Omnichannel Marketing

Introduction

Omnichannel marketing is a consumer-centric marketing strategy that uses various channels to create an integrated and seamless experience based on real-time data.

It’s a buzzword that gets used interchangeably with multichannel marketing, but there’s a hairline distinction between the two that makes a massive difference.

A multichannel strategy uses various channels to distribute content to consumers.

Channels are mainly focused on sending information out. So, an individual’s interaction on one channel has no impact on their experience with the brand’s other channels.

On the other hand, an omnichannel strategy uses various interconnected channels to move in step with a consumer’s customer journey.

The message to the consumer changes depending on their previous interactions with the brand, regardless of the channels used.

Omnichannel strategies take a while to set up, but consumers that interact with multiple channels tend to be more valuable and more loyal than others.

In this report, we’ll cover the benefits of an omnichannel strategy, examples of well-executed strategies, as well as how to set up your own omnichannel marketing strategy and make the most of it.

Let’s dive in!

The Benefits of Omnichannel Marketing

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of setting up an omnichannel marketing strategy, let’s look at the benefits of going through the trouble to set one up.

Omnichannel marketing makes your brand identity cohesive and recognizable.

One of the components of a seamless customer experience across channels is a consistent brand identity and tone. Consumers might feel jarred and confused if your brand is bright and happy on one platform, but serious and morose on another.

When your core values and the way you interact with your consumers are consistent across channels, your brand is more easily recognized. In turn, positive brand recognition improves familiarity and trust in your brand.

Data from omnichannel campaigns provide more detail and insight into your customers.

Data collection using an omnichannel attribution model shows you detailed information about a customer’s shopping behavior like:

· What platform they’re using to engage you.

· When they’re shopping.

· What actions they take before making a purchase.

· Which campaign led them to make a purchase.

This person-level data in combination with historic aggregate data provides extremely rich and useful consumer insights, which leads us on to the next point…

Properly executed omnichannel marketing creates highly accurate targeted messaging (and a better customer experience).

Leveraging your data and accurately mapping the customer journey of each customer segment means that you can be extremely specific with your messaging.

Rather than “spraying and praying” boilerplate messages to all of your consumers, you can interact with people in a way that prioritizes their individual jobs to be done.

Using an omnichannel strategy, you provide value to your consumers by solving the challenge they’re facing at their stage of the customer journey.

Doing so will result in a positive customer experience and have a positive knock-on effect on reputation, engagement, loyalty, and thereafter revenue.

Successful Examples of Omnichannel Marketing

Hot words like “recognizability” and “targeted messaging” can seem detached from actual work on the ground. Here are some examples of successful omnichannel marketing strategies and how they affected customer experience.

Starbucks

The coffee giant’s three main channels are its brick-and-mortar stores, its website, and its smartphone app.

The Starbucks app issues a free digital rewards card upon download. Users can then log onto their account on any platform (app, desktop web browser, mobile web browser), and the points on their card are updated in real-time.

This alone is nothing special, but by using a combination of aggregate data and consumer insights, Starbucks was able to create a feature that allowed people to skip long lines during the morning rush by ordering and paying ahead using the app.

This feature is a great example of accompanying a consumer across digital and physical platforms to deliver value beyond the product being sold, in this case, a coffee.

Disney

This entertainment multinational conglomerate is understandably spread across almost every conceivable platform there is.

They’ve got multiple websites, apps, in-person touchpoints, and television channels. But the magic of their omnichannel strategy is their My Disney Experience App.

The app syncs to a DisneyWorld ticket to help the user create a personalized itinerary, and provides helpful information on attractions that are updated in real-time.

It reduces the amount of decision-making visitors have to do by providing custom recommendations, and reduces pain points like long waiting times by advising visitors on which attractions have the shortest line.

Disney also uses the app to simplify access around DisneyWorld.

Instead of physical tickets that are high-touch and easily lost, the My Disney Experience App offers a complimentary contactless feature called MagicMobile that allows visitors to tap into attractions using their smartphone.

Visitors can also purchase a wristband that connects to their DisneyWorld account and accomplishes the same thing as the MagicMobile.

As you can see, the app enhances the customer experience of DisneyWorld by providing functional benefits like avoiding the hassle, saving time, and simplifying ticketing.

Singapore Airlines

The airline, which has long been noted for its innovative culture, uses email, a mobile app, a website, and in-person touchpoints like the inflight entertainment system, their airport staff, and aircrew.

Like Starbucks and Disney, users can access their Singapore Airlines account on any channel and everything is updated in real-time. In the app, users can book flights, check a flight’s status, book their in-flight meal ahead of time, and sync their account to the in-flight entertainment system to save watch data.

In addition to the app, Singapore Airlines uses email and mobile push notifications to recommend things like restaurants and travel destinations whenever users travel with them.

