Understanding Multichannel Integration
Imagine youâre getting ready for a night out. You order a dress from your favourite store online, but when it arrives, it doesnât fit quite right. Now, you donât want to miss out on wearing that dress, but you donât have time to go through the hassle of mailing it back and waiting for another one to be delivered.
Wouldnât it be easier if you could just pop by their physical store and exchange it for the right size. Hereâs where multichannel integration comes in. Today, fashion retail operates on several channels and platforms: e-commerce stores, social media accounts, websites and more.
Multichannel integration allows fashion businesses to seamlessly combine these channels and make shopping an easy experience for customers. To put it simply, multichannel integration in fashion retail is about using multiple different channels and platforms to facilitate a cohesive customer journey. Itâs about understanding that new-age consumers may begin their purchasing journey on one channel or platform but move seamlessly between them before making a purchase.
As a fashion retailer, this means staying on top of all your channels and ensuring they communicate with each other. It involves setting up brand awareness and storytelling campaigns across platforms like Instagram or YouTube as well as clear communication via mobile apps and push notifications. For example, letâs say a customer finds your brand on Instagram and clicks your profile link to visit your website. They then check out some pieces from your latest collection but leave without making a purchase.
Two days later, they find themselves looking at your ad while scrolling through Facebook and come back to their abandoned cart on your website. If there is congruence in how your brand is visually represented across channels, customers are more likely to associate social media presence with the brand they first discovered. Of course, Iâll admit that multichannel integration isnât always easy to execute.
The key lies in understanding what each channel offers and making sure all your teams are communicating with each other effectively. Only then will you be able to create a seamless multi-channel experience for customers across all touchpoints.
The Benefits of a Unified Approach
I donât know about you, but Iâve found that the classic âsiloâ approach to business is as outdated as bootcut jeans. Thereâs an old adage that many hands make light work and that is not limited to carpentry or feeding pigs. It works for fashion brands, too.
The power of a unified approach cannot be underestimated in the world of multichannel integration. If everyone from your sales team to your designers, buyers, content creators and marketing experts has a shared vision, with the same priorities and objectives, your business can go from strength to strength. When everyone is on the same page (or at least in the same book), mistakes are less likely to be made - especially where multichannel integration is concerned.
Sort of. Those working together will also share different perspectives, which will help with problem-solving. While no one likes too many chefs in the kitchen - especially one as disorganised as mine - working as a team means businesses can try new things and then talk about what did and did not work.
This means better communication across teams, leading to greater collaboration and better overall performance for the company. With collaboration comes innovation, so keep those lines open. In addition to increased efficiency, productivity and business growth, there will be a higher level of employee engagement if you can evidently avoid burnout by ensuring the workload does not fall on just a few peopleâs shoulders. So itâs really quite simple - being on the same page is essential for business success in this day and age where customer expectations are forever changing and a good customer experience is what will help you grow your business across all platforms.
Key Strategies for Effective Integration
Imagine a regular workday, youâre at your desk and you get a ping on slack. You open your phone, there are notifications from whatsapp and instagram that need your immediate attention. It seems like there is also a new brief coming in on email, then you get calls from different people asking about an order and you realise itâs a lot.
This is apparently why integration matters. We live in a world where we are not only active on multiple channels but also expect brands to be present everywhere, wherever we are. In order for businesses to ensure this kind of omnipresence while keeping up the customer experience, integration is key.
Brands must tie together all their systems from front end to back end to create seamless processes both for themselves and the customers. It helps them achieve efficiency as well as deliver good service. Proper integration also allows brands to better allocate resources and identify places of improvement within their business model.
It seems like a good way to ensure proper integration is by choosing the right partners or platforms that offer a robust api ecosystem which allows for easy integration with other softwares or channels. This allows brands to add more features or processes into their system without having to build everything themselves from scratch. Another way is by going for automation which allows them to streamline repetitive tasks thereby freeing up time which can be used in focusing on bigger things.
To make the most out of their integrations, it is important for businesses to set clear goals and objectives that they want to achieve through this process - whether itâs higher sales or better customer experience, being aware of what they want can help them make better choices when it comes to integration.
