Beyond the holiday rush, multichannel retailers can’t afford to be short-sighted, ignoring the paradigm shift in consumer purchasing behavior that will extend long after the pandemic is over. If they aren’t looking at long-term investments to create hybrid customer experiences, they will soon find themselves way behind the pack.
The quest for customer data is expensive and filled with frustration. How many brands are truly ready to invest in wild new experiments like those at McKinsey’s store at the Mall of America to collect more customer data when they can’t even access what they already have? A smart data approach may be the answer to this dilemma.
As ecommerce grows and expectations rise, experts say we can achieve Amazon-level service if we practice customer centricity. Many take this to mean putting the customer at the center of your business and provide amazing service. But customer centricity isn’t all about the customer – it’s really about the customer record.
If you’re thinking about replacing your inventory management system, a search will turn up literally hundreds of commercially available systems, including specialized ones that may not fit your multichannel business. Here are the top 6 features that you should be considering when upgrading your system, and what to look out for.
Shooting across Amazon’s bow with its FBA program, Shopify is going all-in on ecommerce fulfillment, tapping 3PL partners to provide two-day delivery across the U.S. for merchants on its ecommerce platform, many with physical stores, while letting them keep customer data and a branded packaging experience.
Fanbank, a Santa Monica, CA-based startup, aims to give small business owners a greater opportunity to reach online buyers by creating digital credits that can be redeemed in brick-and-mortar stores through Facebook ad campaigns. The ads show up in shoppers’ newsfeeds, and soon will be publishable on a merchant’s Facebook page.
With the drumbeat of bad news about online credit card breaches continuing, retailers can use tokenization to protect against consumer data theft.