Have you ever thought about opening an online shop, creating a specific website to offer better services or merely being more visible online, in order to attract new customers?
If the answer is yes, you may take into consideration how to create synergy between your shop and online channels.
But first: why opening an online channel?
Your business may have a unexpressed potential, for example you may find new customers online, tear down the location limits and shorten the selling – and buying – process.
Consider also that your online channel could be open 24/7, everywhere in the world.
A digital channel, in the form of a website, a social media account or an e-commerce, allows you to communicate and present your offer at the right moment, in the right place. It’s also a tool to track information about your customers, to act in a targeted way or to improve your strategies on the way, to create promotions with monitored budgets, trackable real time.
So, what should you do?
- Have a clear picture of your business model
To evaluate the opportunities and the ways to integrate online and offline, you will have to focus on your business model first, and eventually update it, introducing new services or new ways to present offers.
- Know your customers
To identify the best digital channels for your company to work on, it’s crucial to know your customers and your potential audience first. The most effective way to get those information is to collect useful data, that could be analysed in a smart way.
- Thoroughly look at data
Data can be of different kind: e.g. negative and positive opinions about your products or other brand’s products or what, how and when are customers looking for.
This data will contribute to identify the merging points between online and offline, and will help you to discover how to use them in an effective way.
The main point is to have tools to gather this data, and the ability to read into them and making them useful.
- Integrate online and offline channels
From a strategic point of view, online could be integrated with the most traditional channels through different processes:
– offline and online could operate independently one from another, when the objectives are different, but they have to have a merging point.
– they can be dedicated to different and complementary moments in the selling process.
So… what you’re wating for?
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