Tools and Technologies for Seamless Integration
You're sitting at your laptop. You've had three coffees and youâre about to have a fourth. Youâve got your Shopify dashboard open, maybe your Facebook ad manager is on another tab, your calendarâs up - in front of you is the digital equivalent of a desk covered in Post-its and hastily scrawled ideas on serviettes.
If youâve ever been here, too, youâll understand the importance of integration technologies for keeping everything in one place. Sort of. It's not just a matter of convenience either, though that certainly helps with the caffeine jitters.
Integrated tools like Zapier or Integromat are a boon when you're trying to streamline workflows. Sort of. They connect your separate platforms and automate manual tasks, freeing up time for more important things - like creating content or interacting with customers.
It's sort of magic, watching invoices and confirmations go out on their own or seeing posts appear on several social media accounts without lifting another finger. But it's far from perfect - especially since integrations can quite a bit have issues loading or syncing or doing the thing they're supposed to do when you most need it. Sometimes there are hiccups in the supply chain, sometimes sales orders are delayed by an hour or two.
Occasionally the platforms themselves experience bugs or delays that can hold up an otherwise seamlessly integrated system. Still - these technologies are worth considering if you have even just one full-fledged channel (website + landing pages + lead capture forms etc. ) and one social media account (Tiktok/Instagram/Facebook).
It takes some time to set up but if you're keen to scale up, it's well worth the investment in terms of learning curve, professional support and software subscription fees.
Measuring Success Across Channels
Itâs Monday morning. You check your email marketing dashboard, then log into your Facebook ads account, then sneak a peek at Shopify before you even manage to finish your first coffee. Sound familiar.
It seems like sometimes i do wonder if this obsession with numbers might be missing the forest for the trees - but we can all agree some data is important. When youâve got emails firing off, new sales channels to track, influencer posts, and affiliate referrals to worry about, reporting and analytics can go from helpful to overwhelming in a hurry. A new channel probably means learning a new set of definitions for ROI, click-throughs, and âreturn on ad spendâ.
But itâs not always about learning each channel in granular detail. It helps if you can centralise some of your tracking so your team isnât copying numbers into multiple spreadsheets just to make sense of campaign performance. It seems like one thing that has worked wonders for me is picking up universal identifiers wherever possible - like utm tags on all posts. More or less.
Itâs not just for social anymore. UTM parameters (especially when theyâre consistent) are a dead giveaway of whatâs working and whatâs not across every channel - yes including affiliates or those product placement videos with creators on YouTube. In some cases it helps bring metrics together from different sources in one place - which is a beautiful feeling, let me tell you. Measuring against specific metrics like engagement or sign-ups is great for every brand that wants clear visibility and the ability to pivot on a dime.
But that only works if you know which key metrics really move the needle for you (and align with your business priorities). So measure everything - at least initially - but maybe pick 3-4 that actually matter for each channel. Even better if theyâre fairly similar between platforms so you donât waste time matching everything up over 3 hours on a Friday evening.
Case Studies: Brands That Got It Right
I went to the local store to buy some shoes. What I ended up getting was a new pair of shoes and a shopping list for things I didnât even know I needed. Nike knows how to keep customers coming back for more through its omnichannel integration.
For example, their mobile app not only provides them with the latest Nike collection, but also gamifies workouts and offers personal recommendations. And, they receive notifications about nearby stores that stock the shoes they have been eyeing, which gives them the option to try on their purchase before swiping their card (or rather, tapping their phone). However, Nike is pretty much just one of the many fashion brands that has successfully found its multichannel rhythm.
Another one is Myntraâan Indian brand known for making online shopping easier than ever. Sort of. Their solution was to bring about an âofflineâ experience in an online setting using âTry & Buyââwhere customers could try on clothes at home before purchasing them (sort of like window shopping on your phone). They even have virtual assistants, similar to an in-store sales associate, available 24/7.
Sort of. And when it comes to brands like Leviâs and Burberry, the experiences continue long after purchases are made. In fact, Leviâs released a pop-culture game as part of its Pride Month campaign that brought fans together in a unique digital community.
More or less. This makes brands stand out from competitors who offer nothing more than ordinary customer service across channels.