How can you use a unified commerce platform to measure multi-channel performance?

It supports omnichannel journeys and synthesises customer engagement to strengthen interactions and loyalty. This single platform integrates, optimizes, and empowers every consumer interaction with data-inspired insights. It encompasses in-store and online browsing and sales, web and social messaging and commerce, personalisation, fulfilment, inventory, supply chain, and more. It provides a seamless, consistent shopping experience even as customers shift across multiple marketing, communication, and commerce interactions. It injects agility into the retail tech stack and overcomes innovation roadblocks created by the inability to integrate antiquated single-purpose applications.

- A unified commerce platform is essentially a one-stop solution for retailers to manage all their sales channels, from online and mobile to in-store and call center, in a seamless and integrated manner. It streamlines inventory management, order processing, pricing, promotions, and customer service across all channels, while also providing valuable insights through analytics. This approach ensures consistent and personalized experiences for customers, leading to improved satisfaction and loyalty. In summary, it's about centralizing operations and data to create a cohesive and efficient retail ecosystem.

- A unified commerce platform is crucial for businesses seeking to effectively manage and optimize their multi-channel operations. It enables comprehensive measurement of performance across various channels by utilizing common metrics and KPIs. By understanding the customer journey across channels and identifying valuable customer segments, businesses can make informed decisions to enhance their strategies. Additionally, leveraging data-driven insights allows for continual optimization of channel mix, marketing efforts, merchandising, and customer service, ultimately leading to improved overall performance and customer satisfaction.

Choosing a unified commerce platform involves several considerations. Choose a platform that can grow with your business. Ensure the platform is compatible with other systems you use. Consider the level of resources and support provided by the platform supplier. Consider the cost of the platform. There are several options available, each offering unique features and capabilities. Well-known options include Shopify, Magento, and Salesforce Commerce Cloud. The best platform for your business depends on your specific needs and objectives.

- When choosing a unified e-commerce platform, it's essential to prioritize scalability, flexibility, functionality, and usability. The platform should be able to handle current and future transaction volumes and adapt to changing business needs without sacrificing performance or security. Core capabilities such as inventory and order management, pricing, customer service, and analytics are crucial, along with additional features like AI and personalization to enhance multi-channel performance. Lastly, user-friendliness for both employees and customers is key, ensuring an intuitive interface and accessible reporting for seamless operations.

Implementing a unified commerce platform involves several steps. Conduct a comprehensive evaluation of your existing sales channels, technology infrastructure, and data management practices. Identify what you want to achieve with your unified commerce platform. Choose a platform that fits your needs and goals. Connect your existing systems and data with the new platform. Use the platform to deliver personalised shopping experiences across all channels. Regularly review and adjust your strategy based on performance.

At the beginning, it might be overcomplicating to use external tools to unify the data so a good idea could be to leverage automation and VA (virtual assistants) as much as possible. Build a solid Google sheet that can automatically import key data from each platform or let the VA manually input those data into the Google sheet every week. I found that leveraging VA at the beginning could save you a lot of overhead costs.