Omni Channel Bundled Services

I see that the future of omni channel retail will require retailers to provide a means for consumers to collaborate and virtually shop in addition to the classical purchasing capabilities. The goal of the collaborative shopping network is to encourage the consumer to return to the site and stay on the site longer and even invite their friends and family to join the collaborative shopping network.  The objective is to provide a site where consumers can return and linger in their shopping and social interaction with other members.  In order to increase the likelihood and encourage consumers to return many of the leading eCommerce retailers are bundling additional services, features and offers to support the strategy of increasing the likelihood of consumers to return to the site.

Perhaps the best example is the type of bundling that is offered by Amazon which provides home products, apparel, technology, school books, a place for individual to sell their own products.  Then there is the most pervasive service offered by Amazon; Prime, which is used by Amazon to tie together additional services, including free shipping, video and music.  These services, and many more that are offered by Amazon, provide a compelling reason to return for a vast array of consumers and consumer types.  This strategy of offering all of the services that consumers may desire provides a compelling reason for consumers to return.  Prime alone in the shopping space when coupled with the one-click purchase provides a compelling vehicle for impulse purchases and I think this ability when coupled with the Amazon browser plug-ins provides a distinct advantage and leaves other retailers continuously chasing these services.

I’m not saying that every retailer must offer video or music, what I am saying though is that retailers must expand their horizons and bundle services to encourage consumers to return.  The consumer collaborative shopping site provides the retailer with a platform to expand and try new services, products and interaction with consumers.  This collaborative platform provide a method for the retailer to interact directly with consumers and then potentially partner with other service providers and even other retailers to expand consumer offerings.  The concept is to develop a virtual shopping mall with the retailer as an anchor with the site providing other services and collaborative opportunities for both consumers and partners.

Consumers and web based shopping search services are already providing a crude version of the shopping concept.  Major retailers are also utilizing Twitter and consumer programs to encourage consumers to register for notifications of specials.  The next wave will be the retailer that provides the portal to a bundled set of services along with an opportunity to share and collaborate with friends and other consumers.  This is exactly what Amazon has been offering to consumers and been very successful.  

And now for the audience participation portion of the show…

ECommerce will have wide ranging impacts on both the retail and manufacturing sectors.  How can you focus these abilities to improve the consumer's experience?  Improving the consumer’s experience will require a re-evaluation of the sales channels, the manufacturing channels and practices and the supply chain channels and practices from the raw materials to the consumers’ homes.  In order to ensure and maintain success in this new reality you must harness the tools and capabilities in many new areas.  How can you support these continuously changing requirements?

Consumer Omni Channel Demands

Consumer demands on retail and especially omni channel shopping are growing dramatically to support the changes to the consumer lifestyle.  These changes are also being driven by consumer free time, or more appropriately lack of free time, and the demands of younger generations such as millennials.  The younger generations and especially millennials are coming of age and purchasing power and they are driving changes in the retail environment driven by both technology, such as mobile and smartphone technologies, and social networking.  I see social networking technologies and demands from consumers as driving game changing capability demands from the consumer.

Consumers are taking control of their virtual environments now and they are demanding change from retailers to meet these demands.  Consumers are now demanding interaction and cohesive blends of the virtual and physical shopping environment and these demands are only going to grow as time passes.  With the combination of large eCommerce retailers such as Amazon and the virtual networking capabilities and practices of retailers and the limitations on consumer time for shopping the  consumer is demanding increased omni channel capabilities.  The comfort level of consumers with virtual networking and omni channel retail is changing the way consumers both shop and purchase.  Retailers must recognize and adjust their omni channel practices to meet these changing demands.

Years ago the increase in beginning days of Facebook popularity and the consumer embrace of the social networking practices retailers were forced to scramble to build new teams to incorporate Facebook into their marketing and sales programs.  This caused a great deal of additional labor to manually support this capability especially the level of labor expended to maintain the freshness and respond directly to consumer questions and responses.  This social window provided a means for new consumer interaction with the retailer and the retailers that attained success in their Facebook interaction invested a great deal in the maintenance and support of that portal with the consumer.

