Historical forecasting and predictive models have become less effective due to the market disruption caused by the pandemic. As retail inventory, supply chain, and sales performance begin to improve—and with the shift toward digital commerce—retailers need to adopt new ways of thinking about inventory optimization to maximize sales opportunities.

This starts with having merchandisers and marketers collaborate to better understand true market demand, their individual
customers and their shopping journeys, and ensure communications are personalized. This infographic from Acxiom details:

• How data, artificial intelligence and machine learning can close the gap between merchandisers and marketers. 
• The benefits of bringing merchandising and marketing data and analytics together.
• How Acxiom can help you share the power of customer-level data and advanced analytics across merchandising and marketing.