In today’s hyperconnected world, many consumers no longer see the boundary between the digital and physical worlds. They’ve come to expect a smooth experience at every touchpoint, whether they are browsing online, commenting on social media, picking up an item in-store, or scanning a QR code from a poster.
This means that businesses need to focus on an omnichannel approach. An omnichannel is a seamless, consistent, and interconnected customer experience across all brand channels and touchpoints. By delivering a great omnichannel experience, brands are more likely to increase engagement, customer satisfaction, and brand loyalty.
Omnichannel isn’t just limited to corporations and big brands. Businesses of any size can offer a seamless omnichannel experience. If you’re running an art shop or online clothing store, there are many mediums to reach your target customers.
For example, a customer might start their journey by clicking on your Facebook ad and then browsing on your website before registering as a member and then buying a product in your physical store. They might then decide to purchase a product a week later because of a new subscriber promotion and choose to collect the item in your physical shop.
Throughout the user journey, your brand’s key messaging, visuals, services, and support remain constant and convenient for customers to do business with you. The key is to offer a consistent and unified experience, where customers can expect a positive experience every time they interact with your brand.
8 Key Ingredients of an Omnichannel Strategy
Ingredient #1: User Journey
The first main ingredient in an omnichannel strategy is the user journey. You need to understand and map out the multiple ways that users interact with your brand, as well as their motivation and expectations. Include every single touchpoint in the digital and physical world including marketing and advertising campaigns. To do this, you should already have identified the key user personas or proto personas.
When mapping out your user journeys, you may discover missing components that are needed to complete the omnichannel ecosystem. For example, you might realise that users need an in-store terminal for quick collection of their items. User journey mapping also helps you identify weaknesses and strengths in your current strategy.
Ingredient #2: Seamless Transitions Between Touchpoints
Users need to be able to interact with your business seamlessly across multiple channels. This means they should be able to start an interaction in one channel to eventually purchase, register, subscribe, return items, or request support on other channels without having to start over the process. Users should be able to pick up easily from where they exited in the user journey after each interaction.
This applies to every interaction and intention, including customer support. Cross-channel customer support is vital if you want to provide a great user experience, especially removing the need for users to repeat their request or issue for every single interaction. Another example is in customer loyalty programmes. They should be integrated seamlessly in different channels to make it convenient for customers to redeem or check them.
Ingredient #3: Integrated technology systems and platforms
To deliver a smooth user experience and an effective omnichannel strategy, you need to build an integrated system that connects all your critical software, such as POS systems, websites, customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP), and marketing automation. It should, ideally, be like using one software for all your needs. Customer and business data should be periodically synced and backed up.
Plan for platforms that can easily integrate and scale with other systems. This will allow you to monitor customer behaviour, spot consumer trends, and identify potential sales opportunities and other improvements.
Ingredient #4: Unified and Consistent Messaging and Branding
Another critical area of an omnichannel ecosystem is in your messaging and branding. Having a unified message and branding that’s consistently delivered or displayed helps solidify your strategy. The brand’s core values, tone of voice, message, and graphics should be the same across all customer touchpoints to set the customer expectation and increase loyalty.
You’ll need style guides, brand templates, and adequate staff training to ensure that your brand is protected, whether on digital media, in-store, or over the phone. Having a consistent, on-brand experience will help customers feel that they know your brand and can trust it.
Ingredient #5: Comprehensive Data Collection and Analysis
Improvements are futile without solid evidence, customer data, and feedback. An omnichannel strategy requires a system to collect data and proper analysis to gain a comprehensive understanding of your customers. It’s like a feedback loop process for you to continually improve your omnichannel approach.
Popular tools include Google Analytics for site data, Hotjar for behaviour analytics, social media insights on Facebook and LinkedIn, and business intelligence tools in your CRM, ERP, and marketing software. By studying sales data and customer behaviour, you can pinpoint the best ways to attract and convert visitors to loyal customers while also identifying loopholes in your omnichannel strategy.
Ingredient #6: Customer Personalisation
One way to differentiate yourself from other competitors is in the level of customer service you provide. In this digital age, personalisation can be a competitive edge, and in certain industries, such as luxury goods, it’s required by customers.
Plus, it’s not difficult to implement, especially with many AI tools available. You can look into tools for product recommendation, data analytics, personalised marketing, and service automation to offer your customers a better experience with your brand.
Ingredient #7: Team Structure and Staff Training
A seamless omnichannel strategy requires employees to be on board with delivering the omnichannel experience. You’ll need to add in provision for staff training and support, whether on the systems they use or on customer interactions. They’ll need to have an overview of the user journey to be able to serve customers better.
Additionally, you should examine the team structure and supporting partners that help deliver the omnichannel experience. Think about how you can structure your teams better to improve the workflow and consider whether your delivery partners require training too.
Ingredient #8: Continuous Optimisation
Your omnichannel strategy shouldn’t be a one-time project because customer needs will change, technology will evolve, and new platforms will emerge in the marketplace. You’ll need to regularly monitor and review your strategy to ensure it meets the business goals and brand vision.
There should be an allowance for changes in your omnichannel strategy based on data and market research. With ongoing improvements and constant competitor analysis, your brand can remain relevant in the long run with your target customers.
Conclusion
An omnichannel strategy is important for any business, whether for a new startup or large businesses. Building an omnichannel ecosystem is a long-term investment for your brand, helping you convert one-time customers to loyal fans of your products or services. You can kickstart it by studying your user personas and current customers to begin mapping a comprehensive user journey map and then gradually expand your omnichannel offerings.
