For marketers, more touchpoints and channels lead to more market coverage for their brands. But they also mean more complexity in designing a coherent omnichannel marketing strategy. Marketers need to find the right balance between market coverage and simplicity in planning their omnichannel marketing strategy.
Step 2: Identify the Most Critical Touchpoints and Channels
Any individual customer might choose to experience a different combination of touchpoints across multiple
channels in a certain sequence, which we call a customer-path scenario. For instance, a customer buying a car might see an online banner ad, click the ad, and land on a content website where the customer learns more about the car. Furthermore, the customer schedules a test drive and decides to buy after completing it. This is one possible scenario. Another possible scenario is that the customer
sees the ad on television, calls the contact center to schedule a test drive, and decides to buy after completing it.
There are many possible scenarios that may add complexity to the omnichannel marketing execution. The focus should be on the most popular ones. Consider the Pareto principle as a rule of thumb: the top 20 percent of all possible scenarios is perhaps being followed by 80 percent of the customers. Company resources should be concentrated on creating a seamless and consistent experience across touchpoints and channels that matter the most. (See
Figure 10.2
.)
