​Customer loyalty in an omnichannel world

In a time where smartphones and tablets make information readily available at any time, consumers are in charge when it comes to retail engagement.

Customers who feel highly satisfied are more valuable to your business than others. This observation is the cornerstone when planning customer journeys between different touch points, and striving to improve your business is what keeps momentum up and keeps your business alive.

Rising bar of customer expectations

A decade ago, the discussion about customer touch points revolved around how to translate retail experiences into the online world. Today, brands that started online are opening up stores in the physical world. Their customers expect the same experience regardless of where they choose to shop. They want great products, personal attention and total consistency across the channels they choose.

In the customer-driven, omnichannel retail economy, ‘seamless’ is the simplest way to pinpoint the source of an excellent customer experience. It entails that whether customers starts their journey in the store, online, or on a mobile app, they can accomplish whatever they want, transitioning smoothly from one step to another in their journey without any gaps in the process or brand identity.

But for the majority of consumers today, that’t not the experience they get. 89% of customers report that one bad experience is all it takes for them to abandon a brand. Furthermore, Forrester observed long ago that “the only sustainable competitive advantage is knowledge of and engagement of customers.” Fortunately, tools address both challenges exist.

The value of fully connected customers

Magids et al. wrote in the Harvard Business Review November 2015 about The New Science of Customer Emotions that “As customers relationships with a brand deepens, they move along the pathway toward full emotional connection. Although they become more valuable at each step, theres’s a dramatic increase at the final one: Across a sample of nine categories, fully connected customers are 52% more valuable, on average, than those who are just highly satisfied”.

With ever-increasing consumer demand for brands to be engaging throughout all steps of the process, the capability to increase your customer engagement tactics rises with the use of digital receipts. Simply providing purchase details as a digital receipt is seen as a positive business move, one that an increasing number of retailers are taking advantage of. Including ways to engage the customer through that initial receipt will bond them to your brand even further and provide the “last mile” for fully connected customers.

Digital receipts offer your business the opportunity to help you connect with your customers. These receipts are more than just a scrap of paper to be tossed out without a second glance — they are the opportunity to increase your brand’s visibility and build customer relations.

Digital receipts also offer retailers a greater understanding into their buyer’s shopping habits. Understanding their behaviour allows you to make specific call to actions in your communication, and you can use your customer data to customize your content appropriately for your different clients. This in turn helps increase engagement and omnichannel loyalty.

Stefan Cohen - CTO at Findity