A Comprehensive Guide to Omnichannel Strategy

What is an omnichannel strategy?

In sales, an omnichannel strategy is an approach that aims to deliver a consistent, seamless experience to your customers, regardless of the sales channel used. It is based on the integration of all available communication channels, such as physical stores, websites, social networks, mobile applications, and call centers.

But in B2B, and even more so in the SaaS sector, we’re talking about an omnichannel digital strategy – based on digital channels such as cold mailing, LinkedIn prospecting, etc.

Whether in B2B or B2C, an omnichannel strategy enables us to meet the growing expectations of consumers for a smooth, less pushy, frictionless shopping experience. In short, something more natural!

What’s more, the omnichannel strategy offers many advantages to businesses. It enables them to reach a wider audience using different communication channels. This enables them to respond at all times, regardless of the channel used by the prospect or customer.

In addition, another objective of the omnichannel strategy is that it offers companies the opportunity to collect valuable data on customer preferences and purchasing behavior. This data can be used to further personalize the customer experience and propose targeted offers and recommendations.

And that’s what we want to push at LaGrowthMachine!

What’s the difference between multichannel and omnichannel?

The terms “omnichannel” and “multichannel” are both used in the context of sales and marketing to describe strategies for interacting with customers across different channels. However, they have different approaches:

1. Multichannel: In a multichannel approach, a company offers several distinct communication channels to interact with customers. For example, this may include channels such as physical stores, a website, a mobile app, a dedicated phone line, social networks, and so on. Each channel operates independently and offers customers several options for interacting with the company. However, there may be little or no consistency between channels, meaning that information and interactions are not always integrated and synchronized.
2. Omnichannel: The omnichannel approach takes things a step further, seeking to seamlessly integrate the customer experience across all available channels. In an omnichannel model, the company still offers several communication channels, but the emphasis is on consistency, continuity, and integration between these channels. This means that the customer can start an interaction on one channel (e.g., on the website) and seamlessly continue it on another channel (e.g., via a mobile application) without losing information or history.

The key difference lies in the degree of integration and consistency between communication channels. Multichannel offers several independent communication options, while omnichannel aims to create a seamless, fluid experience between all available channels, offering customers a more coherent, personalized experience. The omnichannel approach is often considered to be more advanced and adapted to customers’ evolving expectations in terms of purchasing and service experience.

What are the advantages of an omnichannel strategy?

An omnichannel strategy has many advantages for your company. We’ll go into more detail in the sections below.

Better customer experience

First and foremost, it enhances the customer experience by offering seamless, consistent interaction across all channels. This enables customers to move seamlessly from one channel to another, fostering customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Broader target

What’s more, an omnichannel approach enables you to reach a wider audience using different communication channels. For example, you can attract new customers on social networks, while retaining those who prefer to shop in-store.

In my experience, I’ve seen a real difference in sales with customers who have adopted omnichannel as a strategy. Indeed, customers appreciate the flexibility and choice of channels offered, which translates into revenue growth for our company.

Better customer knowledge

What’s more, an omnichannel strategy also improves your knowledge of your customers. By using different channels, you can gather valuable data on their preferences, buying behaviors, and needs. This information enables you to personalize your offers and propose products or services that are better adapted to each customer.

Better performance… at a lower cost!

Finally, an omnichannel strategy maximizes your company’s operational efficiency. By integrating different communication and sales channels, you can streamline your processes and reduce costs.

To sum up this section, an omnichannel strategy has many benefits for your company, from improving the customer experience to increasing sales and brand visibility. By adopting an omnichannel approach, you can leverage different communication channels to reach a wider audience, personalize your offers, collaborate with other companies, and improve your operational efficiency.

How to develop an effective omnichannel strategy?

To help you develop an effective omnichannel strategy, we’ve put together a step-by-step guide. It’s nothing more and nothing less than a mapping of the classic process, aimed at sales and/or marketing strategists.

1. Understanding your customers

The first step is to understand your customers’ preferences and behaviors. Analyze the available data to identify the communication channels most used by your potential customers. For example, you can use online surveys, analyze traffic statistics on your website, or interact directly with your customers to gather their feedback.

To deepen your understanding of your customer base, it may be useful to segment your audience into different demographic groups, such as..:

• age;
• gender
• geographic location;
• etc…

This will enable you to further tailor your omnichannel strategy to the specific needs of each group.

2. Adopt a customer-centric approach

The second step is to understand your prospects’/customers’ needs, expectations, and preferences. You’ll need to adapt your strategy accordingly.

For example, if the segment you’re targeting values human contact, make sure you include the telephone as a channel of choice in your strategy.

Another customer-centric approach is to offer a seamless, consistent experience across all communication channels. This means that your customers should be able to move easily from one channel to another without encountering difficulties. For example, if a customer starts an order online, but then wants to complete it in-store, make sure that all the necessary information is available to facilitate this transition.

3. Use the right communication tools

Select the most appropriate communication channels according to your objectives and customer base.

It’s also important to consider your customers’ communication preferences. Some prefer to receive SMS notifications, while others prefer e-mails or phone calls.

Keep in mind that by offering different options, you increase the chances of reaching your prospects!

4. Speak with one voice

Consistent communication across all channels is crucial. Make sure your message, tone of voice, and promotions are aligned across all your communication channels. This strengthens your brand’s credibility and avoids confusion for your customers.

To this end, the use of an omnichannel tool is extremely beneficial for maintaining a consistent voice across all channels. These tools make it easy to manage and plan the messages to be broadcast on each channel while guaranteeing overall consistency.

In conclusion, developing an effective omnichannel strategy requires a thorough understanding of your customer base, a customer-centric approach, the use of the right communication tools, and consistent communication across all channels. By following these steps, you’ll be able to create a harmonious customer experience and maximize the effectiveness of your omnichannel strategy.

Bonus tips: Integrate automation into your omnichannel strategy

Automation can make managing your omnichannel strategy much easier.

Omnichannel strategy can be automated on several levels:

• Omnichannel sales automation
• Support (or customer service) automation
• Marketing automation

Omnichannel sales automation

That’s exactly what we offer with LaGrowthMachine: with our tool, you can program automated omnichannel sequences in advance, enabling you to send dozens of messages a day to different touch points.

LaGrowthMachine’s omnichannel sequences enable you to reach many more leads and convert better, in much less time than with traditional prospecting.

Automated support (or customer service)

What’s more, using chatbots on your website can:

• improve the user experience
• relieve your support teams

Chatbots are virtual assistants programmed to answer common customer questions.

They can provide fast, accurate answers, saving time and reducing the workload of your customer service team. You can customize them to match your tone of voice and your particular use case, contributing to branding and offering a consistent experience to your customers, whatever the communication channel used (chatbot, email support, etc.).

Marketing automation

Personally, I’ve already used automation to send personalized newsletters based on the preferences of my customers or leads, which made them feel taken into account and increased their response:

• engagement;
• retention;
• conversion rate;
• upsell.

When you integrate automation into your omnichannel strategy, the big advantage is that you can save precious time on marketing.

By using automatic scheduling and publishing tools on social networks like Hootsuite, for example, you no longer need to manually connect to each platform to share content.

You can plan your posts in advance, in line with your editorial calendar, and let them be published automatically at the times best suited to reaching your target audience.

But that’s not all!

Automation can also be used to segment and target your marketing campaigns. By analyzing your customers’ data, you can create specific segments based on their preferences, purchase history, or online behavior.

You can then automate the delivery of personalized campaigns to each segment, increasing the likelihood of conversions and customer loyalty.

You can even plug your CRM into your marketing automation solution to further improve workflow.

Some use cases and examples of omnichannel sales strategies

As we’ve seen, omnichannel strategy as a whole brings together many issues. In this last section, I’m going to give you a few examples to shed some light on the use cases of an omnichannel strategy. And these use cases can be reconciled!

Omnichannel loyalty program

Imagine a retail company offering its customers an omnichannel loyalty program. When customers sign up for the program, they can link their online account, mobile app, and in-store loyalty card to create a single customer profile. From then on, the company will track the customer’s purchases and preferences across all channels.

When the customer visits the store, staff will be able to access their profile and offer recommendations based on their past online purchases. What’s more, customers can add items to their shopping baskets online and pick them up in-store at their convenience. Promotions and rewards can also be applied consistently across all channels. This strategy enables a seamless experience for the customer, reinforcing brand loyalty and encouraging repeat purchases.

Live chat and omnichannel customer service

An e-commerce company implements an omnichannel customer service strategy by integrating live chat across its website, mobile app, and social networks. When a customer has a question or problem, they can contact customer service via any channel and get consistent assistance.

Suppose a customer starts a conversation on the website’s live chat, but has to leave the computer before getting a response. Later, he or she can resume the conversation on the mobile application without losing the thread of the conversation.

Customer service has full access to the customer’s interaction history, enabling it to provide fast, personalized assistance. This approach enhances the customer experience by offering seamless support and reducing friction when communicating with the company.

Connected in-store experience

A fashion retailer implements an omnichannel strategy in its physical stores, using technology to enhance the customer experience.

When customers enter the store, they can use a mobile app to scan QR codes for products of interest. These QR codes link the customer to online product pages, where they can obtain more information, reviews, and related recommendations.

If an item is not available in-store, the customer can purchase it directly via the mobile app and choose to have it delivered to their home or collect it in-store. Inventory information is synchronized in real time between the physical store and the online channel, offering a seamless experience and avoiding the disappointment of unavailable products.