Retail analytics platforms are evolving from traditional reporting and inventory analysis into AI-enabled decision environments that support merchandising, marketing, workforce and operational execution. Retailers increasingly rely on these platforms to integrate omnichannel data, improve forecasting and personalize customer experiences while responding to changing conditions in real time. AI, GenAI, streaming analytics and emerging agentic capabilities are accelerating the shift from insight generation toward automated, workflow-embedded decision-making.
Software Provider Summary
The ISG Buyers Guide™ for Retail Analytics evaluates 15 software providers offering products that support operational, marketing and workforce analytics. The research ranked the top three overall leaders as Oracle, SAP and Infor. Providers were classified using weighted performance in Product Experience and Customer Experience for ISG quadrant placement. Infor, Microsoft, Oracle, RetailNext, SAP and SAS were rated Exemplary, with Epicor and Solvoyo rated Innovative. Databricks and o9 Solutions were rated Assurance, and Buxton, Incorta, Nuqleous, ReBiz and Verkada were rated Merit.
Product Experience Insights
Product Experience, representing 80% of the evaluation, focuses on Capability (65%) and Platform (15%), including adaptability, manageability, reliability and usability. Oracle, SAP and Infor achieved the highest performance as Leaders in this category, supported by retail-specific capabilities for accessing and modeling data and performing point-of-sale, marketing and workforce analytics. Leaders demonstrated enterprise-grade capabilities across varied merchandising, customer engagement and retail operations contexts.
Customer Experience Value
Customer Experience, representing 20% of the evaluation, focuses on validation and TCO/ROI. Oracle, Databricks and SAP were the Leaders in this category, showing strong customer commitment and clear dedication to customer needs. Providers with lower performance often lacked sufficient information to demonstrate customer success, articulate commitment to customer experience or communicate measurable value through TCO/ROI.
Strategic Recommendations
Retailers should evaluate analytics platforms based on the ability to integrate omnichannel data and support operational, marketing and workforce decision-making in real time. Assessment should prioritize demand forecasting, pricing and promotion analytics, customer segmentation, workforce optimization, governance and integration with execution systems. Organizations should also evaluate AI, GenAI and agentic capabilities that automate recommendations and actions while maintaining explainability, data lineage and appropriate governance.
The software providers and products evaluated in this research offer product and customer experiences, but not every feature is equally valuable to every enterprise or is needed to support the relevant business processes and use cases. Moreover, having too many product capabilities may be a negative factor for an enterprise if it introduces unnecessary complexity. Nonetheless, you may decide that a more comprehensive set of capabilities is important and meets your enterprise’s requirements.
An effective customer relationship with a software provider is vital to the success of any investment. The overall customer experience and the full lifecycle of engagement play a key role in ensuring satisfaction and long-term success. Providers with dedicated customer leadership, such as chief customer officers, tend to invest more deeply in these relationships and prioritize customer outcomes in line with TCO and ROI expectations. It is equally important that this commitment to customer success is evident throughout the
The research finds Oracle atop the list, followed by SAP and Infor. Providers that place in the top three of a category earn the designation of Leader. Oracle has done so in five categories, SAP in four, Infor in three, Databricks in two and Microsoft in one category.