Retail Analytics for LP Professionals

R E T A I L A N A LY T I C S
F O R L O S S P R E V E N T I O N P R O F E S S I O N A L S
T H E D E F I N I T I V E G U I D E
2 0 1 5

Retail Analytics
– for the –
Loss Prevention Professional
How would decreasing the time it takes to detect, investigate and resolve Loss
Prevention cases help you and your organization meet goals?
With divergent threats from cyber-security data breaches to organized retail crime,
retail Loss Prevention professionals are tasked with more responsibility than ever
before - according to the Global Retail Theft Barometer, shrinkage costs U.S. retailers
about $42 billion a year.
At the same time, LP professionals ﬁnd themselves in a rapidly changing competitive
retail environment with increasingly tight budget constraints – more responsibility, more
value added, but less headcount and less ﬁnancial resources.
More responsibility, less resources – the task for retail LP professionals is to do more
with less.
One enabling tool in the LP professional’s toolkit to do just that is a comprehensive
retail analytics platform.

CONTENTS
1. Introduction
2. Video Management
3. Asset Protection
4. POS Exception Reporting
5. In-Store Dwells and Security Events
6. Investigations Made Quick & Easy
7. Your Data, in Formats that Work for You
8. Data Security
9. Maximize ROI – for LP and for the Organization
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Introduction
LP professionals traditionally have a straightforward list of primary objectives:
1. Ensure the safety of shoppers and employees
2. Detect fraud and fraudulent events
3. Minimize theft and other shrinkage
Through its early adoption and use of the pan-tilt-zoom camera (PTZ camera), the LP function in many ways
pioneered the development of comprehensive retail analytics platforms.
The data early analog cameras collected and provided was powerful, if not exactly easy to access, collate,
organize and report. Over time though, with the advent of digital cameras and relatively inexpensive com-
puter processing power and data storage, video footage – and with it a wealth of valuable store operations
data – compelled the founders of RetailNext to consider the art of the possible for better understanding
what was happening in the brick-and-mortar store environment.
Better understanding means better insights, and with better insights comes better decision-making.
With that, in-store retail analytics – Google Analytics for retail stores – was born.
And its roots lie in Loss Prevention and the profession’s early adoption of video tools.
3RetailNext
Deﬁnitive Guide for Loss Prevention Professionals

Video Management
Video cameras afford an “eye in the sky” for
safety and security, compliance, loss preven-
tion and countless other value-added capa-
bilities for retailers. Critical for LP profession-
als though is easy and secure access.
LP needs the ability to access video – live
and recorded - from all stores in the chain,
whether sitting at corporate headquarters, in
a regional office or local store, or on a mobile
device, on the go. As such, video has to be
viewable from any browser or mobile device,
including iOS and Android platforms.
In the investigation of security events, LP professionals need to access stored video files, and it’s essential
to have video output capabilities for permanent archiving of events under investigation and prosecution.
At the same time, due to privacy and other concerns, video data needs secured permission-based access,
with administrators providing specific access rights to individuals by role, by location.
But, not so fast - important considerations include shoppers and store operations. No store is in business to
support LP; rather it’s the other way around. Without an H264 optimized video management system, band-
width issues at the store can hinder other store operations functions and the overall shopper experience.
4RetailNext
What would it mean to you and your LP team if it no longer had to
cycle through hours of video to find an incident but could instead
immediately review already pre-defined events?

Asset Protection
In the retail store environment, asset protection is prioritized at point-of-sale (POS) and throughout the store
environment.
POS Exception Reporting
On of the biggest risk exposures for retailers is at Point-of-Sale, and one of the most powerful weapons in
the LP arsenal is POS exception search and reporting capabilities.
LP modules allow for the reporting – by store and by cashier - of exception trends including:
• Cash refunds
• Gift card refunds
• Credit card refunds
• Cash post voids
Faced with manpower shortages and other limited resources, added beneﬁts to LP professionals are
immediate access to all stores’ transactions and the one-click exporting capability of exception transac-
tions, complete with receipt and video.
5RetailNext
How would being able to ﬁlter your POS transactions by payment
type, cashier ID, void and payment amount help your LP team with
resolving its security/theft/shrink issues?

