Are hotels still relying on average times to make good a room to plan for resource?
How about forecasting time to clean rooms with different messiness levels? Different messiness levels can then be associated with whether customers are business or family, whether there is room service or not, length of stay, etc...
These forecast will then help managers plan resources more accurately. What's more, they can also assign cleaning/chambermaid resources base on profiles of customers to facilitate subsequent cleaning.
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
A/B Testing To Increase Sales and Synchronize with your Supply Chains
The digital gurus of the Obama campaign had given us tremendous insight into how we can increase participation, opinion and funding through big data crunching (http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/10/obama-campaign-tech-staff).
From a supply chain point of view, we should no longer see demand as something to be modelled from historical data, but just one piece of information to complement continuous sensing and improvement to increase sales, especially online sales. So how do we increase online sales? We heard of how simple A/B testing has helped pull in the bucks (http://blog.optimizely.com/2010/11/29/how-obama-raised-60-million-by-running-a-simple-experiment/).
For many online retailers, many of them continuously refine their websites through experiments to increases sales, cross-sell, upsell and bundling opportunities. This demand creation approach is really quite different from the traditional historical sales analysis coupled with sales promotions and new product launches.
Demand creation is very interesting as we creating a pull of end products from raw materials. At the very least, it complements traditional forecasting/sales promotion/product launches by reducing the bullwhip effect along the supply chain. So how do we do it, it seems quite straight-forward with google analytics (http://support.google.com/analytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1745210&topic=1745207&ctx=topic)
From a supply chain point of view, we should no longer see demand as something to be modelled from historical data, but just one piece of information to complement continuous sensing and improvement to increase sales, especially online sales. So how do we increase online sales? We heard of how simple A/B testing has helped pull in the bucks (http://blog.optimizely.com/2010/11/29/how-obama-raised-60-million-by-running-a-simple-experiment/).
For many online retailers, many of them continuously refine their websites through experiments to increases sales, cross-sell, upsell and bundling opportunities. This demand creation approach is really quite different from the traditional historical sales analysis coupled with sales promotions and new product launches.
Demand creation is very interesting as we creating a pull of end products from raw materials. At the very least, it complements traditional forecasting/sales promotion/product launches by reducing the bullwhip effect along the supply chain. So how do we do it, it seems quite straight-forward with google analytics (http://support.google.com/analytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1745210&topic=1745207&ctx=topic)
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Google Analytics as Forecast for online businesses
Someone said that Google Analytics (GA) is for sales and marketing, it is tool much of a stretch use if for supply chain management.
I certainly don't think so. Good marketing and sales capability means good forecast and synchronization with operations.
The proliferation of online commerce and use of analytics tools like GA has not only help to grow sales for operations synchronization, but ahead also developed better forecasts to minimize obsolete inventory. In fact, I think GA is about accurate forecasts and growing demand.
It will be interesting to develop a whole business to help companies reduce markdowns and write offs by adjusting prices and GA.
I certainly don't think so. Good marketing and sales capability means good forecast and synchronization with operations.
The proliferation of online commerce and use of analytics tools like GA has not only help to grow sales for operations synchronization, but ahead also developed better forecasts to minimize obsolete inventory. In fact, I think GA is about accurate forecasts and growing demand.
It will be interesting to develop a whole business to help companies reduce markdowns and write offs by adjusting prices and GA.
Thursday, November 22, 2012
List Of Free Supply Chain Web Applications
Some of you have asked me to post a summary of what my web applications to.
Below is it. Had sequenced the applications and brief write-up here so that you and your company can build capabilities on top of one another for end to end supply chain capability development.
1. Serialization and Leveraging Off Serialization Standards:
www.transhipmentflow.appspot.com
- It allows users to scan their GS1 128 standard bar codes for decoding by my web application. Many companies ate using 128 standards as it is globally recognized, and it can take production dates, expiry dates, weight, batch, etc.. Thereafter it converts the bar code to a QR code and tells the user how many characters is left. There is no decoder right now, and I think as a transhipment hub, Singapore SMEs will want to decode original bar code information and add to it. QR code is free and can take the most characters.
2. Track and Trace by Associating Product/Carton Serialized Bar/QR code With Location (e.g. online warehouse management system):
http://trackandtraceanalytics.appspot.com/
- This is a simple location and product tracking system where you can scan any and product bar code to a location bar code, find the location of your product when you have the product bar code requirement, then scan out from the location when you pick to free up the location bar code space.
