Omnichannel vs Multichannel Commerce

Omnichannel commerce is an approach to business that implies the simultaneous integrated use of many online and offline channels, various ways of interaction between the client and the company. Examples of such channels are:

Online store or website.
Mobile apps.
Business accounts in messengers.
Groups and company pages on social networks.
Retail stores and chains, company dealers.
Technical support departments and service of the company.

Omnichannel is often confused with multichannel. But there is a significant difference between these concepts.

First of all, omnichannel supposes an integrated approach to communication with the customer. Whichever channel a potential or existing client turns to, communication will continue from where he left off the last time. For example, in retail, omnichannel means that online and physical stores interact with each other and have a single database. The integrated use of various social networks and instant messengers allow you to communicate with the buyer on both of them. This approach involves not only the introduction of unified communication standards but also the collection, tracking, and analysis of all requests and communication with the client in a unified business management system. In addition to increasing customer satisfaction, this strategy allows you to create a customer journey map.

Multichannel also implies interaction between the customer and the company through multiple channels. Let’s say a company has Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Telegram, a website, and physical stores. But the use of each of these channels occurs in a stand-alone or partially integrated mode. The company does not collect or transfer individual user’s requests between channels. If a customer wants to tweet about a question previously asked on Facebook, problems and delays in communication may arise. Usually, the situation is even worse when a client wants to cross-interact between offline and online channels. Customer loyalty decreases, the time of solving questions increases, and the risk of losing a customer grows.

Thus, the problem of linking channels together, integrating them into a single system seems to be quite significant. How can this be practically done? In Syntes, the Master Data Management platform (Syntes MDM) acts as a single database. The Product Information Management Infrastructure (Syntes PIM) is responsible for managing and connecting sales channels. Customer Data Management and Customer Relationship Management systems help marketers promote and sell services while creating and improving the customer experience.

According to the international research Global Digital 2021, 67% of people on earth use a mobile phone, and 53% use social networks and instant messengers. This share is growing by 13% per year. Between 72% and 80% of internet users shop online. 45% of adult users search for information about brands on social networks, and the vast majority (98-100%) have accounts on not one but several platforms. The average number of accounts in different social networks per adult Internet user is 8.4.

Obviously, in such conditions, omnichannel or, in the worst case, multichannel is almost a mandatory requirement. We see that the number of communications increases each year and even each month, and it becomes more challenging to track and integrate them. At the same time, the buyers are becoming more demanding. They consider seamless communication in various channels, including offline, their absolute right. The brand’s failure to provide such continuous communication irritates them.

In addition, the rapid collection and analytics of data are only possible in omnichannel commerce and are critical to the survival of brands in the competitive era of big data.

Syntes will help you succeed in this race by transforming your online brand store to meet the challenges of today’s digital world. We will help implement the latest communication methods and integrate the existing ones to transition your business from multichannel to omnichannel, increasing efficiency.

Syntes, an international company, develops a next-generation MDM (Master Data Management) and PIM (Product Information Management) cloud platform and provides brands and manufacturers with services for creating, managing and automating D2C (Direct-to-Customer) sales and marketing channels. Syntes solutions and services are used by the world’s leading brands and manufacturers of consumer and business products such as Razer, Scarlett, Pantone, X-Rite, AVerMedia and others. Syntes is a registered trademark of Syntes, Inc.

Mentioned trademarks and company names are registered trademarks of their respective owners.