Overcoming the top 3 barriers to omnichannel marketing

There is no doubt that we are liv­ing in an omnichan­nel world, where con­sumers con­stant­ly switch between chan­nels, devices, and touch­points. From a marketer’s point of view, this means there are more oppor­tu­ni­ties to engage with cus­tomers than ever before, but also that cus­tomer expec­ta­tions have nev­er been high­er. They want per­son­alised, rel­e­vant expe­ri­ences, across all touchpoints.

To achieve this, orga­ni­za­tions need an inte­grat­ed approach offer­ing a holis­tic view of the cus­tomer. The lat­est report from Econ­sul­tan­cy and Adobe reveals that this is still a chal­lenge for many com­pa­nies. Based on a sur­vey of 2,000 mar­ket­ing, dig­i­tal, and e‑commerce pro­fes­sion­als and includ­ing indus­try and year-to-year com­par­i­son, the research shows that while more com­pa­nies are tak­ing an inte­grat­ed approach to their cam­paigns, only 12 per­cent can con­nect offline and online data and just a quar­ter have a sin­gle cus­tomer view.

The report also reveals issues that are thwart­ing progress, with non­in­te­grat­ed tech­nolo­gies con­tin­u­ing to be a major imped­i­ment. More than 50 per­cent of com­pa­nies have sep­a­rate tech­nolo­gies for man­ag­ing data across chan­nels, which is a sig­nif­i­cant bar­ri­er to integration.

The report also found that there is work to be done on the mobile front. Respon­dents agree that they lack the sys­tems (71 per­cent), mobile data (70 per­cent), and time/resources (66 per­cent) to effec­tive­ly map the mobile cus­tomer jour­ney. This info­graph­ic offers a sum­ma­ry of the report:

infographic
https://blogs.adobe.com/digitaleurope/cross-channel-marketing/infographic-overcoming-top-3-barriers-omnichannel-marketing/

Clear­ly, organ­i­sa­tions are becom­ing more aware of the inad­e­qua­cies and defi­cien­cies of their strate­gies and capa­bil­i­ties in omnichan­nel mar­ket­ing, and some progress has been made in this area. For exam­ple, com­pa­nies are now 29 per­cent more like­ly to take an inte­grat­ed approach to their cam­paigns across all chan­nels, com­pared to last year.

As John Travis, VP of EMEA Mar­ket­ing at Adobe, states, “This research is encour­ag­ing in show­ing that there is an appetite to dri­ve change and make the cus­tomer a focal point. Across sev­er­al key areas, the major­i­ty of those sur­veyed plan to pur­sue omnichan­nel capa­bil­i­ties or are work­ing on them already.”

You can down­load the full report now, and do not hes­i­tate to share your views in the com­ments section!