Jeff Hunt addresses the importance of developing a personalized and customer-driven strategy in order to seamlessly reach your customer through all channels of distribution -- which should be the goal of every enterprise. Judy President, JB Homer Associates

As Omnichannel evolves into the future, organizations across all industries including retail, banking, wholesale, distribution and consumer products are realizing the importance of delivering a personalized and customer-driven approach to meet the expectations of its customer base. This not only involves prioritizing technology investments to support a seamless, transparent and personalized experience across all customer touch points (brick & mortar, eCommerce, online banking, ATMs, mobile, social media and call centers) but also developing a customer-driven approach through partnerships with customer-facing teams in marketing, sales and customer service to deliver an integrated personalized marketing strategy.

In speaking with clients and candidates for technology leadership searches that JB Homer has been retained on in omnichannel, we have discovered that as part of this strategy, organizations must be able to access, maintain and combine meaningful customer data from all of the customer touch points, and then through the utilization of business intelligence and master data management tools be able to better understand the customer in order to deliver a seamless customer experience across all distribution channels -- including personalized recommendations, targeted promotions and loyalty programs based on behaviors and preferences.

We have also discovered that the customer simply wants to be able to use all channels seamlessly and expects the company to know who they are no matter what the touch point is. For example in retail, the customer expects exceptional service while having the convenience of seamless in-store, online, and mobile shopping and expects to be provided with services such as in-store kiosks for product information and ordering, order online/pick up in store/deliver to home, the ability to buy online/return to store and to be provided with clear communication on order tracking and delivery time.

This personalized and customer-driven integrated approach lets the consumer experience the entire brand, not just a channel within a brand and ultimately gives the customer what they want -- and as the strategy evolves maybe some things they don't yet know they want.

The end goal of the strategy is to provide the ability to track customers through the omnichannel journey and deliver a seamless experience for them across all channels -- and to further delight, retain and help grow the customer base, and the business.