How to Implement Two-Way Communication Between Stores and Head-Office

If you have retail stores, or franchisees, you need to send and receive information from stores. How to do this effectively is less obvious.

Let’s dive in.

From head-office to the stores

When done, here is content other readers find helpful:

⭐ Case studies

🚀 Expert

The need

Head office needs to communicate information to all/some stores, in all/some regions.

This information travels “downward” and may be used to announce upcoming seasonal programs, in-store initiatives, product recalls and planogram changes.

Some are “actionable” (require the recipients to complete an action) while others are simply informational.

🚀 Expert

This post is part of our Expert Content series. In highly competitive industries like retail and hospitality, it is critical to hit the ground running with flawless execution of programs and brand standards.

When issues are found, assign corrective actions to ensure they are resolved before they affect the guest experience, the brand’s reputation, and the bottom line.

Pro tip
Is your site execution workflow up to speed?

From stores to head-office

The need

Stores (typically the franchisee, manager or assistant manager) often need to ask questions, raise concerns or document issues with head office.

This information travels “upward” and is often actionable as it requires Head Office to acknowledge receipt, take and action and communicate the outcome back to the store.

This is often accomplished by email or by calling a support hotline.

Excel and email are Holding You Back

Excel and email communication, while widely accessible, were not designed to handle bi-directional, actionable, traceable and reportable information. They are slow and they create friction.

“Send and forget” is not how you execute your way to success.

There has to be a better way.

Centralized two-way communication

The solution is communication software that centralizes communication and works in both directions.

It works whether information travels upward or downward, whether a communication packet is actionable or not and whether it concerns one store, one group of stores or all stores.

Have a free trial of Bindy and see two-way communication at work.