There are some very clear trends in retail today. There is a proliferation of new channels and new competitors, increasing the complexity of marketing. This is compounded by the significant fragmentation of media now delivering sub-optimal ROI on marketing spend. Furthermore the expectations of the customer have also increased.

On the bright side, the availability and quality of data has increased, and for retail marketers that is good news. But only if you can get it, understand it and use it… wisely.

To succeed in the multichannel world of retailing, you need to ensure you gain a single, holistic view of your customer, regardless of which channel they are engaging. This is not an easy or fast thing to do, so you need to start now. The following steps need to be considered to do this:

1. Familiarise yourself, if you haven’t already, with best practice procedures, practices, strategies and tactics around using customer data in retail. Ensure you understand the privacy legislation and how that applies to your business.

2. Map out and agree, as a whole business (not a single channel or division), what information you will collect, how you will collect it and, most importantly, how you will use this customer information this in your business. It is better to map out the complete picture now, even if you don’t plan to take advantage of this until a point in the future. Include how you will measure customer value - by channel, segment and in total.

4. Lay the right technology foundations for a single customer view. This means ensure you design and build your customer database accordingly. It needs to be owned by the business and not by a channel. It needs to be designed to interface with all inputs and outputs. The technology and design must cater for tomorrow’s channels and programs and not just today’s. A heuristic view of a customer across your organisation and channels is the goal.

5. Map out how you will collect. You will always need to consider the customer value and why they will give you information. A mix of activities will need to be planned to collect information and it will be an ongoing activity to continue to refine and manage this information. This may include competitions, loyalty value, features, functionality and content. And it must be across your different channels.

6. Start collecting - the earlier, the better. The permission of a customer to communicate with you is a valuable asset now and in the future. It is also an asset that will be more difficult and more competitive to build in the future. Good luck.

Paul Marshall

Lasoo.com.au