The app and the extra effort to provide value beyond the flight reduce the stress of traveling and improves customer experience.

How to Build Your Own Omnichannel Marketing Strategy

So, you’ve seen the potential of investing in an omnichannel marketing strategy and are ready to start building your own.

Admittedly, Starbucks, Disney, and Singapore Airlines are huge companies, but there are resources available that make omnichannel strategies accessible to everyone.

Before you rush into getting quotes for a mobile app it’s important to lay some groundwork to keep you on track.

Before You Start…

Discuss with your team:

Although it's called omnichannel marketing, implementing an omnichannel strategy requires a company-wide effort since customer touchpoints aren’t exclusively handled by your marketing department.

Siloed departments will make it almost impossible to break up siloed channels. Discuss the pros and cons of an omnichannel strategy with your team, the work involved, and how this will impact their work.

Analyze customer data:

We mentioned earlier that one of the benefits of an omnichannel strategy is improved data and consumer insights. But everyone needs to start somewhere.

Audit the data that you do have to identify gaps in your knowledge about your consumers. Then you can go about collecting this data to create the first iteration of your buyer personas.

Choose the right channels:

Once you have your buyer personas down, you’ll know what channels they prefer and where you should be engaging them.

If your customers prefer to shop in person to see big-ticket wares themselves, is there really a need for an e-commerce app?

Rather, you could consider using tablets or computers in-store to provide detailed product information and bring the till to paying customers.

We discuss channels in-depth later on!

Lock down your brand identity guidelines and update your channels accordingly:

As we mentioned before, consistent brand identity is a key component of your omnichannel strategy.

This is because consumers must feel that they’re interacting with the same entity across channels. If the identity suddenly changes when they’re taken to another channel, they might feel lost or suspicious.

Review your brand identity guidelines to see if they’re up to date with your current activities and if they would appeal to your buyer personas. It’s also worth checking if your channels actually follow these brand guidelines.

Executing and Leveraging an Omnichannel Marketing Strategy

You’ve built the foundation, now it’s time to build the house! Here are some key steps that you need to take to get the ball rolling.

Train team members that are customer touchpoints:

Your buyer personas will indicate how you should be talking to your customers. People in a luxury boutique and a bookstore will probably have very different expectations.

Are they expecting to sit down and be attended by a well-dressed sales representative?

Or do they prefer to be left alone until they have a specific question for staff?

Make sure that members of your team who interact with customers are aware of this data and have been trained on how to conduct themselves. This can include sales representatives, cashiers, receptionists and admin, customer service, and marketers.

Rework targeted messaging to align with the customer journey of your buyer persona:

The crux of an omnichannel strategy is personalization, which is achievable using segmentation. When you’re just starting out, you can use a combination of your buyer personas and historic aggregate data to create customer segments.

Individuals in a customer segment will have similar customer journeys, so they will have similar needs in each stage. If your segments are accurate, then you can be certain you’re sending the right message to the right person.

Regarding the message itself, you should focus on delivering value by fulfilling the customer’s job to be done. A customer that just purchased a camper van from you will probably feel annoyed if your post-sale SMS mentions a special discount they didn’t get. But, the same customer will probably appreciate a friendly email about road trip routes in the area.

Experiment, and optimize your strategy:

An omnichannel strategy is something that gets better with time. As you collect data about your consumers, you’ll know more about their preferences and shopping behaviors.

If you notice a certain campaign isn’t performing well, try experimenting with different variables and check if you’re tracking the relevant KPI.

You should also be iterating your buyer personas and customer segments as you gather data from campaigns. It’s highly likely you’ll get off to a bumpy start, but don’t be discouraged!

Over time, you’ll understand your consumers intimately and improve the accuracy of your targeting.

Don’t neglect mobile:

A study by the Harvard Business Review found that 73% of 46,000 participants used multiple channels while shopping. Some even used a mobile channel while shopping in the physical store.

For most, mobile is the preferred entry point to the internet and online shopping. You might even consider designing your future campaigns with mobile in mind if your data points you in that direction.

Tools and Resources for your Omnichannel Marketing Strategy

Given the nature of an omnichannel strategy, you should not be trying to go about everything manually.

Thankfully, there are lots of tools and softwares available to help you manage all of your marketing activities. Here we’ll cover the basics you need to get started.

Digital Channels

Each channel will have benefits and drawbacks that you’ll have to balance.

Don’t forget to refer to your buyer persona, which will help you discern where you’ll have the most success engaging your consumers.

Website

Your own website is one of the most flexible channels you can own. Depending on your business, a website can be used as a shop, a portfolio, a blog, a lead funnel, or all four.

A website is also one of the best ways to establish your brand identity, as you have full control over the UX design and web copy.

If you don’t already have your own website, there are tons of services available online that streamline the process for you. Some even integrate marketing and e-commerce functions, which we discuss in-depth later.