3. Streamlining Route by Visualizing Current Route with Space Filling Curve Routing Algorithm
http://compareroute.appspot.com/
- This web application helps users compare their current delivery travel distance with the distance my web application is showing using an algorithm. Base on the average speed and time it leaves your company and return, you can probably estimate the travel distance of your delivery trucks compared to what this web application is predicting. For companies wishing to reduce fuel cost when they suspect certain routes are a lot longer than they should be.
4. Know possible customers along their delivery route for more business with transportation marginal cost
http://nearmyroute.appspot.com/
- Is an advance version of compareroute where I know what is around your delivery points. Helps you identify potential customers
5. Associating picture documents with deliveries for further analysis (e.g. picture of signed DO)
www.transhipmentocr.appspot.com
– web application to convert jpg, bmp, png and gif image files into text for further processing customization. You just need to browse the file and upload to the server and my program will process it.
Below is it. Had sequenced the applications and brief write-up here so that you and your company can build capabilities on top of one another for end to end supply chain capability development.
1. Serialization and Leveraging Off Serialization Standards:
www.transhipmentflow.appspot.com
- It allows users to scan their GS1 128 standard bar codes for decoding by my web application. Many companies ate using 128 standards as it is globally recognized, and it can take production dates, expiry dates, weight, batch, etc.. Thereafter it converts the bar code to a QR code and tells the user how many characters is left. There is no decoder right now, and I think as a transhipment hub, Singapore SMEs will want to decode original bar code information and add to it. QR code is free and can take the most characters.
2. Track and Trace by Associating Product/Carton Serialized Bar/QR code With Location (e.g. online warehouse management system):
http://trackandtraceanalytics.appspot.com/
- This is a simple location and product tracking system where you can scan any and product bar code to a location bar code, find the location of your product when you have the product bar code requirement, then scan out from the location when you pick to free up the location bar code space.
3. Streamlining Route by Visualizing Current Route with Space Filling Curve Routing Algorithm
http://compareroute.appspot.com/
- This web application helps users compare their current delivery travel distance with the distance my web application is showing using an algorithm. Base on the average speed and time it leaves your company and return, you can probably estimate the travel distance of your delivery trucks compared to what this web application is predicting. For companies wishing to reduce fuel cost when they suspect certain routes are a lot longer than they should be.
4. Know possible customers along their delivery route for more business with transportation marginal cost
http://nearmyroute.appspot.com/
- Is an advance version of compareroute where I know what is around your delivery points. Helps you identify potential customers
5. Associating picture documents with deliveries for further analysis (e.g. picture of signed DO)
www.transhipmentocr.appspot.com
– web application to convert jpg, bmp, png and gif image files into text for further processing customization. You just need to browse the file and upload to the server and my program will process it.
Friday, November 16, 2012
Matching Available Delivery Resources With Those That Need It
In the spirit of prototyping, I had just put together a free website for companies to post available delivery resources so that those who need it can find it. Feedback and comments are most welcomed! :)
https://sites.google.com/site/foodconcerige/
https://sites.google.com/site/foodconcerige/
Monday, November 5, 2012
Quick-Change High-Mix, Low-Volume Approach For Transhipment Hubs
I have talked about the use of marginal contribution approach to calculate stocking levels base on overstocking and under stocking cost in the transhipment analytics approach earlier, and compare it with the safety stock and variability propagation calculations.
What I had not talked about is about developing quick change, high-mix, low-volume value added services for a
transhipment hub like Singapore. Value added services like labelling, repacking, QC, light assembling and customization are carried out in such centralized locations. It is thus key for these companies to grab opportunities to reduce changeover time by better scheduling and value stream mapping approaches. What is also important is to know when we need to buffer with inventory, time and capacity. This is where Factory Physics approach comes in.
Value added, storage, logistics, manufacturing and even raw materials balancing and adjustments can then be done with coming item level serialization.
What I had not talked about is about developing quick change, high-mix, low-volume value added services for a
transhipment hub like Singapore. Value added services like labelling, repacking, QC, light assembling and customization are carried out in such centralized locations. It is thus key for these companies to grab opportunities to reduce changeover time by better scheduling and value stream mapping approaches. What is also important is to know when we need to buffer with inventory, time and capacity. This is where Factory Physics approach comes in.
Value added, storage, logistics, manufacturing and even raw materials balancing and adjustments can then be done with coming item level serialization.
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