Personalised content has become imperative for retail companies to compete and stay relevant to their customers. In response, I have seen two trends emerge: omnichannel content delivery and first-party customer data collection. What exactly do these encapsulate, why do they need to be considered collectively, and what do they mean for your retail business?

Right now, technology companies worldwide churn out innovation at a rapid pace. Recent years have seen a sharp acceleration in the capabilities of Machine Learning (ML), Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotic Process Automation (RPA). Each new technology and solution promises a compelling, unique benefit.

A modern retail business deals with more moving parts than traditional brick-and-mortar stores. You might serve customers in a physical store, but they also interact with your brands and products throughout the day. Social influencers promote products during your customers’ personal time, which leads to research during the day, with a final online purchase potentially made in the evening.

You might be familiar with the psychologist Daniel Kahneman’s concept of ‘thinking fast versus thinking slow’.

Gaining control and visibility over workforce processes has become imperative for modern businesses. 

You might have heard someone drop ‘microservices’ as a buzzword in a meeting. Perhaps your technical team has mentioned them, but you are not really across what they are, the business benefits, or why you need them.

As you prepare your business for 2022, I encourage you to review your MarTech stack and consider whether your platforms enable omnichannel content delivery.

Many companies went into survival mode through 2020. They put projects on hold, cut down on expenses, and for many, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) were out of the question. As it becomes safer for companies to open their front doors again, M&As are taking off at an incredible rate. $82.8 billion worth of deal closes occurred in the first half of 2021, exceeding the average of the last five years.

The list of channels available to engage with your customers (and just as importantly, for them to engage with you) continues to grow. Long-standing platforms such as LinkedIn and Instagram remain relevant, while new platforms like TikTok have become places for brands to communicate with customers.

I frequently speak with clients that leverage disparate systems across their business. They might have CRM and ERP systems that do not talk to each other, inventories for online and physical stores that lack alignment, or branch offices without access to the same information. The list goes on.

I saw disconnects like this with a customer of ours. They reached out to Creative Folks as they lacked alignment across their platforms and struggled with consolidating product information between their stores. Their large stores stocked a broad range of items, whereas their smaller ones only stocked a fraction of items. There was no way of knowing which stores stocked what in their systems. An online store added to the disconnect.

How did we help them consolidate these systems to bring consistency and accuracy to their business? With systems integration.

Systems integration brings together every platform across your company. It can change how you meet new customer demands, make decisions about your business strategy, and present new opportunities for innovation.