In-Store Dwells and Security Events
Asset protection concerns extend well beyond the
POS terminals. Video analytics and other technolo-
gies are used to create “dwell zones” around
high-priced and other high-risk merchandise, or at
less-trafficked locations in the store, offering real-time
alerts to sales associates to assist customers who
have stayed in the dwell zone beyond a pre-deter-
mined threshold of time.
Additionally, other security events, like the opening of
the back door, key pad usage, panic buttons and
more can be monitored and reported, allowing management and LP professionals to quickly access
time-stamped video and other data for investigative purposes.
And, while LP practices are frequently thought of catching things when they go wrong, the same discipline
is used to catch when things are going right, or to identify continued training opportunities. A frequently
cited example from retailers is the ability to quickly and easily determine if sales associates at POS are
checking a shopper’s identiﬁcation for ﬂagged credit card purchases – if so, recognize and reward, if not,
retrain.
6RetailNext

What would it mean to your LP team if 16 different real-time videos
were viewable simultaneously on one screen, with zoom capabilities
for each of the 16 views?
Investigations Made Quick & Easy
What used to take minutes now takes seconds, and that’s
music to the ears of LP professionals faced with cuts in head-
counts and other resources.
Through the LP module of a retail analytics platform,
investigations are as easy a 1-2-3:
1. Search transactions across all stores
2. Identify suspicious transactions via receipts and video
from across all stores
3. Export complete transactions, including receipt and
video
The RetailNext platform allows the custom conﬁguration of
video layouts in a video dashboard, integrating up to 16
camera views, from one or more locations.
Dashboard layouts can be saved and loaded, and a one-click
export can synch multiple camera views into a single stitched
video for easy review and sharing of an incident from all
available angles.
7RetailNext

Your Data, in Formats that Work for You
Managing, analyzing and reporting LP data can be time consuming, particularly if platform-dependent.
Leading edge LP modules like that found in the RetailNext platform have reporting suites that develop
standard reports, but with an ability to edit and modify. The RetailNext platform also integrates mobile
applications for iOS and Android, and allows easy data exports through CSV ﬁles or a powerful set of
enterprise REST APIs.
Data Security
No guide to Loss Prevention would be complete
without including the priority of data security.
Data security is a multi-faceted issue, and it’s most
prevalently mentioned related to shopper data at
POS. As such, most retail organizations integrate
data security through the broader reach of Informa-
tion Technology and its network security groups.
Important to the LP professional is a system that
adheres to corporate security polices, practices and
protocols, and integrates seamlessly into all corporate systems and architectures.
Today’s LP solutions are secured for the 21st century cyber-threats and deploy standard practice encryp-
tion.
8RetailNext

Maximize ROI - for LP and the Organization
In an environment of competing priorities and limited investment resources, it’s the ROI that matters, and
that’s good news for LP professionals.
Whereas once a relatively “siloed” function, LP is now an integrated function across the retail organization,
and an integral component in creating an organization that mirrors today’s omnichannel shopper.
A great beneﬁt to the LP professional and her/his
budget is a state-of-the-art LP module integrated into
a more holistic, centralized retail analytics platform
that provides analytics and solutions for the entire
retail organization. In addition, comprehensive
platforms allow for easy third-party integrations,
enabling the adoption of future hardware technolo-
gies as they come online.
9RetailNext

One Platform Across the Entire Organization
Whether in Loss Prevention, Marketing, Merchandising, Store Design or other functions, a centralized
platform delivers multiple returns on one capital expenditure, including the following capabilities:
RetailNext’s platform and LP module is capable of leveraging existing LP cameras and all other hardware
sensors, and delivers the maximum ROI:
1. Minimize video reviewing time
2. Detect fraud with pre-deﬁned high-risk transactions
3. Resolve cases faster with one-click access to transactions, receipts and corresponding video
4. Cut theft by 75% or more and reduce shrink 0.2 to 0.3 points
5. Save 40-70% in capital expenditures (CapEx)
10RetailNext
“Purchased separately, traffic management and loss prevention
systems would have cost up to 40% more.”
– Stacey Shulman, former CIO at American Apparel
• Loss Prevention
• Video management
• POS exception reporting
• Operations
• People counting and conversion
• Staffing optimization
• Staff exclusion
• Real-time alerts
At RetailNext, we’re passionate about retailing and how to empower retailers to become better retailers, growing comp
store sales and improving bottom-line proﬁts.
Do you have a point of view to share, or questions about retail analytics and how it’s used to better Loss Prevention
practices and other retailing functions?
Please join the #retail conversation on Twitter @RetailNext and at www.facebook.com/retailnext, and visit the
RetailNext site at retailnext.net.
• Queue analytics
• Marketing & Merchandising
• Shopper activity maps
• Mobile in-store analytics
• Display and product placement analytics
• Window effectiveness
• Personalization enablement

Retail Analytics for LP Professionals

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