Google Cloud Platform Case Studies SoundCommerce Powers Retail Decisions With Real-Time Data

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	SoundCommerce Powers Retail Decisions With Real-Time Data Google Cloud Platform

SoundCommerce Powers Retail Decisions With Real-Time Data

Google Cloud Platform

Technology Category	Analytics & Modeling - Data-as-a-Service Analytics & Modeling - Real Time Analytics Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Computing
Applicable Industries	Retail
Applicable Functions	Sales & Marketing
Use Cases	Inventory Management Real-Time Location System (RTLS) Supply Chain Visibility
Services	Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services Data Science Services
Challenge	SoundCommerce, a data platform for retail brands, was facing challenges in accessing and taking action on the data they needed to efficiently and effectively deliver above and beyond the competition. They were under pressure to offer the best customer experience, which required understanding customers and supply chain. Their previous solution put too much administrative burden on their technical team for creating, maintaining, and customizing a shared and responsive data model, and a growing library of reports and visualizations. The prior stack lacked the power and features that consumer brands and retailers need to make fast decisions at scale. In addition to product challenges, the SoundCommerce product team worried about the risk of potential vendor lock-in down the road — both for their commercial product and for their customers’ data. Read More
About Customer	SoundCommerce, founded in 2018 by veterans of Amazon.com, provides an out-of-the-box data platform for retail brands from global chains to local small businesses. The platform is designed to help brands better forecast and manage inventory while providing the most seamless customer experience. It is built upon years of retail, eCommerce, and analytics experience and is designed to collect data from any source and build a model around the metrics and relationships that are most crucial to retail. This includes everything from trend forecasting, inventory control, marketing strategy, and customer experience. Read More
Solution	SoundCommerce chose to build their data platform on Google Cloud Platform, BigQuery and Looker. This provides a robust base platform while still providing flexibility for clients to choose their own tools as needed. The platform helps retail companies understand and optimize their inventory, exceed customer expectations, and ultimately create 'super fans'. It delivers robust and real-time insights to their customers. With these insights, consumer brands and retailers can monitor and focus on three key concepts, which SoundCommerce believes are essential for retail success: A focus on real-time commerce operations as a driver of Customer Experience, close tracking of granular Unit Economics — the detailed revenue and profit profile for every order — to enable quick and precise decision-making about pricing and operational optimizations, and Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) that includes variable costs and contribution margins of a customer relationship, to accurately track and grow CLV over time. Read More Log in to view content
Contents

Technology Category

Analytics & Modeling - Data-as-a-Service

Analytics & Modeling - Real Time Analytics

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Computing

Applicable Industries

Retail

Applicable Functions

Sales & Marketing

Use Cases

Inventory Management

Real-Time Location System (RTLS)

Supply Chain Visibility

Services

Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services

Data Science Services

Challenge

SoundCommerce, a data platform for retail brands, was facing challenges in accessing and taking action on the data they needed to efficiently and effectively deliver above and beyond the competition. They were under pressure to offer the best customer experience, which required understanding customers and supply chain. Their previous solution put too much administrative burden on their technical team for creating, maintaining, and customizing a shared and responsive data model, and a growing library of reports and visualizations. The prior stack lacked the power and features that consumer brands and retailers need to make fast decisions at scale. In addition to product challenges, the SoundCommerce product team worried about the risk of potential vendor lock-in down the road — both for their commercial product and for their customers’ data.

About Customer

SoundCommerce, founded in 2018 by veterans of Amazon.com, provides an out-of-the-box data platform for retail brands from global chains to local small businesses. The platform is designed to help brands better forecast and manage inventory while providing the most seamless customer experience. It is built upon years of retail, eCommerce, and analytics experience and is designed to collect data from any source and build a model around the metrics and relationships that are most crucial to retail. This includes everything from trend forecasting, inventory control, marketing strategy, and customer experience.

Solution

SoundCommerce chose to build their data platform on Google Cloud Platform, BigQuery and Looker. This provides a robust base platform while still providing flexibility for clients to choose their own tools as needed. The platform helps retail companies understand and optimize their inventory, exceed customer expectations, and ultimately create 'super fans'. It delivers robust and real-time insights to their customers. With these insights, consumer brands and retailers can monitor and focus on three key concepts, which SoundCommerce believes are essential for retail success: A focus on real-time commerce operations as a driver of Customer Experience, close tracking of granular Unit Economics — the detailed revenue and profit profile for every order — to enable quick and precise decision-making about pricing and operational optimizations, and Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) that includes variable costs and contribution margins of a customer relationship, to accurately track and grow CLV over time.

Impact #1	Saved hundreds of manual reporting hours each month and reduced platform licensing costs by almost 75%
Impact #2	Increased overall engineering throughput by at least 50%
Impact #3	Built a turnkey data and decisioning platform for consumer-direct retail companies, powered by Google Cloud BigQuery and Looker

Impact #1

Saved hundreds of manual reporting hours each month and reduced platform licensing costs by almost 75%

Impact #2

Increased overall engineering throughput by at least 50%

Impact #3

Built a turnkey data and decisioning platform for consumer-direct retail companies, powered by Google Cloud BigQuery and Looker

Benefit #1	Saved hundreds of manual reporting hours each month
Benefit #2	Reduced platform licensing costs by almost 75%
Benefit #3	Increased overall engineering throughput by at least 50%

Benefit #1

Saved hundreds of manual reporting hours each month

Benefit #2

Reduced platform licensing costs by almost 75%

Benefit #3

Increased overall engineering throughput by at least 50%

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Overview

SoundCommerce Powers Retail Decisions With Real-Time Data

Operational Impact

Quantitative Benefit