Rise in the number of smart phones and internet users has encouraged enterprises to have their marketing presence across various communication channels to create maximum consumer engagement. It’s not about the store or phone or desktop anymore: It’s about all of these and moving towards a cross channel way. 

Cross-channel communication facilitates proactive engagement and personalisation for a great consumer experience. It focuses on effectively delivery information across SMS, Email, Interactive Voice Response 

(IVR), Internet & more through a unified platform in a quick and secure way, thus providing a viable plan to acquire and retain more clientele. After all, it’s all about being present at the right time, on the right channel, with the right message. 

Challenging as the role is, it helps if digital marketeers are aware of the latest trends, facts and figures when it comes to omni-channel, cross channel presence, customer acquisition and mobile marketing. Here is some important information that marketing professionals in retail should be aware of. 

Omni Channel retail 

The size of modern retail in India is expected to double from Rs 87,100 Crore (USD 13 billion) to Rs 171,800 crore (USD 25.7 billion) in three years driven by omni-channel retail. 

Going Online 

Digital drives e-commerce and gets foot-fall to the physical store. This influence doesn’t end at the store entrance as shoppers who are online use multiple gadgets for their research and say that it has be- come an important part of their retail experience. Revenue generated from online retail is projected to grow to USD 60 billion in 2017 & USD 70 billion by 2020. 

Cross-channel presence 

What’s changing today is the cross channel presence where shopper behaviour is driven by technology and thus online presence for retail has become extremely important to attract multiple user personas. Six in 10 internet users start shopping on one device but continue or finish on a different one, and 82% of smart phone users say they consult their phones on purchases they’re about to make in a store. 

Customer acquisition

Customer Acquisition has been observed to be the central priority of Indian retailers (51%), for the 4th year in a row. Single brand retailers (73%) and online e-commerce sites (74%) have moved ahead fast with this goal in mind. 

Focus On Online Marketing 

44% retailers want to implement an equal mix of online and offline marketing activities. However, with digital being the new currency in the industry, online presence has ranked first on their priority list. 

Offline Marketing initiatives

61% retailers agreed that they use special offers for customer attraction. 55% single brand retailers and 58% of online operations with physical store also voted for this marketing activity.

Importance of email marketing 

85% retailers agreed that email gave them better consumer engagement and is important for them. Mere 8% of them said that email marketing is not important for their business. 

Mobile marketing 

94% retailers embraced mobile as a part of their marketing strategy. Octane Research 

Social media marketing 

93% of the total respondents use at least one of the social media platforms. Facebook appears to be their favourite. The most active users are in the age group of 20-34 years. 

While social sites are still pushing to make social commerce work, retailers are taking note. 61% marketers have shown an accumulated interest in Social Media Promotions. This was accounted by a majority of 85% online retail operators. 

Customer engagement

Interestingly, the number of respondents who never faced call drops reduced from 10% in 2013 to 7% in 2017. 95% of the respondents want to hear from their favourite brands and companies in 2017 as compared to 78% in 2013. 94% of the respondents complained of receiving uwanted calls and Spam messages in 2017 as compared to 90% in 2013. 

Excerpted from Empowering Retail in the Digital Age, an RAI – ValueFirst knowledge paper. 

Article & image source: STOrai Magazine