The Key to Omni-Channel Retailing

Today, and into the foreseeable future, retailers must move past multi-channel retailing to omni-channel retailing. While the two are similar, omni-channel focuses on creating a homogeneous customer experience across all channels. The customer experience is brand-focused rather than channel-focused. Bricks-and-mortar stores become part of the retailer’s overall supply chain and should be considered an inventory and fulfillment source to meet the demands of their customers.

The retailer’s challenge is how to plan, optimize and execute the right inventory, at the right place, at the right time to meet or exceed the customer experience. A successful omni-channel retailer is capable of capturing orders (demand) from an e-commerce website, social media sites, bricksand-mortar stores and kiosks. The retailer must have the ability to fulfill orders from any place, which may include drop shipping from a vendor, single or multiple distribution centers (DCs), a store and even a competitor. Finally, the retailer needs to deliver orders to customers when they want it and with order integrity.

The retailer’s goal is to meet or exceed the customer’s expectations and to create brand loyalty by being transparent with content and context. The world of retailing must move from pushing out content to allowing customers to pull content in from multiple sources. However, such transparency comes with risks and requires a retailer to have tightly integrated applications, with relatively ‘near-time’ customer order information (forward and reverse).