Shifting gears

Moving from multito omni-channel MarTech strategies

Upstream CMO, Chrysa Karamanidi , and Head of Product & Growth, Katerina Matthaiou , highlight the importance of deploying omnichannel marketing strategies and why MarTech can accelerate their adoption

Consumers today do not just seek mere digital interactions, but consistent and unified experiences across any touch point through which they communicate with a brand. In response, many brands have implemented multichannel strategies.

However, few are those that have succeeded in transitioning into an omnichannel approach. Usually, the emphasis is placed on the use of various channels to reach the largest possible number of customers, with the channels working independently from one another.

This approach isn’t always successful as 56%1 of consumers report that they frequently have to repeat the same information through different customer flows, which is a cause for frustration. In fact, 79% of consumers expect consistent interactions across channels and 80% consider a brand’s experience as important as its products2

Omnichannel is the art of redefining the customer-brand interaction. It is not about the quantity of channels, but about the quality of the integration between the channels. In the realm of consumer expectations, the product purchased is only as important as the seamless journey it accompanies. Each communication channel needs to contribute its own distinct element, working together to craft a unique personalized experience. Whenever we get closer to an omnichannel strategy, putting the user rather than the channel at the epicentre of the communication, the results are remarkable.

HOW MARTECH IS RESPONDING

The benefits of embracing an omnichannel approach are manifold, ranging from brand consistency and higher customer satisfaction to personalised offerings, efficient customer support, enhanced overall experiences and elevated conversion rates.

Despite these advantages, the transition from multichannel to omnichannel is slow and intricate, influenced by factors such as organisational silos, resistance to change, resource requirements, lack of expertise of the marketers, inconsistent customer data and inadequate customer understanding.

Additionally, infrastructure and technology pose challenges in this transition, as different departments use different tools, which lack integration, there are costs to consider for upgrading existing infrastructure and new infrastructure has to be implemented to ensure security and privacy.

Here’s where marketing technology comes into play, enabling companies to adopt true omnichannel strategies. What a MarTech platform needs to offer is centralisation, the ability to control all the communications across the board through a sole platform. Integrating data gathered from all different channels or even from existing customer data platforms (CDPs) will ensure better targeting, but it will also enable setting up event-triggered communications. Unified reporting will help acquire a better understanding of customers, leading to improved decision making. Magic can only happen with the right tool.

PUTTING OMNICHANNEL MARKETING INTO WORK

One example of omnichannel strategies unfolding can be seen through Upstream’s mobile marketing platform, Grow. Such a case is driving plan upgrades for a major mobile network operator in Brazil. The seamless integration of the MNO’s data into the platform enabled targeted campaigns, which drove 24% higher conversions. Also, the company reported a 45% uplift in plan upgrades through automated retargeting of customers who dropped off the purchase funnel on the web, through mobile messaging channels, such as SMS or RCS.

Similarly, Upstream reports

a 135% customer base increase through onsite campaigns for a fashion retailer in Brazil in 45 days. The new CRM base was then used to drive sales via mobile messaging. Leveraging behavioural data, the company ran personalised win back campaigns that improved repeat sales by 8%, as well as cart recovery campaigns, decreasing cart abandonment by 70%. Overall, the retailer enjoyed a 16-fold return on investment.

Four ways to apply MarTech to omnichannel

The global omnichannel marketing opportunity is set to be worth $19.5bn by 2030, according to the latest research, driven by omnichannel’s improved connectivity between brands, retailers, merchants and audiences. Here are four ways to make it work.

Programmatic advertising – One of the biggest steps forward with modern MarTech is the use of automation. Until now, many brands and merchants were having to manually collect, analyse and segment customer data, then create and deliver ads accordingly. They then had to track and optimise campaigns based on what then occurred.

MarTech – especially today’s AI-powered platforms – can much more easily automate all of this, not only doing what a human would do, but also finding new, often overlooked segments, demographic groupings and more.

Generative AI can also help create even more engaging ads for all identified groups, as well as automating the bidding and buying process.

Targeted email – Similarly, AI-driven MarTech can create much more effective email marketing campaigns, generating new levels of personalisation based on the customer data collected and presented to the system. It can also be used to automate B2B email marketing, generating and sending series emails, industry report emails and even writing blog posts.

Geofencing – For marketing the relies on location, geofencing is ideal, but since it is often intrusive it relies on personalisation not only being totally fool proof, but also timely. Here MarTech systems backed with AI can look at the consumer data available, look at the content or offers and much better match the two. It can also assess how often someone has been pinged with a geofenced offer in a particular place – and indeed if they acted on it – and hold back from sending too many.

Cross-channel customer support – better data means too that customer support can better serve customers. Collecting, analysing, slicing and dicing data can create the ultimate in personalised marketing, but this too can be translated into how you handle these customers should they contact your business. Omnichannel routing can also channel customers to the right person for their likely or known request, with the system knowing what they have bought and what they need from their interaction. It can also choose the best support based in the channel through which the customer arrives at the agent.

Chrysa Karamanidi, Chief Marketing Officer, and Katerina Matthaiou, Head of Product & Growth, at Upstream were speaking at MEF Connects Omnichannel in London on 28 November 2023

References

1 Salesforce, State of the Connected Customer Report

2 Salesforce, State of the Connected Customer Report