tools like automated translation, Google Apps enabled us to improve communication and collaboration between our different sites around the world. »

Christine Atkins Senior Vice-President, Ahold

Coordinate diaries

The shared online calendar enables nisation with smartphones, setting of you to schedule key dates, projected reminders for meetings or conference milestones and anticipated delive- calls, searching for created events and rables. the option to integrate with public Co-workers share their diaries, with diaries. Management of working hours availability of participants, synchro- is thereby made simpler.

9 OPPORTUNITIES

Share best practices

Via Google Video, heads of depart- and shop layouts through portals for ments and shop managers can collaboration that combine photos, exchange their points of view and graphics, videos, comments, forums experiences relating to merchandising and documents.

« In fashion, we work with product catalogues, archived images of our collections and press photos. We started by adopting Gmail but quickly discovered the power of and Video for Business. Since then, thanks to these solutions, it has been quick and easy for our teams to share videos, photos and presentations, both internally and with the press. Our shops around the world can access pictures from our catwalk shows instantly. It is a huge advantage to be able to give online access to all this content without needing to send large numbers of attachments. Our employees really appreciate the way the technology helps them to work more efficiently and creatively. »

Carlo di Biagio Group Operations Director, Roberto Cavalli.

You can create discussion forums knowledge exchange between depart- with to promote ments and shops.

10 OPPORTUNITIES

Develop employee loyalty and simplify human resource management

Communicating key information

To teams that are geographically company culture and employee dispersed can be an arduous task. involvement. Furthermore, a tool With tools like Google Apps, both like can translate mobile and office-based employees can emails, websites, documents and access their emails from any location. even instant conversations into 53 The information is made accessible languages, making international to everyone and helps to reinforce communication easier.

Bring human resources teams and employees together

With Google Sites, it is possible to requests, etc. in real time. It is even create a human resources portal possible to automatically chase up that is accessible to all, without any employees who have not yet formally technical skills. This will store all accepted company policies, in order of the company’s information, rules to implement compliance regulations. and forms. This kind of system eliminates nume- By implementing automated actions rous manual procedures, which are on the basis of simple scenarios, it is expensive and can be subject to typing possible to track applications for an errors. Because they are simplified internal vacancy, employee changes and automated, the procedures are of address and contact details, holiday better received by employees

11 OPPORTUNITIES

Develop employee loyalty and simplify human resource management

Integrate new employees

When faced with turnover levels that based on Google Sites, that consist of can be high, it is critical to be able secure videos and documents. This to source, integrate and train new self-service approach helps new employees quickly. When it comes to employees to get integrated quickly new employee training, it is very easy and smoothly, whether they are sales to introduce portals for self-training, assistants or managers.

The French automotive Treves supplier has auto- mated its system of hiring requests, which used to be written by hand. Both in its native country of France and internationally, this slow and tedious procedure was marred by the loss of a fifth of the forms. Now, managers submit hiring requests through a simple web form in . Each request passes automatically through all the steps of the validation process. Once it has been noted, the new position is added to a Google spreadsheet. The validation process has thereby been reduced from four weeks to ten days. The human resources manager can also track all recruitment and job vacancies in real time.

Manage skills

It is often difficult for human resources scripts, it is possible to identify these to obtain a real-time image of skills skills and the training completed by within the company. By combining employees in order to maximise team and Google Apps potential.

12 OPPORTUNITIES

OPTIMISE WORKING PROCEDURES WHILE REDUCING OPERATING COSTS

Reduce operating costs

Lighten the IT load to concentrate on retail

At a cost of 40 euros per user per nance. Google Enterprise takes care year for all of the services supplied of these and continually provides the as Saas, Google Apps creates signifi- best technology. Retailers use these cant savings. Brands no longer need to IT services according to their current worry about investing in equipment needs, in a smooth manner thanks to and software, nor in upgrade mainte- monthly billing.

« We calculated out over a five-year period and realised that we could achieve a 60% reduction in our email system Total Cost of Ownership by moving to Google Apps »

Louise Gary Manager of Client Services, Hamilton Beach

With Google Apps Marketplace, simple. They also offer additional brands can very quickly choose and integrations such as data syncing deploy web applications included with the Google Apps suite. Admi- in the Google Apps suite: such as nistrators manage a single directory of software for accounting, CRM, project both users and applications from the management, etc. Every Marketplace same unified interface as Google Apps. application provides a single sign-on This functionality reduces overheads system, making adoption extremely and improves security for the retailer.

