Experian notes that 84% of US adults are “digital”. However, not all of your customers will use the internet to engage with your brand. Consumers still prefer to spend time in stores, even if they are only “show-rooming”, and even the internet-savvy may engage with your company’s call centers or choose to be approached with traditional forms of advertising. Ensuring the best experience possible for your customers and increasing brand awareness are the keys to growing your business. However, gathering all of your customer information into one coherent picture and organizing a consistent message across all platforms is not easy. How can you manage all of this? An omni-channel commerce solution can do these things—and much more—for your business.
Omni-channel: It’s Not a Jedi Mind Trick
Omni-channel is a data-driven sales approach that focuses on delivering a high-quality shopping experience, regardless of the customer’s choice of venue, while enhancing your brand image. Your customers can engage with your company and products from just about anywhere: in stores, with their PC at home, or via a mobile device. The omni-channel commerce approach is about more than ensuring increasing revenue (although at least one industry study showed that omni-channel customers spend an average of 15-30% more than others and tend to be brand-loyal). It’s about using data you already own to construct a rapport with new customers and maintain a positive relationship with existing customers. Omni-channel can ensure a positive, consistent message across all of your touchpoints, as well as bring insight into how your customers can best be served.
These Are the First Steps…
Every business is customer-driven, so the first steps in any business strategy must revolve around the customer. The omni-channel approach allows for businesses to stay competitive by developing a more complete picture of customer demands using data, such as the purchase type, location, sales history, and other information to create a more relevant brand engagement. For example, if your customer recently purchased dozens of boxes of holiday candy through your mobile app, you may want to email her an offer on a bulk discount for her next purchase—or a coupon for $15 off a gift for herself.
Omni-channel is more than a survival tool, it’s a differentiator. Many businesses have implemented some aspects of omni-channel, but have failed to use it as a total solution: information gets siloed instead of being shared, resulting in lost revenues and issues with customer engagement. It’s important to keep in mind that customers are expecting omni-channel and will shop with the provider who can leverage a seamless approach to engagement and purchases. Since omni-channel is all-inclusive, customers do not only have the opportunity to make purchases easily across platforms, but also have the chance to be exposed to product information and reviews about current or future purchases through a consistent brand message through social media sites, email updates, or even direct mail or print offers.
Your Focus Determines Your Reality
Omni-channel is a powerful approach to enterprise growth, as it is data-driven and customer-centric, but pulling together and effectively managing all the different types of information can be challenging. As one of the top commerce and digital interaction platforms globally, the SAP Hybris omni-channel commerce solution has served to bolster the success of a broad range of both large and mid-sized companies, like General Electric, Reuters, and 3M. SAP Hybris is an omni-channel open-architecture commerce solution; it allows your enterprise to take advantage of all of your channels to enhance revenue, develop your brand image, and make it simple for customers—existing and new—to engage with your enterprise. Your marketing team can gain a better understanding of market trends and predict customer needs and wants. Hybris handles commerce and order management, simplifying these processes and streamlining operations; it is also extensible, so your development team can easily enhance the solution for your specific enterprise needs. Since Hybris is scalable, it can grow as your company’s development accelerates.
There’s No Such Thing As Luck
The power of omni-channel is in your hands. Exploiting an omni-channel solution like SAP Hybris can enhance your company’s growth, as well as improve your understanding of your current and potential customers. Choosing to implement the SAP Hybris solution in-house does not mean your company needs to manage everything alone—you can partner with an established SAP solutions provider.
For more information about hybris resources and experts to supplement your omni-channel initiatives, contact us today!