One drawback of a website is that you need to undertake adjacent activities to draw attention to it. You can use the other channels discussed below, or you can also work on SEO and SEM to rank higher on search engine results.

Email

Email is the traditional method of digital outbound messaging.

Like a website, email is highly flexible and can accomplish a variety of goals. You should also learn to design emails that match the aesthetics of your brand identity.

One drawback of email marketing is that it’s quite over-used and done incorrectly. People usually can’t be bothered to open promotional-based emails so you’ll want to strike a solid balance between sending emails that contain valuable content with sales-based campaigns.

There are also other common pitfalls. Email too often and you’ll be marked as spam. Don’t email enough and you’ll be forgotten. Email on the wrong day and you’ll be competing with ten other businesses in someone’s inbox.

It’s a complicated landscape to navigate, but if you stick to a strategy, target your messaging, and focus on delivering value, your performance will improve over time.

SMS

SMS messaging is a faster alternative to email. While getting phone numbers and consent to send messages can be challenging, text messages have high open rates and are opened quickly. These are a great option for time-based campaigns like clearance sales or special events.

Social Media Platforms

We could write a guide for every single social media site and still not cover everything. But the courses offered by PromoteLabs.com is a good starting point!

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Broadly speaking, social media is similar to search engine marketing. So, like a website, you can pay to have certain posts put on people’s feeds, or you can rank on keywords to appear there organically.

Social media marketing is a popular choice because once you gather momentum, your ROI can snowball exponentially. This is because the algorithm generates leads for you by exposing your brand to people who match your target audience and are just passively scrolling.

For an omnichannel strategy, actions taken on social media should carry over to other channels.

For example, customers that visit your website through a milestone post on your social media are shown a webpage with a special offer related to the milestone.

But you probably already know that social media is insanely competitive. Far more than any other channel out there. If you pursue social media marketing as part of your omnichannel strategy, focus your efforts on the platforms your buyer persona uses the most.

Mobile App

You may have noticed in the section on examples of omnichannel strategies that all of those companies offered mobile apps. For B2C companies with physical channels, mobile apps are the most effective way to bridge digital and physical.

However, developing a mobile app is incredibly expensive and complicated.

A study by McKinsey found that only 0.01% of apps are financially successful. Before you start putting money into an app, you should seriously consider what the purpose of your app is and if it can be accomplished with a more cost-effective alternative like a website or web-based application.

Segmentation Tools

Customer segmentation tools automate the segmentation process. Generally, they integrate with your channels, pull data from them, present the data in a readable way for strategic use, and organize individuals into customer segments.

Some tools specialize in things like eCommerce or email marketing.

A good tool will keep your data organized in a way that you can navigate so that you have a clear picture of who’s in your CRM. You should be able to compare different data points to identify recurring patterns amongst your segments.

Marketing Automation Tools

With your customer segments automated and updating in real-time, the next step is to connect a marketing automation tool so that messages get sent out automatically. Like segmentation tools, there are several options available.

Most tools work similarly and require little coding knowledge. You’ll connect all of your channels first.

Then when you plan an event, usually called an “automation” or “workflow”, the software uses a drag and drop flowchart to represent the code.

An example of a workflow would be sending a welcome email when someone signs up for your newsletter or sending an email when someone abandons their cart.

Some services offer templates of workflows, which is why it can feel like e-commerce stores operate similarly.

If you’re just starting out and don’t have much data available, there’s no need to reinvent the wheel!

As long as you’re prioritizing your customer’s job-to-be-done over the sale, you’ll be interacting with them in a meaningful way that helps keep you top-of-mind.

Data Dashboards and Reports

All of your channels and tools will have some kind of analytics, but when you’re straddling multiple platforms that bring in thousands of data points, things can get overwhelming.

It’s worth investing in a reporting tool that is compatible with all of your channels and tools.

A good data reporting software will pull data from all your integrations, and present it in a real-time dashboard that you can customize to show the most important metrics for your business.

Final Words

Customer-centricity and omnichannel marketing create a positive feedback loop within your brand. To implement an omnichannel strategy, you focus on the customer’s needs. Because you care about your customers, you meet them where they’re at with an omnichannel strategy.

This way, the strategy gets easier and more effective over time.

Also, delivering additional value besides your product offering won’t go unnoticed by your consumers. Shoppers that interact with your brand on multiple platforms are more engaged, more loyal, and more valuable to your business.

There are a lot of moving parts to an omnichannel strategy, but the good part is that you can start small and scale over time as your business grows.

Tailor your strategy to your buyer personas, and don’t be afraid to reach out to your customers! If you’re genuine about helping them, you won’t come across as pushy or annoying.

Lastly, the majority of menial work can be automated using segmentation and marketing automation tools. You and your team work upfront to define segments, write campaigns, design automated events, watch the data roll in, and tweak for optimization.

To your success,