Grin Gets Real: How To Use Data To Create An Omnichannel Strategy That Works
Claire Leon is Co-Founder at Acorn-i, where she is responsible for overseeing internal teams, working closely with partners, and driving the company’s expansion in the market. She previously spent seven years at Amazon, where she had a key role in bringing its advertising platform to market in the UK and building partnerships with agencies at a global level.
Full episode details
“What omnichannel is and has to be for the brand, is you’ve got to make it easy for your customer to find and fall in love with your product.” – Claire Leon, Acorn AI
In the last year, with so many people bound to their homes, digital has quickly become a critical commerce channel. Suddenly, the consumer has far more control in selecting how they purchase and how they receive the goods that they want. More than ever, brands need an omnichannel approach because they need to be available wherever their customers are shopping online.
An omnichannel strategy works best when driven by an in-depth data analysis. A brand’s choice of which marketplaces, social media platforms, and advertising channels to show up on, should come from their understanding of where their customers reside online. Brands need to use data to understand which platforms are bringing them the most loyal customers, with the highest lifetime value, and put their resources towards bringing in more of those kinds of customers.
The most successful DTC brands are willing to offer their products in as many places as their customers could possibly want to buy them, and they are pulling data from all these different platforms and using it to build a fuller picture of their ideal customer profile.
“An omnichannel strategy has to harness, I believe, that customer-first approach.” – Claire Leon, Acorn AI
Breakdown of the Grin Gets Real Podcast Episode
“Do we truly understand cross-channel migration? Do we understand the lifetime value of each customer? And that influencer marketing piece that we did, do we understand how valuable that was? Was it just one-off sales that we won? Or did they actually win us a repeat purchase? Let’s let’s look under the bonnet, you know, and I think that data is available.” – Claire Leon, Acorn AI
Claire Leon had to learn to be interested in data, but as co-founder of the company, Acorn-i, she now sees clearly how a data-driven approach to eCommerce strategy makes for the most successful brands in the market today. Acorn-i provides their clients with the tools to analyze their data from places like Amazon and Shopify and develop strategies to sell more online.
In this episode of the Grin Gets Real Podcast, Katya from Grin, talks with Claire about how DTC brands can use their data to understand shopper engagement and build a successful omnichannel strategy. They discuss common misconceptions brands have, and why an open-minded approach to omnichannel, guided by data analysis, will give brands the highest returns on their investment.
Claire provides a different way of looking at omnichannel from what she calls “an agnostic” viewpoint, and she offers ideas for brands to optimize the omnichannel approach such as:
• Utilizing Amazon as a powerful acquisition channel.• Not just focusing on DTC, but rather giving customers as many ways to buy as possible.
• The importance of understanding cross-channel migration.
• The distinction between buying just any sale online, and buying a good sale, where the customer keeps coming back for more.
• The value of harvesting data from Amazon such as search terms that shoppers purchase against, geolocation of customers, and new to brand vs repeat purchase metrics.
• Why you need to be able to say, “the lifetime value of that customer is x.”
“An Amazon seller central account is a world in itself… And not only is that data overload, but it is time-consuming.”– Claire Leon, Acorn AI
With all the data that’s available, data overwhelm is common, and too many brands shy away from the data because of this. In this podcast, Claire gives strategic advice for brands about how to invest their resources towards tracking and analyzing data, and how to use that information to build a strong customer profile.
Omnichannel is key for eCommerce brands to reach as many customers as possible and to build a community of customers over the long term. In this episode you’ll hear how to quantify the role of marketplaces, social media and direct website traffic to develop a winning eCommerce strategy.
Get clarity on the omnichannel approach by listening to the podcast now!
Quotes from this Episode
“I think part of the way you buy loyalty is by being agnostic. You’re basically showing your customer that you’re putting them first. You’re saying, I don’t care where you buy it, just buy it.”
“And now that we’ve got access to [data], because the technology has given us that opportunity, we do need to pivot to get good at that. As much as it might take us out of our comfort zone.”
“A frequent problem that brands seem to have at the moment is working out if marketplaces like Amazon are increasing their DTC sales. And they are struggling to understand, how do I measure the impact of investment on my own website versus what I choose to place on Amazon?”
“You can’t compete with the power of Prime.”
“People don’t really understand the position that marketplaces play as an acquisition channel to your market, to building to grow… And I think brands do need to get smarter in understanding those metrics and how they operate in that space.”