Omnichannel Marketing Automation: Ace ‘em all!

 

With internet usage increasing exponentially, consumers have adopted the ‘anywhere anytime’ buying and businesses are finding it hard to roll with the punches. Shopping patterns have evolved over the years, so is marketing.  Businesses are now focusing on customer experience and omnichannel marketing as the bespoke multi-channel marketing techniques and strategies are failing to increase footfall.

Multichannel & Omnichannel Marketing

·         Multi-channel marketing - places the brand as its key focus and delivers the same message across various channels putting the consumers in a one-size-fits-all scenario

·         Omnichannel marketing – puts the consumers and the data surrounding the consumers at the centre. In short, the channels are the brand, which adapts around the consumers’ behaviour for a personalized and seamless experience

Why adopt Omnichannel marketing?

Omnichannel marketing is beneficial from all ends for the following factors: Seamless channel integration, unified customer experience, more control over channels, improved ROI, increased brand awareness, and more loyal customers

Why automate Omnichannel marketing?

Until now, marketing automation was limited to email automation, but with technology and best practice, all other channels can also be integrated into automation workflow, thereby creating an immersive customer experience.  An omnichannel marketing automation platform allows marketers to create personalized strategies to be delivered, ranging from initial touchpoints, such as a first welcome notification to the visitor, to complex multi-step programs.

How to create an Omnichannel marketing automation strategy?

Data is the critical source of Omnichannel marketing automation strategy. Data speaks volumes about customer profiles, and without customer profiles, omnichannel marketing is an uphill task. With data, customer profiles can be segmented, which enables us to develop personalized strategies for each segment.  Segmenting also helps in campaign engagement and understanding customer behaviour.

Data is Big

Yes, data is significant. All information about a customer is data, which enables us to get insights and plan marketing strategies.  When data is limited, the need for a machine learning algorithm is not required but when data is enormous, handling such data requires the help of an ML algorithm. The algorithms help businesses to make decisions and plan marketing strategies.

Big Data helps marketers design better and effective campaigns by segmenting buyer personas using data like customer behaviour, purchasing patterns, favourites and background.  It helps to make better pricing decisions based on various parameters like competitor cost, supply & demand, stock clearance and purchase history.  Some of the other use cases of Big Data is analyzing customer’s emotions, consumer behavioural patterns and personalize the customer experience.