OCR scanning solution for faster product monitoring

Executive summary 

Sales representatives and merchandisers in fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) and retail waste time on manual data collection which hinders productivity and decision making. An optical character recognition (OCR) solution can automate data entry, enabling your team to work faster and focus more time on relationship building and selling. Discover how TELUS Retail Execution can improve your business’s operations with OCR. 

In the FMCG industry in the UK and Ireland, OCR is used to streamline operations and improve efficiency. Image recognition in the Irish CPG market is growing fast due to rising retailer adoption of AI to streamline shelf auditing and reduce manual stock checks. 

This resource examines the many pitfalls of manual data collection, the advantages of OCR technology and how it can transform your business’s retail execution for the better.  

Issues FMCGs face with manual data collection 

Your business may face many significant issues in retail execution when your reps rely on manual data collection. Most reps sacrifice approximately 70% of their time in a typical week to nonselling tasks, spending 9% on administrative tasks and 9% manually entering customer and sales information. A lot of that admin work and data entry happens during their in-store visits, taking them away from their main objective of selling and relationship building. Top concerns include:  

Wasted time 

Manual data entry and collection is slow, expensive and error prone. Your team may waste many hours manually recording data like prices, shelf placement and SKU presence. They get stuck filling out forms and using inefficient basic mobile apps that require a ton of manual data entry. Some of these apps enable photos to be taken, but frustratingly many still require manual data extraction and entry. This wastes valuable time and cuts heavily into the number of stores that your reps can visit in a day. 

Impaired data quality and accuracy 

Manual data collection is inherently error prone. It leads to typos, data misinterpretation and missed items. It’s also unregulated in the sense that it can lead to inconsistent data collection methods across teams and delayed data availability. Your reps may inconsistently interpret what should be captured in their recordings, which can result in incomplete data collection. Many reps have also been known to skip entering some item data altogether just to save time in store. There’s also no efficient way for your reps to verify the data that’s been captured – so it’s anyone’s guess if what was recorded is accurate. 

High operational costs and inefficiencies 

If your team is using manual data entry methods, your business will face high costs for each store visit your reps make due to the amount of time they spend on data entry while on duty. This hinders you from scaling your field teams efficiently. In store, your reps likely spend too much time on admin work instead of doing what they’re really there to do – sell and build relationships. Because your reps’ data entry is manual, your managers can't get real-time visibility into field conditions and can’t easily pinpoint regional trends. You also can’t respond quickly to pricing issues or out-of-stocks. 

Business pitfalls  

When things move too slowly for your FMCG company, you struggle. “Fast moving” is in the category name for a reason after all. Manual data collection may leave you unable to respond fast enough to competitive pricing changes. Promotional compliance issues may go undetected. You may experience losses in revenue from out-of-stocks or pricing errors. You may struggle to calculate the ROI of your field team. Poor data quality may hinder your decision-making ability. And you may struggle to compete with businesses that have access to better technology that enables them to move more swiftly. 

But in a technology-powered world like ours, it doesn’t have to be this way. Your business just needs to invest in the right software solution to dramatically reduce the time your team members waste in store on secondary tasks.  

What is optical character recognition (OCR) software and how does OCR scanning work? 

OCR technology automates data extraction from photos. A wide range of businesses use it to enable faster data collection with nearly perfect accuracy and real time insights. In retail execution, it transforms data entry from a slow, manual, error-prone process into an automated, accurate, real-time system. It can enable your business to monitor more stores, respond faster to issues and make better decisions with far less effort. More specifically, it can automate tasks like product monitoring, pricing verification and compliance tracking. 

Technically speaking, OCR solutions scan an image, preprocess it to clean up noise and improve clarity and then use algorithms to identify characters. Once the characters are recognised, they’re converted into machine-readable text. This makes image text editable, searchable and storable digitally.  

What are the benefits of optical character recognition (OCR) in retail execution? 

In retail execution, speed and accuracy are essential. An OCR solution can be used to convert handwritten or printed data into digital entries, improving speed and accuracy during product monitoring. 

