To mark the 2 year anniversary or the creation of our digital and data solutions brand, Thumbprint, we sat down with our Head of Thumbprint, and McCurrach Strategy and Marketing Director, Gordon Neil, for this two part interview to discuss all things digital, data and efficient ways of selling more through smart technology. 

What’s the approach to building new products in Thumbprint?  

The benefit of being part of a sales and marketing group is that we can leverage our other businesses to identify opportunities in the marketplace that Thumbprint can develop, and this comes from a blend of three areas: 

• We track the direction of the market: The current direction of the sales industry is focused on how you leverage data, because there’s so much of it in the marketplace right now and brands are still wrestling with how to realise the value of that data. We need to build products that do that and do that well. 
• We listen to our clients: Conversations with clients across our group often spark ideas about how we can solve the problems they have. We spot trends in these conversations – if multiple people in the market are telling us the same thing, and they don’t have a solution for it, we work out the best strategy to achieve that goal.  
• We move at pace to take advantage of opportunities: It’s important that we’re structured for success, as often we need to be able to move at speed to be opportunistic. We do this by deploying the capability and specialism we have in our group which includes everything from IT to business analysts to marketing. It also includes our broader network of partners who give us access to expertise that we don’t have in-house.  

Are Thumbprint products only available to existing clients?  

No absolutely not, they’re available to any brand.  

While some of our existing clients do use our Thumbprint products as an enabler for the field teams we run for them, brands do not need to be an existing client and they can absolutely purchase our Thumbprint products off the shelf as standalone products.  

Currently, we have Thumbprint clients who only come to us to do activity on MyStore+ or licence DART at Field of Head Office level because that’s the best solution for them, and we have other clients who pick multiple services from the group. Everything is bespoke to their needs and strategy.  

What sectors does Thumbprint operate in and what does the future look like for Thumbprint? 

Currently, across the Thumbprint portfolio we work with over 100 brands. 

At the moment, the Thumbprint products are focused on retail and FMCG because it just so happens that we’ve brought our products to market in that space, but both DART and MyStore+ are applicable in other sectors. Our entire approach to building data and digital products allows us to apply products in any sector.  

For example, as an EPOS analytics product, DART is adaptable to any sector where you have EPOS data. Likewise, MyStore+ is an application that works for independent retailers, so it’s also applicable in any sector where you have independent retailers or businesses, such as pharmacies, pubs, food service, independent pet stores or technology retailers.  

As we develop more products we may start in another sector, it just depends on where the opportunity is. We try to identify where there is an opportunity or challenge, and where this can be scaled with pace.  

The reason we started in Grocery Multiples for DART is because it is the most advanced market for data across the globe. So, we took the best of what data was available and started there, allowing us to scale it quickly.  

Why did we start in convenience with MyStore+? Because there are over 40,000 retailers in that sector and we know that two things are true: retailers struggle to get advice and brands struggle to engage them, because there’s a high cost to send a field team into store and phoning them doesn’t work. Also, it’s a space we know well given that we currently work with over 20,000 convenience outlets through our field marketing business, so we saw a big opportunity for technology to make the difference retailers and brands were looking for.  

In summary, at Thumbprint, we build technology that makes brands lives easier and helps them unlock their sales potential.  

Big thanks to Gordon for giving up his time to answer our questions. To learn more about Thumbprint, DART and MyStore+ click here. They’re available for organisations of all sizes with a variety of budgets, so get in touch today to see how we can help.