A retail analytics platform collects data from your POS, inventory and e-commerce systems and turns it into dashboards. The choice is between a dedicated retail product and a general BI tool configured for retail – and the right answer depends on which POS you run and how many stores you have.
Part of our retail technology analytics series.
What to evaluate
- Connectors – does it integrate with your exact POS, accounting and e-commerce platforms, or need manual exports?
- Automated refresh – numbers update themselves, not a weekly rebuild
- Multi-store roll-up – group view and per-store drill-down
- Cost at your scale – per user, per store, per data source – model it at your real numbers
- Data portability – can you get your data and dashboards out if you switch?
- Who maintains it – a dedicated product is more turnkey; a BI tool needs someone to build and own it
Dedicated retail platforms
Retail-specific analytics products (and POS add-on modules) come pre-built with retail metrics and often set up in days – if they support your POS. Check the connector list first; a platform that cannot read your systems is not a shortcut.
General BI tools
Power BI and Looker Studio connect to almost anything, cost less, and are not tied to one vendor – at the price of a build. For a retailer running more than one system, this flexibility usually wins. See the tools comparison.
A shortlist checklist
- Confirmed connectors for every system you run
- True cost at your store and user count
- Multi-store and per-store reporting out of the box
- Automated refresh, not manual export
- Export path for your data and dashboards
- A reference call with a retailer your size
Retail analytics guides
- Retail Data Analytics: A Practical Guide
- Retail Analytics Tools: What a Small Chain Needs
- Choosing a Retail Analytics Platform
- Retail Data Visualisation: Dashboards Staff Use
- Retail Data Mining: Transaction Data Into Decisions
- Retail Analytics for Independent Retailers
Want one clear view of your retail data? Scandifix builds Power BI dashboards for retailers that pull from POS, e-commerce and stock automatically. Talk to our Edmonton team.
Frequently asked questions
What is a retail analytics platform?
Software that pulls data from your POS, inventory, e-commerce and other systems into one place and turns it into dashboards and reports – either a dedicated retail product or a general BI tool like Power BI configured for retail.
What should I look for?
Connectors for the systems you actually run, automated refresh, multi-store roll-up, the cost at your store count, and whether you can export your data if you leave.
Dedicated retail platform or general BI tool?
A dedicated platform is faster to set up if it supports your exact POS. A general BI tool (Power BI, Looker Studio) is more flexible and usually cheaper, but needs building. Most small chains do well with the latter.
How does Scandifix help?
We run the comparison against your systems and budget, then build and maintain whichever you choose.