Satisfied customers are the key to success for any business, anywhere in the world. However, if you look around you, only a few companies have been able to crack the customer satisfaction equation to win customers’ trust and loyalty forever. But how can other businesses get them there?

The answer may be closer than you realize within your supply chains. Multiple surveys have directly linked a smooth supply chain with better customer experience.

Making your customers happy isn’t only about whether they somehow receive the products on time. It is also about having control over the entire journey the product needs to go through before it reaches them. It is about keeping the customers well informed on what to expect at every stage and proactively calling out any possible delays.

Customers expect transparency, dependability, and speed, particularly in terms of product availability and shipping. To meet these expectations, companies must have a 360-degree view of their supply chain, from vendors to delivery touchpoints. This visibility enables businesses to preempt issues, respond faster, and regularly fulfill promises — all of which contribute to better customer experience and boost customer satisfaction.

In this article, we will discuss the effect of supply chain visibility on customer experience and how it can be used to provide a seamless client experience.

Role of End-to-End Visibility in Customer Experience

*How Supply Chain Visibility Improves Customer Experience*

Supply chain visibility is the capability to monitor, trace, and evaluate every supply chain stage in real time. A well-managed distribution network plays a crucial role in this by ensuring that inventory levels are tracked efficiently across warehouses, logistics centers, and retail stores. For customers, that translates to consistent service each time, order status visibility, accurate delivery estimates, and fewer delays.

Companies that are always up to date with the status of their products can better manage and avoid disruptions, which may otherwise cause expensive stockouts or delays.

Supply chain visibility provides advantages that directly improve customer experience through:

Transparency and Trust
Quick Response to Disruptions
Optimized Inventory Levels
Improved Delivery Accuracy
Data-Driven Insights

Let’s explore each of these in detail.

Transparency and Trust: The Foundation of Customer Loyalty

Customers' trust is built with service consistency and information transparency over time. Customers appreciate companies that keep them informed of where their purchases are from order entry to final delivery. Supply chain visibility enables businesses to update clients about their orders or even if they have other general queries.

Businesses can implement several measures to enhance transparency and trust, including:

Set Up Self-Service Tracking: Offer customers an automated real-time portal to view their orders and estimated delivery times.
Automate Notifications & Alerts: Set up automated notifications for milestones, including order confirmation, shipment departure, and anticipated delays. This proactive communication builds trust and reduces the need for expensive and time-consuming customer service interactions.
Develop a Centralized Customer Dashboard: Companies can develop a dashboard for B2B customers that brings together virtually all supply chain information pertinent to their current orders and purchases, such as the latest inventory levels, manufacturing updates, and delivery dates. This way, customers get higher transparency, and businesses can manage expectations better.

Quick Response to Disruptions

Supply chain disruptions can happen anytime in a worldwide market for any reason, like natural disasters, route closures, or unexpected supplier issues. Improving supply chain visibility enables businesses to identify these disruptions early and mitigate delays and cost impacts.

Effective inventory control is crucial in managing supply chain disruptions, as it helps maintain optimal inventory levels and ensures that companies do not face excess or shortage.

For actively managing disruption, companies can use:

Predictive Analytics for Early Warning: Companies can implement predictive analytics to detect disruptions based on past data and ongoing external factors, including geopolitical events or weather forecasts. Early alerts give businesses time to react better. For example, they can modify production schedules or reroute deliveries based on the situation.
Make Business Continuity Plans (BCP): Develop continuity plans with supply chain partners. Create backups in the form of alternative routes, backup suppliers, or temporary workforce arrangements. Such preparedness provides rapid recalibration to avoid delays when visibility tools detect a disruption.
Setup a Real-Time Risk Monitoring System: Create a risk monitoring platform and gather data points like lead times, supplier performance, and geopolitical events. These insights help businesses anticipate possible supply chain disruptions and react quickly in case of one. This helps avoid disruptions at customer touchpoints.

Optimized Inventory Levels for Better Product Availability

Businesses always need to keep sufficient inventory to meet customer demand while keeping inventory costs, including storage and overhead costs, under control; otherwise, there is a risk of sales loss. But at the same time, they shouldn’t invest excessive capital, which can negatively impact cash flow. Investments in inventory follow the law of diminishing returns. Finding this delicate balance is difficult, and supply chain visibility lets companies fine-tune inventory levels in real time. This helps reduce stockouts and overstocking and ensures items are available when customers require them.

Maximum inventory levels refer to the cap on the amount of stock for each SKU, and exceeding this limit is considered excess inventory, which can lead to increased costs and risks.