Now, while the number of social networking sites has dramatically expanded and the technology used by consumers to interact with these sites has also dramatically improved, I don’t really see that many retailers taking advantage of these new tools.  Consumers themselves are building their own collaborative communities by creating a quilt work of social networks and eCommerce location based search engines to build their own collaborative shopping networks.  There is a vast amount of valuable consumer information that is lost to the retailer though because the common retailer has not provided a portal and the integration of the tools to support this consumer collaborative shopping networks.  The retailers that develop and support the consumer collaborative shopping network will change the omni channel market to generate the greatest level of success in the future.  In fact this will shortly become a requirement for omni channel business similar to the Facebook revolution.   

And now for the audience participation portion of the show…

ECommerce will have wide ranging impacts on both the retail and manufacturing sectors.  How can you focus these abilities to improve the consumer's experience?  Improving the consumer’s experience will require a re-evaluation of the sales channels, the manufacturing channels and practices and the supply chain channels and practices from the raw materials to the consumers’ homes.  In order to ensure and maintain success in this new reality you must harness the tools and capabilities in many new areas.  How can you support these continuously changing requirements?

Consumer Omni Channel Interaction

It is no longer enough for a retailer to provide a channel from which consumers can purchase products, the retailer must now provide an interactive channel that blends the social networking with the ability to purchase electronically or via the brick and mortar store.  This inclusive shopping, social and purchasing environment must utilize mobile technology to blend the virtual electronic shopping with the physical shopping and support the purchase from any channel.  These changes are being driven by the demands and expectations of millennials in reaction to the technology and social media capabilities that are being mashed together by these millennials to meet their lifestyle.

These changes are being driven by the millennials and must be supported by retailers in order to remain successful in the future.  This will be difficult for most retailers because of what I think of as the culture of retailers; innovation followers that invest generally in the second wave of technology.  Retailer have focused on the sales aspect and generally have baulked at consumer demands or changing consumer practices.  As an example I think of the consumer practice of window shopping where the consumer goes to a brick and mortar store to examine the product and then purchases online.  Retailers fought this practice from the beginning rather than embracing and providing consumers with a true multi channel environment for their shopping and purchasing practices.  

There are a few retailers that are leaders, such as Amazon, or Alibaba, that are driving retailers and the retail industry in general to meet the demands of the consumer through expanded offerings and ease of purchasing.  The purchasing capabilities of Amazon have changed the face of eCommerce and the types of products that are purchased electronically.  These competitors have only scratched the surface of consumer shopping opportunities across channels.  Retailers must take note of the consumer interest in the consumer add-on sites such as Retail-Me-Not for purchasing opportunities and social networking sites such as Pinterest and Instagram for shopping and networking capabilities that allow consumers to extend their shopping practices virtually.

Retailers must embrace the shopping concept and the tools that support this concept in order to take advantage of an early entry into the shopping space.  This means that the retailer must incorporate access and much closer interaction with social networking sites to encourage the consumer to stay on the site when they visit.  This requires the retailer to open their site to the interaction from external sites and also to incorporate some of the social networking capabilities such as encouraging sharing friends and contacts with the retailer to enhance the consumer experience.  This concept is new and will be growing in demand with consumers and the smart retailer will embrace early to allow them to mold both the consumer interaction and the omni channel integration in a manner that benefits both consumers and the retailer.

And now for the audience participation portion of the show…

ECommerce will have wide ranging impacts on both the retail and manufacturing sectors.  How can you focus these abilities to improve the consumer's experience?  Improving the consumer’s experience will require a re-evaluation of the sales channels, the manufacturing channels and practices and the supply chain channels and practices from the raw materials to the consumers’ homes.  In order to ensure and maintain success in this new reality you must harness the tools and capabilities in many new areas.  How can you support these continuously changing requirements?