Passionate about the relationship between employees and their companies, Stéphaine Bernat has always worked in marketing and communication roles in retail environments at an international level before becoming interested in the world of SaaS. It is now on the issues of adopting digital communication on screen at Cenareo that she is exploring another aspect of the dialogue between a brand and its audience, whether internal or external.
The retail sector has evolved at record speed in recent years. With the digital explosion, players in the sector adopted a multi-channel strategy that seemed to place e-commerce in competition with the physical point of sale. But this alleged opposition has finally generated a new approach that favors omnicanality and the total complementarity of online and offline.
The 2010s: from single-channel to multi-channel
For a long time, going to the store to buy a product was the norm. But the digitalization of the economy has pushed retailers to reach their targets also on the internet. The development of a multi-channel strategy then symbolizes the desire of retailers to effectively multiply contact points. Past the beginnings of the first e-shops, the Internet has become a privileged shopping area. The weight of online sales represented 3% of retail trade in 2010 (excluding fuel, pharmacy and medical items). It gradually climbed to 9% in 2019. A year later, thanks to successive lockdowns, its share jumped to 13% (Source: Fevad).
However, this continuous and rapid growth of online has also revealed a real threat for retailers: the risk of cannibalization between the different distribution channels or even the death of the point of sale. A physical store has no interest in having a customer come to the store for advice before buying online. Another negative effect of multi-channel marketing is higher costs and more complex logistics, as communication, advertising, distribution and sales must be managed in parallel. The transition to omnichannel is under way: how to think about physical and digital shopping spaces in their complementarity and no longer their opposition.
The customer journey at the center of attention
An omnichannel approach that also owes its emergence to another factor: the consumer, now faced with different distribution channels, has changed his habits. By giving him the opportunity to buy online or in store, we thought we would give him the “choice of weapons”. But he finally chose to integrate digital technology... into his in-store shopping journey. And conversely, he uses points of sale in his online shopping journey...
With new customer expectations inherited from multi-channel marketing, brands are therefore now focusing more on the buying behavior of their targets. But for retailers, it is necessary to go even further in integrating online and offline to offer the consumer a more fluid and unified buying journey.
Multichannel is dead, long live omnichannel
The 2.0 consumer wants to obtain information about a product on social networks, try it out at a point of sale, have it delivered to the home... He wants to take advantage of the advantages of digital technology as well as the benefits specific to buying at the point of sale. Omnicanality is therefore a response to changing consumer behaviors.
This trend has led the store to go digital, but it is also encouraging pure web players to open their own physical points of sale! Online challenges offline, but physical retail is also pushing e-commerce to its limits. Jeff Bezos would thus be on the verge of launching several Amazon department stores with an area of 2,500 square meters. At the same time, Amazon's “Prime” option exists to satisfy the consumer's need to own a product at the time of purchase.
Online and offline: the best enemies?
The search for the convergence of online and offline is now impacting all dimensions of retail. The increasing use of chats, chatbots or social networks shows that even customer relationships are becoming digital.
In 2011, The Retail's Big Show featured a wall of twelve smart touch screens capable of presenting several thousand products in 3D. Ten years later, it is clear that this virtual wall has not invaded the market. A “real person” salesperson is always present to advise the customer, but the latter is actually part of a more global strategy where screens and tablets are also used to streamline the customer experience.
Is the “phygital” the big winner at the end of the health crisis?
Of course, the health crisis, with the closure of “non-essential” businesses, has greatly upset a sector already weakened by the Yellow Vests crisis. It represented a tremendous acceleration of the digitalization of the sector with the development of click & collect, drive or contactless payment. At the beginning of the 2010s, the retail sector could still perceive a threat in the development of online. Today, it is indeed e-commerce that has made it possible to limit the impact of store closures.
It is clear that digital technology is also used as a powerful drive-to-store lever, at the service of stores that are still perceived as the best potential shopping space. Social networks, dynamic signage - and in particular location-based digital advertising - are thus used to generate more in-store traffic. Digital “plays the card” of the physical store. And the use of an application like Yuka shows that the mobile can meet a Web-in-Store purpose. Brands are more than ever looking for phygital strategies that aim at omnicanality as the best of both worlds of digital and physical retail.
Retail “with a human face”
The health crisis has considerably boosted the digitalization of retail, but it seems in the same movement to reconnect it to its origins, to rehumanize it. From a place of sale, the store thus becomes a place of life, entertainment and especially experiences. Orange already understood this well with the development of the “Smart Stores” concept, which aimed to create more serenity and trust in stores designed as an extension of the home. The consumer is led to test products in their real environment, he becomes an actor in a unique experience.
The new Ikea store concept, opened in the city center of Vienna, is also an ultra-digital shopping destination: touch screens on all floors, omnichannel shopping solution via application, cash registers replaced by automatic terminals... More than 100 screens are integrated into all floors and are intended to provide both inspiration and additional product information.
When the experience comes back to the heart of the in-store customer journey... even at Ikea, a pioneer in the field.
What is the future of retail in 2030?
In just ten years, brands will have alternately switched from a multi-channel strategy to a cross-channel approach that finally culminates in omnicanality. Right now, brands need to ensure that the strengths of each sales channel serve everyone's performance. No more compartmentalization between physical commerce on the one hand and digital distribution on the other. Retailers must organize a permanent ping pong between the two that will serve omnibusiness and therefore their performance.
The quest for a unified business is on!
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