How do you get omnichannel right?

When it comes to success or failure in retail, customer experience is everything. The rise in shopping channels has made delivering memorable experiences more challenging, however, as customers have come to expect a consistent and personalised service however they shop.

According to Econsultancy, 87% of consumers view the ability to purchase in all channels as very important in a retailer, particularly following the growth of mobile commerce.

As such, retailers need to move away from a multi-channel strategy – which enables new channels outside the store, and activities that cross between channels, such as click-and-collect – towards an omnichannel strategy.

What differentiates omnichannel from multi-channel is the layer of customer experience surrounding it; it is that consistency and ability across all channels and touch points that shoppers crave.

Particularly to mid-sized retailers, achieving an omnichannel model can seem like a daunting task. In reality, however, it just means putting in place the right technology, and advances in mobile and the cloud, have significantly reduced the investment needed to employ such tools.

Implementing the right technology is essential to creating customer experiences not just today, but into the future. At TRC, we provide an omnichannel platform built on a single source of information, so that everything – ecommerce, mcommerce, in-store, loyalty schemes, payment gateways, accounts and electronic point of sale – comes from the same database.

This enables retailers to consider how each element of their business will develop, and how their customer experience will grow. We want them to think about how any technology deployments will be integrated at a later date to maintain consistency and connection, rather than treating each technical acquisition as a standalone project.

Having worked with many Irish retailers, it is clear that businesses are at varying levels of maturity in their omnichannel journey, and fear of the complication and expense of new systems is part of the reason some companies are being left behind.

However, our solutions can be rolled out in modular form through the cloud, which makes implementation easier and reduces cost.