Top Mistakes by Retail Merchandisers
Avoid these mistakes to ensure you conduct and submit a complete retail merchandising report.
1. Not carefully reading the guidelines.
Remember to read over the guidelines fully well in advance of your visits. Even if you have done similar projects in the past for certain clients, they always have new requests. We’re providing you the information to succeed in these guidelines, make sure to read them!
2. Committing to service too many locations at once (or during a route).
We get it. It’s always great to try and complete as many store visits as possible on your route because you make more money! Learn how to budget and understand how much time and effort these visits will actually take. Don’t bite off more than you can chew and get into a bad situation with a lot of stores left to visit and only 1 or 2 days left to get them done!
3. Photos that are too blurry and not directly facing the item or display.
Photos are far and away the most important part of all of our merchandising and retail service projects. They tell the story for our clients and it is absolutely imperative we provide them with great photos. Take your time and take a clear, in-focus photo. If it’s blurry, trash it and take another. Make sure you are taking the photo the way the guidelines ask you to. Help us help you by clearly capturing the item requested as well as the environment around it. This way if we do have follow up questions about your visit, the photos will aid in understanding what happened.
4. Not visiting a location during the correct day(s) and times(s).
Many of our projects, whether in retail environments or doctor’s offices, have required days and times to service. Pay attention and work with each store or site directly to ensure you are arriving to complete your task during the right time. If you are unsure, call your scheduler!
5. Put the wrong product/marketing materials in the store being serviced.
Often times we do projects across multiple retailers or doctor’s offices. Each site may have different products, marketing pieces or print collateral that is specific to that store or office. Make sure you know which items go in which stores. If mistakes happen you’ll have to return and remove that from the store or office and correct it. Save the 2nd trip and take a little extra time up front to make sure you have the right materials!
6. Field Rep voice mailbox is full and will not return calls from Project Managers.
CI’s operations staff want you to be as successful as possible. We often try calling and some reps seemingly make it quite difficult to get a hold of them. Please clear out your voice mailbox and return our calls or emails when we’re reaching out. Often times it’s to clarify situations so we can ensure you get paid for the services you completed. We’re here to help!
7. Not getting as much information as needed during the store visit.
Some reps try to race through their objectives. Don’t be that person! Take your time, remain at a steady pace. It only will take a few more minutes and you’ll end up getting all of the information we need, or provide even better information. Examples would be detailing in additional comments things we might want to know about the visit, or taking 3 photos on photo tasks instead of 1 when prompted.
8. Tried to make the visit before receiving all required materials.
This happens far too often. If you are receiving materials in bulk to complete a route of stores, wait and make sure you receive all of your materials prior to trying to make your visit. If you are curious about if you have all of your materials, contact your scheduler!
9. Completing the mission under the wrong location in GoSpotCheck.
This is frustrating and can sometimes happen if your App does not refresh once you make it to the store. The best way to ensure this doesn’t happen is once you get to the store and you’re looking at your available jobs, slide down the list and let it refresh with your new location data and it will bring the store you’re right outside of to the top of the list. Double check the address matches where you are, and you’ll be all set!
10. Failed to communicate with CI scheduler when something goes wrong in the field.
A common theme across our tips and most common mistakes is failure to communicate. We want to help you! If you’re making a visit between 8:30 am – 5:00 pm central time and have questions, call your scheduler! If something didn’t go right in the field during the visit, don’t just submit the mission and hope we don’t see it or need to follow up. Be proactive and let us know so we can work with you to make sure you do what’s fully asked to the best of your ability and we’re able to relay that to the client.
