Recent Articles

A customer walks into a store to return a pair of shoes. The store associate asks for a receipt, the customer hands them an email confirmation from an online purchase. These shoes were purchased on line, shipped from warehouse inventory, not sold in the store from the store inventory. How do you manage the return of an item that was bought online but is being returned to the store? How do you manage updating your inventory? Can your point of sale system (POS) access the original purchase and customer record to make the return, and perhaps exchange process, seamless for the customer? Does your...

Order Management has come a long way from the golden age of catalogers.  Back in the 1980’s, pre-Internet, there were two sales channels catalogers needed to worry about: the phone and mail-in orders.  Today, order management systems (OMS) need to work with every retail channel, or omnichannel, in order to be the central repository for all customer purchases, not just orders.  This requirement has been propelled by growing consumer expectations generated by a paradigm shift in the way they shop.  In addition, retail executives are looking for the OMS to reduce the number of systems necessary to manage orders, inventory,...

Omnichannel may be the latest buzzword, but it’s more than just a passing fad.  Omnichannel technology is the infrastructure that enables retailers and online merchants to give today's customer the shop-anywhere, ship-anywhere, pick-up or return anywhere behavior they demand. The previous generation of technology that many of today’s businesses rely on consists of numerous disparate systems that were not designed to operate together.  Today’s leading edge retailers and online trend-setters have replaced those systems with omnichannel-capable new systems.  Now you need to do the same thing to remain competitive – but how? Step one is to recognize that while omnichannel is complicated...

With the economy still not at peak performance, apparel retailers went to the old standby this past holiday season, discounting. We all know that, if not done well, this promotions strategy can quickly erode margins and add little value to the customer, especially loyal ones. For the online channel, free shipping (the oldest promotion used in eCommerce) was still at the top of the heap this past holiday season. Customers have come to expect free shipping, especially for orders of significant value (over $100).  If you're like many retailers, you'd like to stop this practice of giving customers free shipping all...

It's July, so if you're a retailer, it's time to start preparing for the holiday season. Freestyle Solutions is here to help online retailers and brands survive and thrive during the busy season. Below are some tips that will help your business this holiday season. Prepare Your Website Is your website ready for the traffic spikes the holidays can bring? Testing load time for API’s and your site’s speed is a good idea before the holiday season. If you collect customer data or accept credit cards online, you’ll want to verify your site is PCI compliant. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI...