3 Quick Wins for Multi-Channel Retail Challenges (Part 3) -

Today’s retail landscape is more challenging than ever. Data is everywhere—from Point-of-Sale (POS) to email, Twitter, and Foursquare—but it’s only useful if retailers can find a way to connect the dots and communicate with each customer as an individual.

Managing all this data and using it to create a unified, 360-degree view of each customer may seem like a daunting task. But this week I’m sharing three quick wins retailers can implement immediately to solve your most pressing interactive marketing challenges.

Challenge #3: Disconnected online and offline experiences

Quick Win #3: Capture incremental revenue opportunities with world-class integrations

How well do you really know your customers? Even if you’re already gathering analytics data, failing to link the information to remarketing capabilities results in irrelevant customer communications and untapped revenue. Shopping cart abandonment programs help significantly decrease lost sales by tracking online shopping carts and remarketing to site visitors through triggered messages—leading to higher ROI, recaptured sales, and increased customer interactions with your brand.

Aside from web analytics and ecommerce capabilities that are tied to online customer interactions, retailers are also struggling to measure offline interactions and quantify the in-store experience. But how can you meet this need when the interactive programs you employ aren’t designed to track both online and offline shopping behavior?

ECOMMERCE TOOLS
eCommerce products are not only useful online, but also within your brick and mortar stores in order to drive additional revenue. Here are a few of our favorites:

RECOMMENDATIONS. If you’ve added a recommendation engine to your website, why not suggest additional (and relevant!) products through email and at POS? When a customer purchases computer paper in-store, display on-screen recommendations like “printer ink” to your sales clerks so they can more accurately up-sell at the check-out counter. Or, remind customers of products they may be running low on based on purchases they’ve made within the past year.

QR CODES. QR codes intrigue customers and engage them with in-store product displays. Link QR codes to product ratings and reviews so customers can make better-informed decisions. This will encourage more transactions at POS instead of waiting for the consumer to research product information online at home. But remember that not every consumer is familiar with QR codes, and only about half have smartphones. In order to reach as broad an audience as possible, include basic instructions with the QR code—and a URL for those without QR readers.

TRACKING
By tying interactive campaign results to online and offline analytics (and vice versa), you’ll have the right data to provide a realistic and complete marketing profile of customer metrics.

CUSTOM CONTENT. Dynamic content isn’t just beneficial to subscribers—it also enables individual tracking of customer activity, tying custom codes to email coupons in order to follow customer spending. And with this kind of power, you can easily test different variables of your email to find the right mix that will drive future response rates.

REWARDS PROGRAMS. Loyalty programs and rewards cards are another win-win for both the customer and retailer. Members are privy to more exclusive deals, while you track spending behavior in order to make more accurate product recommendations. By linking this information to multiple marketing channels, you can take advantage of cross-channel capabilities, meeting customers wherever they are, whether through email, text, social networks, or personalized websites.

Looking for more insight into retail challenges and how to solve them? Check out our SUBSCRIBERS, FANS, & FOLLOWERS report Retail Touchpoints Exposed and the companion piece, Retail Touchpoints Optimized.

And don't forget to check out Part 1 and Part 2 of this series!