Are retailers really ready for Omnichannel?

It is clear that retailers no longer need evidence that omnichannel capabilities are decisive factors for success in retailing today. Nor do they need to be convinced that omnichannel functions will play an even larger role in the future. And this is why today’s leading retailers are putting the consumer at the center of how they Buy, Market, Sell, and Service. A commitment to customer centricity that is at the very heart of a seamless shopping experience.

However, this does not mean to imply that retailers are omnichannel ready. In fact, industry studies find that most, if not all retailers, have a long way to go to become true omnichannel champions. And this is probably due to the fact that a truly omnichannel transformation encompasses nearly every technology, system and process in the retail enterprise, making this process a daunting task that can take many years for most retailers.

The path to omnichannel retailing requires then a long-term roadmap, divided into manageable short term projects linked to clearly identified business goals and oriented to develop the key omnichannel capabilities, which include customer centricity, product and pricing information management consistency, unified commerce and organizational alignment.

Retailers know about the importance of omnichannel, but they also know the big effort it requires. Few retailers today are omnichannel ready and, in fact, it will take the vast majority of retailers many years to transform their back-end and customer–facing capabilities into a seamless shopping experience across all channels in an efficient and cost-effective way.

To achieve omnichannel retailing then, retailers require multi-year, multi-phased strategic planning. Although retailers will need to prioritize some initiatives, it is very important that the roadmap includes initiatives to progress in parallel in all the critical omnichannel capabilities. The retailer will also need to make a cost and ROI analysis of each initiative that allows to find internal funds.

We understand all these concepts may be very abstracts for a retailer, since almost all the information that can be found about omnichannel is not really hands-on. That’s why we will be holding a free webinar on the 29th of January to show attendants how to succeed in Omnichannel implementation in a practical way with the Openbravo Commerce Platform. Furtheremore, after the webinar, attendants will get a Free Kit with useful information to embrace the Omnichannel challenge.

Hope to see you there!