It automates data extraction from invoices, receipts, shelf labels and product packaging – enabling faster inventory management and more accurate billing. Your business can leverage it to reduce manual errors, speed up processes and ensure real-time data availability. It can help you deliver better customer experiences, empower your teams to shift their focus to strategic growth areas and minimise your administrative overhead.  

Investing in OCR-enabled retail execution software is essential if you want to compete in today’s market because it:  

Saves time and reduces manual work 

OCR automatically extracts data from photos—no manual data entry required. Your team simply takes a photo of a paper form, uploads it, and the solution fills in monitoring questions automatically. This speeds up the monitoring process, allowing your team to work more efficiently and complete in-store tasks faster. 

Improves accuracy 

By capturing data directly from paper forms, OCR ensures the correct information goes into the right fields. With 95%+ accuracy, your business benefits from fewer mistakes and more reliable data for decision-making. 

Enables real-time data collection 

With instant data capture, your team can act quickly on pricing, compliance, and availability issues. This real-time visibility helps your business respond faster and make smarter, data-driven decisions. 

Boosts productivity and lowers cost 

Automating data entry helps your team finish monitoring more quickly. With more time available, they can visit additional stores, handle deliveries, and complete other essential tasks. By simplifying processes and reducing manual work, OCR makes operations more cost-effective. 

Who should use an optical character recognition (OCR) solution? 

Not everyone on your team will need to use OCR scanning technology in their day to day. Here’s who can most benefit from OCR in an FMCG ecosystem: 

Sales reps and merchandisers 

These are your frontline workers who visit stores to audit inventories, deliver products and conduct product monitoring. They capture details on paper when they can’t use their mobile devices. With OCR, they can simply take a photo of their paper form, upload it and let the system fill in the information automatically. 

Field teams in remote areas 

Some of your field reps may work in places with poor internet access, or in situations where using a phone or tablet is challenging. For these team members, OCR enables them to collect data on paper and easily digitise it when they return to the office or reconnect to the internet. 

Optical character recognition (OCR) in action 

James, a sales rep, needs to complete a product inventory review at a store. He’s unable to use his tablet or phone because of a poor internet connection, so he captures the number of delivered and expired products on paper by hand.   

Later, when he has internet access, James takes a photo of the paper form and uploads it with OCR. The system quickly reads the product IDs and numbers, automatically filling in relevant monitoring questions. What used to take James more than an hour now takes a few minutes, giving him ample time back to reinvest into other tasks. 

James and his manager are now able to collect, access and analyse data simply and easily, finding insights and reporting on any trends. 

Using optical character recognition (OCR) with TELUS Retail Execution 

TELUS Retail Execution software makes enterprise-grade OCR scanning accessible and easy to implement. Your team can quickly convert handwritten or printed information from paper forms into digital data in the Retail Execution Enterprise (REE) app.   

Forget manual data entry, just snap a photo of your completed form, upload it and OCR will automatically fill in the relevant monitoring answers for you. Once the import is complete, you can quickly verify the answers against the printed document. This easy process saves you time, reduces errors and makes field operations faster and more efficient, allowing your team to focus on their bigger priorities.  

Here’s how to get started with our OCR solution in four easy steps: 

1. Capture  

During store visits or audits, your sales reps and/or merchandisers can use paper forms when using a mobile device isn’t possible. Instead of manually entering this information later, they can simply take a picture of the filled-out form. 

2. Upload 

In the REE mobile app, your team members can quickly upload a photo with one tap on the “OCR” button. It’s designed to be fast and intuitive, fitting easily into their existing workflow. 

3. Process  

Once uploaded, the system analyses the photo, identifies product IDs, question IDs and answers, and automatically fills in the appropriate answers in the monitoring. This means fast, accurate data entry without extra effort. 

4. Verify  

When you use OCR to import answers into Monitoring, you want to be sure the imported values match the values written on paper. With the REE solution, you can quickly check imported Monitoring answers against the original values from the printed document. 

Your field team doesn’t need any special training to start using the OCR feature. It’s designed to be simple and intuitive, ensuring a smooth experience – even for first time users. 

Key takeaways