why skele̅?
With so many online outreach and e-commerce solutions available, why is there a need for a service like skelē?    The answer lies somewhat in the question.   It is exactly because there are so many sites for online shoppers to search for what they seek that a new solution is needed for local merchants.  We need to dig into the current state of commerce to get a better understanding.



Let's take a look at some trends
As we can see from these charts, over the past decade and looking forward into the future, e-commerce is making accelerated gains into retail.   It also shows that those gains have come at the expense of brick-and-mortar retail.



This leads to...
  • Many retailers closing/declaring bankruptcy: Sears, JCPenney, Neiman Marcus, Lord & Taylor, Sur La Table, to name some of many ...
  • Other troubled retailers have announced closing locations: Kohl's, Bed Bath & Beyond, Guitar Center, Stein Mart ...
  • In general, brick-and-mortar stores footfall has been declining by 15% per year as e-commerce rises.



Why is this happening?

Demographics & Convenience
These charts show that increasingly, shoppers trend online when browsing, and online-only retailers have a builtin advantage that brick-and-mortar locations cannot overcome by online presence.   There are simply too many small websites that shoppers would need to navigate to.   Local retailers have to do more to keep their customers.



The good news
80% of Consumers Want Online-Offline Integration
That's great!   ... but, how do we do it?



Enter skele̅
Through the power of a tight integration of a robust cloud-based backend, a sleek and unified portal, and stream-lined in-store equipment, skele̅ opens the world of local shoppers to brick-and-mortar merchants like never before.



Ok, how does it work?
Through ease-of-use inventory management at each location, skele̅ is able to provide local merchants the ability to give local consumers visibility into their inventories and search for the items they want at various brick-and-mortar shops near them.  Product discovery is accomplished through simple keyword searches in the portal, combined with a smart / powerful cross-referencing in the backend.   Once found, shoppers can complete a seamless online reservation and pick it up in-store on the same day.



What else can skele̅ do?
Through it's goal of a unified flow of services, skele̅ takes a lot of the grinding tasks off the plate of the merchant, so that they can concentrate on things like product offering and in-store marketing experience.   Plus because skele̅ focuses only on brick-and-mortar merchants and local commerce, search results will not have any online marketplace results to get in the way of your sales.
Here is a list of what member merchants get with skele̅:
  • Ease-of-use Inventory Management
  • Searchability of inventory by keyword across merchants by locale
  • Ability reserve online with terminal notifications
  • Automatic inventory update with transaction
  • Simple Returns
  • Paperless Receipts
  • Automatic Customer Management
  • Ability to publish coupons and use automatically
  • Automatic rewards accrual and usage
  • Automatic store credit assignment and use
  • Easy member portal for credit and loyalty tracking



Sounds good. But how much does it cost?
skele̅ earns it's money by becoming your payment processor.   Through it's industry contacts and specialized rates, skele̅ is able to drive down the cost of processing and bundle it with it's services.   Because of this, all of skele̅'s current services are available for what most merchants already pay for their processing - 3.0%.   In other words, skele̅ merchants get all of these services by allowing skele̅ to process their transactions (at the 3.0% rate).
For skele̅ members (consumers), there is no cost.




skele̅
breaks down the wall between the
information world
and the
real world.




Want to know more?
Take a look at the video showing skele̅ in action.
You can also reach out to us with questions or to schedule an in-store demo at info@skelekey.com.






References: