- April 23, 2014
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Omni-Channel Success: How Kay and Jared Jewelers Increased Sales by 49%
Omni-channel, one of retail’s newest marketing buzzwords, refers to satisfying consumer demand for a unified brand/shopping experience across any and all digital channels.
Omni-channel leads where cross-channel and multi-channel still lag: in the deep, system-wide data integration that enables company and consumer to interact and transact seamlessly, online and off, with total team focus on customer satisfaction.
One company that’s getting omni-channel right is Signet Jewelers, owner of Jared of the Galleria and Kay, two popular retail chains with hundreds of US locations.
During a two-year fact-finding initiative with IBM interactive, Signet used customer segmentation analysis, voice-of-the-consumer surveys and in-store observations to answer questions MarketingProfs writer, Neal Berg, says every retailer (and we say, every small business), should ask:
- Who are our customers?
- Why do they choose our brand?
- How can we do a better job of engaging and empowering
them in a rapidly changing digital world?
Connecting Online, In-store and Via Smartphone
Equipped with its newfound insights, Signet upped its social media presence by launching new Facebook and Twitter profiles; simultaneously, it redesigned the Jared and Kay websites, and posted new mobile sites for each company. Signet’s goal, in keeping with its omni-channel aspirations, was to make every shopping experience as easy and intuitive as being in the store.
To help customers find and choose the right products, it added capabilities that allowed customers to:
- Chat live with sales associates
- Compare items side-by-side
- View available credit balance
“Omni-channel consumers may spend up to 25% more than standard multi-channel shoppers.” –MultiChannel Merchant
Results and Takeaways
Compared with the same period the year before its omni-channel initiatives, Signet reported a staggering 49% increase in online sales. While your company may lack the resources of a large global retailer, Signet’s success with omni-channel marketing can still be instructive:
- Know your customers: if you haven’t asked them in a while, survey loyal customers to find out why they choose your company or brand over others; integrate any new revelations into your marketing message.
- Admit that “channels” are disappearing: it’s all one channel now to mobile, socially enabled consumers; provide the holistic, seamless shopping experience they expect, online and off, and they’ll reward you with more sales, more social sharing and greater loyalty.
- Acknowledge the role of data: sure, system-wide integration that puts customer, product and inventory data at customers’ and sales reps’ fingertips is a complex and costly endeavor; but you don’t have to go all in to realize a payback; even small changes in data handling can produce desirable results.
- Look for ways to improve: convene a meeting with marketing, IT and executive teams; explore whether, like Jared and Kay, your brand is truly putting customer needs first; are you equipped to seamlessly sell via online, offline and mobile technologies? If not, consider how you might make connecting, interacting and transacting with your brand easier and more convenient. (P.S.: do you use social media?)