Here are some of the process improvements that the companies can take to optimize their inventory levels:

Demand Sensing Tools: Demand sensing methods combine forecasts with real-time data from different sources, such as point-of-sale devices, for short-term demand prediction. This lets businesses adjust inventory levels dynamically to market conditions to boost product availability.
Multi-Echelon Inventory Optimization (MEIO): Multi-echelon inventory optimization considers the whole supply chain, from warehouses to retail outlets. MEIO helps decide the optimum inventory levels for each location. This strategy allows products to be delivered closer to end customers, reducing lead times.
JIT Inventory Management with Suppliers: Companies can use JIT inventory practices with vendors with the help of supplier collaboration platforms. JIT minimizes undesirable stock holdings while ensuring the right products will be in stock when necessary.

Improved Delivery Accuracy

Delivery accuracy is crucial for customer experience, as incorrect or late deliveries can result in dissatisfaction and lower loyalty. Supply chain visibility will help businesses monitor each supply chain stage — from factory pickup to last-mile shipping. This allows companies to ship goods promptly and in good shape.

Managing storage costs is also essential in improving delivery accuracy. By maintaining optimal inventory levels and avoiding excess storage costs, businesses can streamline operations and prevent unnecessary expenditures.

To improve the delivery accuracy, companies can adopt:

Order Fulfillment Tracking: Companies can track each stage of fulfillment by integrating order management, warehouse, and transportation management systems. This ensures that any delays or errors are flagged directly for corrective action.
Route Optimization in Real Time: Use route optimization tools to discover the best path for the customer, depending on traffic patterns, climate, and delivery routes. This reduces delivery times and delays.
Use Digital Proof of Delivery (POD): Digital PODs keep a timestamped delivery log and collect consumer feedback once received. This boosts delivery accuracy, creates an audit trail, and gives customers a feeling of security.

Data-Driven Insights for Better Customer Experience

Supply chain visibility offers actionable data to help companies understand and optimize the customer experience. Data from supply chain stages can help companies spot trends, improve processes, and make data-driven decisions to elevate the customer experience.

For building the data-driven insights, companies can:

Analyze Order Patterns for Better Forecasting: Identify customer order trends and leverage this information to improve forecasting accuracy and ensure high-volume products are always in stock.
Segment Customers Based on Order Behavior: Segmenting customers by sales channels, order frequency, product preference, and typical order size enables companies to customize offerings and ensure better service.
Set Up Feedback Loops: Add a customer feedback loop following delivery and incorporate it into supply chain visibility tools. This feedback collects the voice of the customer (VOC), which helps identify areas for improvement, such as delivery times or product packaging.

A Step-by-Step Guide to Implementing Supply Chain Visibility

Implementing supply chain visibility requires a strategic approach. Here are some steps to increase supply chain visibility:

Define Supply Chain Visibility Goals: Identify the specific goals and objectives of implementing supply chain visibility, such as improving customer experience, reducing inventory costs, or increasing brand loyalty. Clear goals will guide the implementation process and ensure alignment with business objectives.
Assess Current Supply Chain Processes: Evaluate current supply chain processes, including procurement, inventory management, logistics, and distribution, to identify areas for improvement. Understanding the existing processes will help pinpoint where visibility can add the most value.
Implement Supply Chain Visibility Technology: Invest in supply chain visibility technology, such as transportation management systems, warehouse management systems, and inventory management software, to track and monitor supply chain data in real time. These technologies provide the tools needed to achieve comprehensive visibility.
Integrate Supply Chain Data: Integrate supply chain data from various sources, including suppliers, manufacturers, logistics providers, and customers, to gain a comprehensive view of the supply chain. Data integration ensures that all stakeholders have access to the same information, facilitating better decision-making.
Analyze Supply Chain Data: Analyze supply chain data to identify trends, patterns, and insights that can inform supply chain decisions and improve customer satisfaction. Data analysis helps businesses understand their supply chain dynamics and make proactive adjustments.
Monitor and Adjust: Continuously monitor supply chain visibility and adjust strategies as needed to optimize supply chain operations and improve customer experience. Regular monitoring allows businesses to stay agile and responsive to changes or disruptions.

By following these steps, businesses can increase supply chain visibility, improve customer experience, and gain a competitive advantage in the market. Implementing a robust visibility strategy not only enhances operational efficiency but also builds trust and loyalty among customers, driving long-term success.

Building a Customer-Centric Supply Chain with Holocene

Supply chain visibility can help improve customer experience by allowing companies to be responsive, accurate, and transparent throughout their customers' order cycle journey. It also increases consumer trust in the brand and the likelihood of returning for more purchases later on.

At Holocene, we develop visibility solutions for customer-centered supply chains. Our technology solutions provide:

real-time data insights,
predictive analytics, and
collaboration to convert the supply chain into a customer success factor.

By partnering with Holocene, your organization can develop a supply chain that meets consumer demand, meets and exceeds industry standards, and allows sustainable business development.

Contact Holocene today to learn more about how we can help enhance supply chain visibility and achieve a peerless customer experience.

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