Even though both focus on customers, the main goals and practices of omnichannel and multichannel differ. Read the article and learn how to give your customers the best shopping experience.

OMNICHANNEL BASICS

Omnichannel is a strategy that allows you to communicate with customers without limits. It deals with many connected channels (POS, mobile app, e-shop) and creates a unified customer experience no matter what channel they use.

Omnichannel has many benefits. Thanks to the connected channels, you can collect more customer data from different customer touchpoints. Use CDP & CRM CareCloud, where all the right data will be assigned to the right customer. CareCloud also has an Analysis & Reporting app where you can analyze these types of data and predict your customer purchase behavior.

The more customer data you get, the more you can personalize the marketing content. Personalized communication means satisfied customers who will likely return and purchase again. Last but not least, the benefit is that your sales will increase with omnichannel.

WHAT ABOUT MULTICHANNEL?

Multichannel is also a marketing strategy to communicate with customers, but each channel (store, e-shop, mobile app) has a different type of marketing communication. 

These channels don’t need to be integrated with each other. For example, communication on social media can look different than email communication. You just need to be careful because each design has to represent your brand. CareCloud platform offers an easy-to-use email designer where you can design your email/SMS in no time.

With multichannel marketing, you are more flexible in targeting because you have different communication and marketing for each channel. Create different benefits and campaigns for customers in mobile apps versus store and e-shop.

THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN STRATEGIES

Multichannel and Omnichannel may sound the same initially because both use various channels, are focused on customers, and want to create the best shopping experience. But the main difference is in their strategies. Let’s see.

Omnichannel focuses more on the unification of customer experience across communication channels – no matter what channel the customer uses, the experience from the purchase should always be the same.

Time for an example: A customer is checking the offer on hiking equipment. Put one into the shopping cart, but it doesn’t make it to the final purchase. Therefore, omnichannel will remind him of the abandoned cart with a personalized remarketing advertisement on, for example, Instagram. 

On the other hand, multichannel marketing focuses mainly on the differences between individual channels and on adapting communication and marketing for each channel. Customers can choose what offer is more suitable for them, or you can motivate them to purchase more through one particular channel. 

Let’s take a closer look. A bookstore that collects data from customers knows that customers buy more books from the e-shop but prefer discounts in the store, so they send a marketing campaign that they have 1+1 free if you buy in the e-shop, but the brick-and-mortar store has a 20% discount at the time. A different offer for each channel.

Whatever marketing communication you choose is up to you. But in both ways, you will need a marketing platform that will help you check your campaign success and optimization.

A WORD AT THE END

CDP & CRM CareCloud offers versatile tools that make your marketing campaign unique. CareCloud is integrated into every customer touchpoint, making creating an omnichannel campaign easier and faster. For multichannel campaigns, you can use CareCloud custom designer to create emails and SMS messages according to your brand design. Make your customer feel special.