Exploring omni-channel as a sales strategy

Customers in the manufacturing sector are rapidly embracing digital commerce.

It is clear they want the ability to self-serve – wherever they are, and whenever and however they want. Customers also like to seamlessly pick up where they left off in their buying journey, and that too, on the device of their choice. This is especially true for manufacturing sectors with more complicated configurations and longer buying cycles. To meet these customer needs, manufacturers must move from traditional sales models and invest in next-gen capabilities that deliver seamless and personalized omni-channel experiences. Table 1 illustrates the typical differences between a traditional and next-gen sales experience.

Table 1: How manufacturers are building next-gen digital commerce capabilities

How digital commerce and ecosystem-centric business models play into manufacturing

Reimagining digital commerce through customer centric ecosystem and reimagined digital channel engagement.

The digital commerce market size is projected to reach $17.53 trillion by 2030. New business models like expanding ecosystems, B2B marketplaces, subscription-based models, and as-a-service models will continue to evolve and offer new revenue streams to manufacturers. Next gen capabilities like AI-driven conversational commerce, phygital experiences, AR-VR engagement, and configurators will play a vital role in keeping up with the shifts in customer behavior and enhancing customer experience. It is imperative that manufacturers build agile processes and IT architectures that can adapt to the rapidly changing digital commerce landscape and evolving business models. Figure 1 illustrates a few key approaches manufacturers are taking to reimagine their digital commerce customer experience value chain.

Figure 1: Reimagining the digital commerce customer experience value chain

Delivering at speed and scale: The role of technology

Manufacturers are looking to dynamically create and manage the customer experience across digital commerce channels.

However, from a technology standpoint, it requires enterprises to de-couple the front-end user experience and move all content management to a digital experience platform (DXP). The DXP allows manufacturers to dynamically assemble, personalize, and orchestrate the front-end user experience by managing a gallery of loosely coupled, reusable, independent components that leverage MACH architecture. This provides agility and flexibility for the business and marketers to manage campaigns without relying heavily on IT or front-end developers.

Enabling new revenue streams

We outline three ways digital commerce helps manufacturers increase revenue growth.

• Empowers sales organizations

It is important to recognize that digital commerce doesn't replace sales teams, it enables them – now, more than ever. Digital capabilities enabled by 3D technology, VR-AR visualization tools, customer specific pricing, comparison tools, real-time inventory and more, help deliver an on-demand personalized customer experience to support sales teams. The trick is to figure out when digital experiences are more effective than human-driven experiences and vice versa.  And this is where customer journey mapping becomes an essential element of a sales strategy. Equally important is considering how to effectively manage this shift within the organization with change management and new governance processes.

• Enhances supply chain resilience and agility to avoid business disruption

The pandemic-induced acceleration of digital commerce, further compounded by the recent spike in inflation, has led manufacturers to focus on agility in their forecasting processes. They are also looking to increase responsiveness to improve their supply chain resilience.  Manufacturers who regularly invested in broadening their supplier relationships, developing contingency plans, and investing in AI and analytics to provide real-time supply chain visibility were able to better weather the unprecedented pandemic-induced challenges.

• Provides opportunities to create a B2B marketplace whose growth outpaces traditional digital commerce

Over the last decade, marketplaces have disrupted and transformed the retail, vacation rental, and taxi industries, to name a few. But most recently, they are reshaping how manufacturers approach their digital commerce strategy, traditional supply chain structures, and channel partner relationships. Globally B2B marketplaces are projected to grow at a whopping CAGR of 20.2% from 2023 to 2030, faster than all

B2B ecommerce channels. Unsurprisingly, manufacturers are eyeing the huge opportunity this presents to develop, own, and operate marketplaces and become the ‘Amazon’ of their sector. Other benefits include gaining valuable insights from operating the marketplace and creating the ecosystem by having partners with complimentary products or service offerings to attract consumers, grow revenues, and impact the bottom line.

Figure 2 illustrates five real-world examples of new digital commerce business models across various manufacturing sectors that have resulted in measurable business value.

Figure 2: Manufacturers accelerate growth with new digital commerce business model – success stories

Enabling future-ready digital commerce: What it takes

By future-proofing their digital commerce strategies, companies can get ahead of the competition.

Here are the key best practices to consider for a future-ready digital commerce transformation:

• Omni-channel fulfilment: Build a customer-centric omni-channel experience to meet customers’ needs – when, where, and how they want it.
• On-demand flexibility: Leverage MACH architecture to create a future-ready and flexible digital commerce platform.
• Sales enablement: Empower sales teams to effectively deliver round-the-clock assistance for customers on a channel of their choice.
• Supply chain resilience: Invest in tools, technology, and channel relationships to future-proof your supply network from any external or internal crisis.
• Evolving business models and channel disruption: Build a commerce architecture that can easily integrate new business models at speed and scale.
• Delivering business value: Understand and build your strategy around key business drivers that will deliver value, ROI, and other quantifiable benefits.