The dramatic transformation of retail in recent years has presented both exciting opportunities and unprecedented challenges for businesses.
While competition is fiercer than ever, meeting customer expectations for seamless omnichannel experiences and building meaningful connections has become vital to driving lifetime value in the relationships between brands and consumers. To navigate these challenges successfully, it’s now important for retailers to embrace the concept of unified commerce – taking it beyond the standard omnichannel approach.
In our third video presentation from the unified commerce platform Shopline, Zimpul owner Peter Lodewijks joins Jon Levy, country manager for Shopline Australia, to discuss the importance of unified commerce as a significant advancement beyond omnichannel systems. According to Levy, while omnichannel does connect multiple platforms to expand a brand’s ability to sell across various channels, unified commerce goes even further by leveraging a single platform to run a modern retail business.
Check out the video below to learn how unified commerce can turn sales channels into customer touchpoints that work together in ways that align with the business, leading to a seamless experience for consumers.
As discussed in the video, here are five key insights to guide retailers’ understanding of unified commerce:
- Why unified commerce over omnichannel?
Embracing unified commerce is an essential step for retailers looking to modernise or scale their business. With the widespread use of emerging technologies such as AI, consumer expectations for extraordinary retail experiences will continue to rise. Unified commerce allows businesses to lower the effort needed to adopt new trends and meet these evolving customer expectations. Furthermore, unified commerce eliminates the need for maintaining multiple systems and provides a single source of truth, optimising operations and reducing ongoing costs.
- What are the practical benefits of unified commerce?
Unified commerce offers several practical benefits that would be challenging to achieve through a traditional omnichannel approach. Features such as returning online purchases in-store, seamless gift card usage across channels, and improved understanding of customers through unified data are just some examples of this. These advantages lead to a customer-centric approach and ensure the brand is not siloed behind sales channels, enabling a cohesive and engaging experience for shoppers.
Unified commerce allows retailers to leverage generative AI to enhance various aspects of their business, from product descriptions and SEO keywords to marketing campaigns and automated chatbots. The integration of AI also opens up exciting opportunities for social commerce, enabling real-time customer engagement and personalised experiences.
- Operational efficiencies and employee experience
Beyond the customer experience, unified commerce streamlines operations and enhances the employee experience. By having all data in one place, retailers can phase out manual tasks, manage systems more efficiently, handle customer service queries better, and enjoy streamlined financial management. This centralised approach enables retailers to focus more on growing their business and less on managing multiple providers and systems.
- Overcoming challenges and choosing the right platform
While the benefits of unified commerce are clear, some retailers may perceive it as challenging to implement. Platforms such as Shopline however, are designed to offer an easy and seamless process for businesses – while partnering with experts can also provide valuable support during the implementation phase.
Retailers looking to adopt unified commerce should consider platforms with open APIs that allow easy integration with existing systems and future technologies. This open architecture enables businesses to expand their functionality and create headless solutions without starting from scratch.
- Empowered satisfaction
Unified commerce empowers retailers to successfully navigate a dynamic and disrupted retail landscape. It’s not just about selling anywhere – it’s about having sales channels work together to benefit the customer. The true strength of unified commerce lies in its ability to scale businesses, optimise operations, and provide a cohesive, satisfying experience for customers, employees, and shareholders alike.
As retail continues to evolve, embracing unified commerce will be a key differentiator for businesses seeking not only to survive but to thrive in today’s highly competitive environment. It is a key pathway in providing extraordinary customer experiences, meeting their ever-changing expectations and securing long-term success in the retail industry. Even though investment in unified commerce may sometimes be perceived as expensive, a total cost of ownership comparison can clearly demonstrate and justify its actual value.
For more insights from industry experts like Peter Lodewijks and Jon Levy, be sure to watch the complete video series from Shopline, which will conclude with episode four – making the case that unified commerce is the future of retail, and that businesses embracing such platforms today will lead the way forward tomorrow.
Learn more about Shopline Australia here.
