As a retailer, you always want to offer your customers the best possible experience – regardless of whether a customer is in your store or at home sitting at their computer. Your business processes and sales channels need to work seamlessly so that your customer experiences the same personalised shopping experience wherever they are. That’s the goal of unified commerce, a modern and dominant retail business strategy.
For many organisations, unified commerce is a mere speck on the horizon. Online and offline shopping need to work seamlessly, and to achieve this, four key components need to be aligned. Firstly, your systems, including your checkout, webshop and order management. You also need to look at your (sales) channels and products. Channels need to connect seamlessly, and product and inventory information needs to be up to date and accurate both offline and online. Finally, it’s all about interactions. Everything needs to be available in real time and in one place.
Streamlining your systems, channels, products and interactions are the ingredients for a successful unified commerce business. But where should you as an organisation make a start to be successful? What market movements should you take notice of? In this article, we look at three key trends in the field of unified commerce.