The new era of omnichannel - top 5 key trends to look into
Locking hundreds of thousands of people at home and blocking the possibility of shopping in onsite stores has caused an explosion in the popularity of digital channels. For this reason, the approach to sales in the omnichannel model has also evolved.
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The ROPO (Research Online Purchase Offline) and reversed ROPO (Research Offline, Purchase Online) effect is also a major factor that influences omnichannel strategies. The extent of these phenomena depends on the product category, but may reach even 47%.
The above phenomena and their scale indicates the popularity of omnichannel purchases in Poland. However, the omnichannel from before and after the pandemic are quite different
Omnichannel after the COVID-19 pandemic
“The Future of Commerce Trend Report 2022" prepared by Shopify indicates that despite the return to offline shopping, clients' behavior has changed. This creates a big challenge for offline retailers as well as online stores. For this reason, omnichannel understood in the traditional sense of the word is in process of an evolution. These are some of the ongoing trends:
Combine multiple channels within one shopping journey
Shopify's data shows that 55% of users expect that information about the availability of a given product in a specific, physical store will be available on the store's website. Along with this expectation is also the willingness to buy the product online and pick it up on the spot.
For this reason, 49% of brands, breaking the organizational silos in which offline stores and e-commerce operate will be a priority for the next year. Moreover, 47% companies point out that the greatest challenge associated with this transformation is the correlation of data used in both realities.
How to use this trend in your store
The only way is to build a centralized database that can be used on operational and marketing level, that also can be used by all the company's systems. Similar to the solutions we have created for Castorama.
Customer experience as the main motivation
The ability to freely operate between different marketing and sales channels is an element of building a good user experience. And these, in turn, will be the basis for the development of both online and offline stores.
According to the report prepared by McKinsey on the state of the retail market, leaders in the field of user experience achieve up to three times better financial results than the companies that handle it the worst.
The report indicates that the post-pandemic world has forced retailers to manage the information they have in their ecosystems more efficiently - in the report it was directly called "acceleration of metabolism". In the case of online and offline stores, the key aspect is collecting information about customer experiences and their evaluation of the store's operation.
How to use this trend in your store
According to MobiRank data, already 57% of traffic comes from mobile devices. This means that the key to providing an optimal experience for the buyer within one trip is to optimize the store also for mobile.
Another element is collecting post sales feedback, mainly in the form of surveys and evaluations to quickly identify the least efficient elements of the entire process.
Increase in the role of local search and activities targeting the surrounding area
The Covid-19 pandemic has proven that elongated and extremely optimized supply chains work great when the world is not shaken by anxiety. However, when unforeseen circumstances such as war or pandemic occur, shortened local supply chains gain strength.
This trend is also reflected in the search habits of customers. Data from the payment operator Cashflows shows that 62% of consumers feel comfortable buying goods from local suppliers who source their supplies from domestic producers.
There is also a clear increase in interest in local searches. Data collected by MarketingWeek shows that local searches increased by 42% during the pandemic. Moreover, 37% of respondents declare that they are interested in online searching for information on products available from local suppliers.
How to use this trend in your store
From the perspective of online stores, this means, first of all, adjusting the strategy to customers who are interested in finding goods available nearby, without the risk of difficulties of a long delivery.
Shops that also have their stores offline should ensure adequate visibility within local phrases.
"Being everywhere" as a new default of market presence
On top of linking channels, you also need to increase the number of channels that can reach your customers. This means that in order to operate effectively, the store should be present not only where customers will most likely look for it, but also where the probability is much lower.
An interesting direction in this case is TikTok, price comparison engines or marketplaces. In all these channels, the key element is a well-built and tailored product feed. Thanks to it, presence in "all" channels can be automated and managed using one specific tool.
How to use this trend in your store
Choosing the right tools is crucial for automating your presence in many channels - succeeding is such task is easier if you have powerfull yet elastic tool for product feed management.
Showrooming
Omnichannel and the revolution that follows it affects not only online stores that are racing to provide more and more sophisticated experiences. The change also applies to offline stores.
Offline stores are gradually changing their role from places where, first of all, users buy goods, to places where goods are properly presented and customers can see them. This trend is particularly visible in the case of luxury brands and brands operating in such segments as beauty or fashion, where the appearance of the product is an important element of the experience related to its use.
How to use this trend in your store
The key in this case is the appropriate arrangement of the offline store. By combining data with online stores, providing information about the availability of offline products and appropriate space arrangement, the offline store in practice becomes a demonstration space for the most attractive products and a pickup point for orders from an online store.
Summary
The pandemic forced brands to quickly adapt to new market conditions and accelerated the digital transformation. For this reason, what a few years ago was perceived as the top achievement of customer experience and retail, is now a standard that all customers require.
If you want to learn more about the changes that the pandemic has forced on stores operating in the omnichannel model? Contact us today!
What is Feedink?
Feedink is a product feed management tool. It imports your store's offer, lets you improve it with rules and sends up-to-date feeds to Google Shopping, Meta, price comparison sites and marketplaces.
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