6 Must-Haves For Retailers' Mobile Platforms

By Greg Burch, VP Mobile, Business Development and ISV Relationships, Ingenico North America

The mobile platform has become a key strategic component for retailers focused on creating a compelling in-store experience for shoppers, enabling clerks to provide increased service and bringing the point of sale to the in-lane point of service. Below is a list of must-haves when offering a mobile store system platform to retailers:

1. Flexible data connectivity options. Retailers must determine how a new mobile platform operates within their existing network infrastructure. Does it connect directly to legacy systems or should it run in its own silo? Flexible data connectivity will accommodate legacy systems as well as future technology investments. This is often accomplished with a flexible, standards-based API that also allows enterprise legacy systems to achieve connectivity through a translation layer.
2. Scalable mobile solution. Many retailers are still launching their first mobile in store platforms, therefore, they are learning about their individual store operations requirements and team capabilities. To achieve success in this evolution, the platform should be scalable to support a phased implementation. Retailers should be able to launch a subset of the full system feature set in order to migrate to a mobile store system; for example, a retailer could launch a system that only implements inventory look up to start to enable the mobile evolution of the store operations infrastructure. Additionally, retailers should be able to scale up the quantity, functionality, and type of devices on the system.  

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