Technology Stacks Retail CIOs and CTOs Can Build to Boost Secure In-Store Shopping Experiences and Sales

Retailers have always sought new ways to keep prospective buyers in stores longer to maximize sales. Few would suggest this changing despite the meteoric rise of online and app-driven retail technology in the last decade. Why? Brick-and-mortar stores maintain the highest sales conversion rate, averaging 31.5 percent — easily beating out e-commerce, which averages 3 percent to 4.2 percent.

The CIOs and CTOs of today’s retail organizations play a central role in maximizing sales through the modernization of their technology stacks. This allows them to optimize supply chains, enable real-time data analysis, personalize marketing efforts, and enhance online and in-store shopping experiences. Such initiatives help create seamless omnichannel experiences that meet the demands of tech-savvy consumers, ultimately driving greater loyalty, sales conversion rates, and revenue.

The Technology Driving In-Store Triumphs

For example, many retail organizations deploy tracking solutions to determine how store management can adapt their retail environments to suit the needs of their customers. One effective method is on-premise mobile device tracking. This technology works by detecting the presence of mobile devices as shoppers move about with them through the store. Based on data collected from previous purchases or browsing history, the system can prompt the store’s digital signage to change to display products that complement those past purchases.

Many retailers also use (or plan to use) artificial intelligence to further personalize the customer experience, automating customized product recommendations and consumer demand projections and improving inventory operations. Other critical technologies enhancing the retail experience include high-bandwidth and easily accessible shopper Wi-Fi networks, automated point-of-sale (POS) systems, virtual try-on stations, and experience zones.

The return on investment of a modern revenue-generating technology stack that prioritizes customer security and fully utilizes cloud computing cannot be undersold. However, such stacks must operate in network environments that enable the full functionality and value they can bring to in-store shopping experiences.

SD-WAN: Powering Modern Shopping Experiences

Retailers are increasingly turning to software-defined wide-area networks (SD-WAN) for the reliable connectivity required to power personalized, cutting-edge in-store experiences. SD-WAN maintains high network performance by dynamically routing traffic along the most efficient paths, minimizing downtime while prioritizing the needs of critical applications to run smoothly — even during peak hours and network disruptions. The byproduct of this efficiency is another advantage: reduced operational costs.

SD-WAN also offers a level of scalability that allows retailers to easily expand their networks as new stores open or as bandwidth demand increases without requiring large, additional infrastructure investments.

Securing Customer Information and Retail Operations

A standout feature of SD-WAN is its integration capability with advanced security platforms. It seamlessly enables encryption, secure access, fraud prevention, and firewall functionality, which, when combined with unified management of security policies, ensures a consistent approach to protection and compliance across geographies.

To further enhance security, many retailers also opt to deploy secure access service edge (SASE), which combines cloud-centric security functions with SD-WAN to deliver a holistic, cloud-native solution. This approach unifies secure web gateways, cloud access security brokers, zero-trust network access frameworks, and firewall-as-a-service deployments into a single framework. Best of all, this synergistic combination of capabilities in such frameworks creates a secure, shared environment that retail locations can leverage without compromising connectivity-driven in-store experiences.

Expertise and Experience Lead to Repeatable Success

As successful retailers tailor their store placement strategy to maximize regional sales, a similar discipline should be applied to developing a networking and security ecosystem that accommodates each store and the corporate and distribution centers supporting them. Working in this way, retailers can streamline the technology deployment, including the networking platform on which everything runs, to:

• ensure that the technology is aligned with driving sales;
• meet the needs of customers and employees;
• stay up-to-date with security, enhancements, software updates and patches; and
• comply with regulatory and privacy requirements.

Large retail organizations may have the resources to hire and train the personnel required for all this work in-house if they prioritize it. However, that’s often not the case for small and midsize retailers, which must compete against the large retailers to identify, acquire and retain a very limited pool of qualified IT and security candidates if they wish to insource these functions. For such retailers, managed service providers can provide a practical alternative — their services come at a fraction of the cost. More importantly, they're staffed with specialists who work with many organizations 24/7 to design, deploy, maintain and operate appropriate hardware and software solutions for modern retailers’ networks.

Modern technologies such as SD-WAN, AI, and SASE are revolutionizing the retail industry. By modernizing their technology stacks, retailers optimize operations, enhance customer satisfaction, and enable robust security and scalability. This approach to digital transformation, guided by experienced CIOs, CTOs, and managed service providers, enables retailers of all sizes to stay competitive, drive sales, and build lasting customer loyalty.

Jonathan Tinner is technical product director for the SD-WAN and uCPE product portfolio at GTT, a managed network and security provider.