An omnichannel strategy means providing your customers with a fully integrated shopping experience from the physical store to the virtual store, including mobile applications and the full range of possibilities offered by the offline and online world.

According to Harvard Business Review, 73% of customers use multiple channels during their purchase journey. Only when the customer has gathered as much information as possible from various sources to support their purchase decision will they decide to buy from a retailer.

Benefits of Omnichannel Commerce

1. Better Customer Experience

• What do your customers expect? Number one on the list is a unified experience.
• According to UC Today, 9 out of 10 consumers want an omnichannel experience with seamless service between communication methods.
• As the number of touchpoints increases, so does the need for seamless integration from one touchpoint to another.
• Social ads, an email newsletter, a mobile push notification, a conversion with your chatbot, or a face-to-face chat with your store staff.
• By breaking down the walls between the channels in a business, the consumer is empowered to interact with a company naturally.

2. Increase in Sales and Traffic

• Making your sales strategy omnichannel-proof isn’t that simple. But it’ll be worth your time and money.
• A study of 46,000 shoppers shows that omnichannel customers spend more money than single-channel customers.
• And with every additional channel they used, the omnichannel shoppers spent more money in the store.
• Customers who used 4+ channels spent an average of 9% more in the store than those who used just one single channel.

3. Increased Customer Loyalty

• Not only do omnichannel customers spend more, but they’re more loyal to your brand.
• The same study shows that within 6 months after an omnichannel shopping experience, these customers had logged 23% more repeat shopping trips to the retailer’s stores.
• They were also more likely to recommend the brand to family and friends than those who used a single channel.
• You can stop pushing discount coupons, mid-sale campaigns, and other traditional marketing tricks with an engaging brand story. Focus on customer loyalty, and your brand will be safe.
• This means that an omnichannel strategy will not only increase sales it will also improve your customer loyalty. Sounds good, right?

4. Better Data Collection

• Retailers tracking their customers over different channels can better serve their customers with a more personalized experience.
• The omnichannel approach allows businesses to gain insights on how to create content. It offers that will encourage their customers to engage in shopping more – not only online but also at the physical stores.

Omnichannel vs. multichannel

Although both multi and omnichannel involve selling across multiple physical and digital channels, the key difference is how the customer experience is combined across those channels. A traditional multichannel retailer may have a website and physical stores. These two channels are generally very siloed and have very little interaction with one another.

Stores will have their own stock and sell directly to customers, while the website will have its own stock. Items purchased in-store can only be returned in-store; sometimes, online orders cannot be returned in-store. As a customer, your online interaction with the retailer is completely separated from your offline interaction. In essence, the online and offline channels are treated as separate businesses.

Today’s consumers do not tend to see a brand in silos. They are likely to have multiple touchpoints with a retailer and expect their customer journey between each touchpoint or channel should be seamless.

I want to be able to interact with the brand:

·   Online

·   Through social media 

·   On my mobile

·   Or in-store

·   … and I want each of these interactions to be unified.

Why apply an omnichannel approach?

A recent study by Omnisend looked at how omnichannel marketing improved in 2020. According to the survey, marketers that integrate three or more channels in their marketing campaigns increase their purchase rate up to 287%. In 2019, an omnichannel approach could improve the purchase rate by 12% versus 3.21% for single-channel campaigns. Most importantly, the consumer references for omnichannel campaigns have also increased by 14.8% between 2019 and 2020, showing this approach’s importance in improving the customer’s engagement with your brand message.

At the end of the day, staying consistent in your omnichannel marketing strategy is crucial for business growth. The marketing team of every business should constantly be evaluating where you are as a brand, where you want to go, and most importantly, understand that the future of commerce is the unification of both in-store and online shopping, enhanced and customized for complete user experience across multiple channels through whichever method your customer prefers.

Marketing analytics helps us see how everything plays on each other to decide how your company may want to invest moving forward. Re-prioritizing how your team spends its time, and the resources, channels, and efforts you invest in, are critical steps to achieving marketing success and improving sales. At DuartePino, our analytics experts analyze your business’ data to evaluate better the performance of your marketing, content, and products and use your analytics insights to reach the right people. Contact us to learn what our trust advisors can do for you.

*This blog post was written by Estefanía Guzman, Intelligence Advisor at DuartePino. Learn more about an omnichannel strategy for business growth. Contact us.