A Look Ahead into 2017

The end of 2016 and the beginning of 2017 have flown by. Our entire team has been working at a steady pace, pushing out improvements to our key ordering solution, BUYiQ, including release of Stocked Not Scanned, a ScanGenius feature many users were looking for in BUYiQ; a Batch Quick View function that speeds scanning performance on all devices; and the launch of Pricebooks for Directs, giving vendors the opportunity to load retailer-specific wholesale pricing into our system for retailers’ viewing in MyGeniusCentral.com. All of these features were released during January and early February.

As we head towards Expo West, we are really excited about the features we’ll be presenting at the show.

We’ve been updating BUYiQ’s look and feel, making the user interface fresh, clear, intuitive, interactive, and rewarding, especially if you are looking for deals and offers on-the-fly. Last year, we took our designs out to some retail customers for feedback and development is almost complete. We will be demoing the new version at Expo West with expectations that we will widely launch in April.

BUYiQ users will have already experienced the new In-Aisle Sample Request function. In the first month, with only 5 vendors participating and no advanced promotion, we had over 160 requests for samples from buyers. As more vendors participate, we expect even more request submissions. Buyers can access samples from participating vendors via the Sample List function or when they scan any item in the vendor’s catalog.

On the heels of the sample request function, we are entering into a pilot of our first-in-a-series of interactive vendor promotions called Mix & Match Promotions. The first release will showcase multiple deal levels for a single UPC, allowing retailers to see and take advantage of deal pricing with a single tap. The new function will eliminate the need for buyers to mentally calculate savings when purchasing higher multiples or call their reps for special pricing. We will be demoing this function to vendors and retailers at Expo West.

Vendors are excited about our increased automation capabilities, allowing participating vendors to choose from a variety of automated methods to receive orders electronically. Due to retailers’ requests, we are working on expanding electronic invoicing from vendors. Our first iteration of retailer-specific wholesale pricing, called Pricebooks, is launching at Expo West along with our new Retailer Order Report function which will be widely released in April. All of these services are intended to help support vendors move into automation and address our retailers’ needs for more accurate and timely data feeds into their various POS and back-end systems.

As always, your feedback is very important to us. Many customers use the BUYiQ feedback feature and we certainly reach out to our retailers and vendors to collect their input during the research and development phases of our product development. We’d love to talk with you in person, as well! If you are planning on attending Expo West, please be sure to drop by Booth 2770 to visit with us.

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