13 OPPORTUNITIES

Reduce operating costs

Win new markets

The Saas model of Google Apps is ideal new employees in just a few hours and for companies that are growing rapidly gives them instant access to email because it allows for the addition of and all of the company’s documents.

« The technological lead of Google Apps for Business, as well as the new practices and the minimal total cost of the solution, are all major benefits for Brandalley in view of the highly competitive nature of e-commerce. »

Thibaud Cainne CTO, Brandalley

« Our objective is to double in size. In our search for ‘agile growth’, EAT adopted Google Apps for Business. By providing our employees with online applications, we no longer need to waste time installing and updating local applications. In addition, our employees have the option to work using any device: computer, smartphone or tablet etc... »

Cesar Ramanauskas Systems Engineer at EAT

14 OPPORTUNITIES

Reduce operating costs

IT that’s always up to date

Chromebooks, which are 100% web- stored on the computer, tiresome tasks based computers using Chrome OS, like backups and transferring data also offer subscription-based pricing when changing equipment are no for greater flexibility. longer necessary. Brands no longer This is an all-in-one package that need to worry about the consequences includes the computer, operating of a computer being lost or stolen. system, updates and cloud-based are equipped with the management, as well as full assis- first commercial operating system tance from Google Enterprise. Google designed from the start to ensure updates are absolutely smooth and protection against the permanent guarantee that the operating system threat of viruses and other malware. and software solutions are always up For administrators, Chromebooks are to date, without any need to manually managed easily from a single web- install patches. As very little data is based console.

« Google gives Specsavers the ability to roll out to new countries rapidly, leveraging a cloud infrastructure without significant investment. »

Karl de Bruijn Directeur Informatique Europe, Specsavers

« While it takes us two weeks to open a new shop, Gmail is the service that is activated most quickly... »

Cesar Ramanauskas Systems Engineer at EAT

15 OPPORTUNITIES

Guarantee security and reliability

Google operates one of the most With 24-hour-a-day, 7-day-a-week reliable distributed data centres in the protection and monitoring by a dedi- world. Protection of the intellectual cated team, these systems continually property and data on these servers is meet very strict requirements in terms an absolute priority and the company of controls. dedicates a great deal of resources to Google guarantees at least 99.9%2 maintaining data security. uptime for Google Apps.

Improve the supply chain

Automate data collection

Thanks to its online forms, Google industry-specific processes that can Apps automates the collection and be automated in little time and at low centralisation of sales-related data cost with Google Apps. between points of sale and head office, as well as from suppliers. Monitoring of budgets and price changes, product 2 The 99.9% uptime guarantee recalls and calendars of events shared with Google Apps for Business between shops are just some of the forms part of the service level agreement.

« Google Apps is a simpler, more economical way of bringing our information system to life. The degree to which this tool has increased employee productivity is also unbelievable »

Howard Kolodny Director of Information Systems, Z Gallerie

16 OPPORTUNITIES

Improve the supply chain

Manage complaints

Euromaster Group, which has accelerates the customer response 1500 points of sale in 10 countries, time. implemented Google Apps in order The same can be said of absences, to develop new business practices. which are managed through a sha- Complaints are managed through red online spreadsheet, simplifying Google Sites, combining email with the HR manager’s task by grouping instant messaging, which makes the together the information from each monitoring process smoother and Euromaster garage.

Extend access to standardised usage procedures

Often long and difficult to update, therefore have access to the latest these procedures are documented updated version, in their mother and shared with a limited number tongue, thanks to Google Translate. of employees. By using Google The costs of creation, revision and Sites, brands can create this kind of publication are minimised. Access document collaboratively and make is possible from any kind of device, it accessible to everyone. Employees mobile or fixed.

17 conclusion

We can look forward to many new business practices being made possible by , particularly in relation to collaboration and mobility. With four million companies using Google Apps, retail managers and employees are seeing gains in the speed, simplicity and sharing of their day-to-day tasks.

TO FIND OUT MORE AND READ TESTIMONIALS FROM COMPANIES USING GOOGLE, CONTACT US OR VISIT GOOGLE.CO.UK/A