The competitive advantage of Store Assist

Laurence Faguer: Selling online is expensive—anything that allows you to develop your eCommerce activity while increasing your profitability is worth considering. Sometimes this means relying on someone with more experience than you in some aspects of your business.

Walmart Commerce Technologies gives retailers access to its proven technology through white label solutions, so customer experiences stay under your brand. The Store Assist app is one way that Walmart Commerce Technologies is helping businesses navigate today’s omni-channel world. This out-of-the box, mobile-first, store fulfillment application powers frictionless fulfillment, from in-store and curbside pickup capabilities to last-mile delivery and ship-from-store integrations.

With Store Assist, retailers can now leverage Walmart’s years of operating experience as a Fortune 1 company and take advantage of ongoing product innovation to continuously stay ahead of customer needs. This allows retailers to stay focused on what matters most—their customers.

Let's get down to business. What is Store Assist?

Massoud Nezam: Store Assist is powered by Walmart Commerce Technologies and is a fulfillment application that digitizes and optimizes store fulfillment processes. This app was built for retailers leveraging Walmart’s years of operating experience as the Fortune 1 retailer. The app unlocks mobile-first fulfillment capabilities for retailers of all sizes to effectively help manage all their in-store, curbside, ship from store and last-mile delivery orders.

LF: Knowing that Walmart is a people-led retailer, how does Store Assist improve the customer experience?

MN: Yes, and you’re right—Store Assist enhances the customer and employee experiences, from checkout to operating more efficiently and even reaching new customers.

We all know customers remain time and budget conscious but also want personalized, frictionless, convenient shopping experiences, no matter what channel their shopping is on. This is keeping pressure on retailers to further streamline and adapt their business to meet, and ideally exceed, customer expectations while also preserving their margins.

With Store Assist, customers have the option to fulfill their orders with a retailer in multiple channels whether that’s pickup in store, pickup curbside, have their order delivered or shipped from the store.

Store Assist also helps by ensuring that the customer gets exactly what they ordered as the app has a built-in mechanism to prevent associates from fulfilling the wrong item. The app can also help associates pick substitute items when items are not available whether that’s based on the customers preferences or suggested substitutions. Finally, the customer typically doesn’t have to wait as long to pick up their order thanks to Store Assist’s ability to help with a seamless handoff process. In fact, our tech has helped Walmart decrease customer wait times by nearly 40%.*

LF: Where does your client find the best ROI? Is it in lowering fulfillment costs by leveraging local store footprints? By filling orders accurately and efficiently, by managing supply chain challenges?

MN: It’s all the above. Higher efficiency is driven by numerous capabilities and functions in Store Assist including picking optimization, multi-order picking, real time reporting, staging and handoff support. Like I said, Store Assist really takes the guesswork out of picking, which increases employee productivity and efficiency. It also essentially helps retailers turn their physical locations into fulfillment centers. And remember, the same tech that powers Store Assist has powered the world’s largest retailer for a decade— helping Walmart associates pick over 830M orders since 2019, to be more specific.

At the top end of the profit margin, it allows retailers to be more efficient and in turn open more pickup or delivery slots for the same day if they choose. This allows for increased revenue and a better customer experience.

LF: There must be a question that everyone asks you in the first conversations, especially in Europe: where do you keep your client’s customer data?

MN: We believe that a benefit of working with us, instead of leveraging third parties to do the fulfillment, is that retailers get to directly own the relationship with their customers. We have guidelines in place at Walmart Commerce Technologies based on privacy regulations, data protection regulations, antitrust policies, and Walmart’s standards. We’re happy to have discussions with future clients about the details of data access, data separation, etc.

LF: When and why did Walmart first come up with the idea of offering its own white label technology?

MN: A little over a year ago, we launched Walmart Commerce Technologies as an official external brand to sell solutions based on our proven technology to help and enable businesses of all sizes with the tools they need to thrive in a digital world.

However, this idea has been incubated for a while and was a product in the making. Walmart has always been customer obsessed. It’s at the center of everything we do, which is why we’ve focused on developing technology that has elevated every aspect of the customer experience. It’s taken us years and dedicated resources to develop these solutions, and that can be a barrier for many businesses.

Walmart has a unique ability to help other businesses elevate their offerings, keeping pace with the rapidly evolving marketplace and meeting the needs of changing customer expectations.

LF: When first equipped by Store Assist, how do employees react, and what is their feedback using it?

MN: It’s fun to see this technology in action and the employees are energized, they like how prescriptive the technology is to help them fulfill orders efficiently and quickly.

The employee leaderboard also brings an element of friendly competition. Employees try to outperform their colleagues with pick speeds, hand off speeds, etc.

As part of onboarding clients also get access to resources that can help them when configuring Store Assist—whether that’s configuring certain capabilities in the app or onboarding employees. We all know technology is only one piece of the equation. Operationally, you need to optimize the tech to fit your unique business. This is something we can help with. With Store Assist you get access to some of the same teams that have rolled out this technology at Walmart stores. That’s a unique proposition for a retailer; getting best-in-class technology as well as the operational experience of the world’s largest retailer at the same time.

LF: What benefits does Walmart find in serving its customers locally, with having the inventory the closest to the customers?

MN: I think we’re all aware that convenience and speed are always top of mind for customers. And as retailers, businesses want to deliver on that customer satisfaction of getting items when they want them and quickly. I think retailers have seen that if they can’t deliver quickly, consumers are not shy to look elsewhere.

Plus, with curbside and in-store pickup, customers can avoid shipping charges and pick up items at their convenience—without even entering the store. And while order speed is top of mind for customers, it’s also top of mind for retailers because retailers are looking for ways to better leverage store-level inventory to help reduce supply chain issues, and drive fast and cost-effective local fulfillment.

LF: You recently announced a partnership with Salesforce. What will a French Salesforce client get out of this partnership?

MN: French retailers will benefit from this partnership in the same way that all clients might. Our partnership with Salesforce provides retailers' access to the same scalable technologies that Walmart uses.

These solutions will enable personalized and easy commerce experiences with real-time order visibility and reliable local pickup and delivery. Most importantly, with a seamless integration to Salesforce Commerce Cloud and Order Management, retailers can drive efficiency and profitability across the omnichannel shopping journey.

LF: What does a French retailer need to prepare to take advantage of Store Assist?

MN: Well, that's the beauty of Store Assist—it's white-label, and completely turnkey. Because this is proven tech from the world's largest retailer, you can leverage Store Assist to help you scale your business from day one. If you’re interested in either unlocking omnichannel fulfillment capabilities or want to optimize your current operations just reach out to us and we can chat about your business's specific needs.

LF: How can my readers get in touch with you?

MN: I encourage any readers to reach out to our team directly either on our website, commerce.walmart.com, or by emailing commercetech@walmart.com. I also welcome the opportunity to connect on LinkedIn. I’d love to get connected!

* Wait times at Walmart stores compared from Nov 2020 to June 2021