CMOs know the importance of creating smooth digital journeys for their customers, but the advent of in-platform purchases on the likes of TikTok are creating new loops to market.
StrategiQ’s Emma Burley looks at what’s needed to embrace the ‘next global shopping revolution’ in terms of budget, talent and attitude.
Set to triple in size by 2025, brands will need to embrace social commerce as digital advertising ROI is expected to contract in favour of trust-based purchase journeys. Social commerce presents the opportunity to develop new means of transacting, leveraging experiences that could enable smaller brands to trump the big names through personalisation and building meaningful connections.
Post-pandemic rise of digital commerce
In Gartner’s The State of Digital Commerce survey, CMOs from around the globe shared their thoughts and approaches to the insurmountable rise of digital commerce since the pandemic. Of the CMOs surveyed, 86% reported that digital commerce will be “the most important route to market in the next two years.”
Companies have been forced to respond to the accelerated growth in digital commerce, and have looked for key tech innovations to speed up their digital commerce presence. These include social commerce, online marketplaces and new direct-to-customer business channels.
Navigating this exponential growth presents a set of unique challenges and opportunities for CMOs and senior marketers. Innovation and investment in the right places could result in a significant competitive advantage, provided CMOs have the tools and support in place to deliver a lucrative digital commerce strategy.
Test and learn mindset
Creating a culture of experimentation is crucial in fast-tracking digital commerce success, enabling CMOs to figure out what prospects want, and how to meet their needs. Applying a test and learn framework removes the reliance on a hunch, or even worse, stagnating on the status quo. Instead, a campaign is a hypothesis, to be tested.
A test and learn framework is a methodical means of making steady improvements and mitigating risk. This can, when consistently adhered to, deliver a significant ROI, with demonstrable progress to help engage stakeholders and board members in investment in tools, assets and skills. Test and learn is already openly leveraged by big players including Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Airbnb and Google.
People power
Galvanising people around a test and learn framework can also transform a marketing team into a group of problem solvers with a common goal, each applying their specialism, channel or interest as a component of the framework.
Test and learn frameworks also provide deep insight into customer needs and behaviours that are invaluable to everyone in the organisation.
From product developers through to sales and aftercare, a test and learn approach is a uniform means of tackling the challenge at hand – whether that’s increasing retention, engagement or acquisition.
Omnichannel or lose
There are very few industries that do not require an omnichannel approach. Integrating digital and traditional marketing ensures that customers experience a seamless journey across all online and offline touchpoints. In fact, there has been a slight, but notable increase post pandemic in investment in traditional advertising, and while, according to the 29th edition of the CMO Survey: Marketing in a Post-Covid Era investment is plateauing, percentages are stabilising against a notable drop in digital investment, with only website improvements seeing an increase between February and August of 2022.
The integration of the right channels for your customers, be it traditional, digital, or a combination, continues to prove a vital component of the digital commerce journey as a driver of conversion but also customer retention. The State of Omnichannel Shopping – Statistics and Trends revealed that companies that have robust omnichannel strategies retain almost 89% of their customers. Perhaps more significantly, companies with weak omnichannel strategies have a 33% customer retention rate.
Social commerce, the $1.2 trillion goldmine
Cited by Forbes as “the next global shopping revolution”, social commerce is the emerging digital commerce player that’s already changing the way people shop online. Social commerce essentially enables in-platform purchases of products, removing the friction and subsequent drop-off that occurs when consumers have to click away from a channel to perform an action.
Described by TikTok’s GM of North America Solutions, Sandie Hawkins, as “Word of mouth on steroids”, social commerce also plays on the growing need to take recommendations on products and services from people they trust.
This could be family, friends and communities, but more relevantly authentic influencers they follow on social media.
Social media enables consumers to feel inspired and confident in products and services. Plus, by applying a direct means of purchasing on the platform, you’ve got a perfect mix of meeting customer needs from a trust and a purchase journey perspective.
Set to triple in size by 2025, brands will need to embrace social commerce as digital advertising ROI is expected to contract in favour of trust-based purchase journeys. Social commerce presents the opportunity to develop new means of transacting, leveraging experiences that could enable smaller brands to trump the big names through personalisation and building meaningful connections.
Digital skills
The war for talent continues to be a major threat to digital commerce progression, hitting smaller organisations hardest. In a study by the Digital Marketing Institute, there are reported significant shortages in digital skills, hit hardest by a lack of data analysts, general digital marketing and UX designers.
One VP of marketing, Communications and Advertising in the UK said “It’s the combination of analysis and marketing skills at a sufficiently high level that is hard to find.”
Talent talks
Further to attracting new talent, the retention of staff in a fiercely competitive hiring landscape presents a huge challenge for senior marketers and CMOs. Especially during a period where developing and mastering an approach to digital commerce could be critical to the growth or even survival of businesses.
Even those marketing teams laden with ‘experts’ who can talk the talk, find themselves unable to fully walk the walk as platforms and channels evolve at the speed of light. Leaders must prioritise not only nurturing and developing talent to deliver the services at the right level to drive their digital commerce strategies, but also ensure talent is suitably rewarded and engaged.
Get set, transact
Digital commerce is arguably the fastest growing and changing marketing component in the armour of a CMO. With new platforms and opportunities emerging, you’ll need to be responsive and proactive in learning new means of selling and embracing emerging ways of engaging with potential customers online.
Agility and loyalty will prevail, with both approaches and retaining talent, as the marketplace continues to heat up with rising competition for share of voice, with brands building relationships and providing meaningful reasons beyond just price point for prospects to connect with them, set to fare best.
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