User behavior has redefined the meaning of customer experience in the retail sector: they search and buy online, but also check if it’s available in physical stores.

The union of digital and physical or analog worlds has become a necessity for companies if they want to meet consumer expectations, who have blurred the boundaries between these two worlds.

User behavior has redefined the meaning of the customer experience: they search and buy online, but also check if it’s available in physical stores, often completing the purchase in-store.

Studies show that 63% of purchases start online, but 49% of consumers still prefer to buy in stores. This shows that physical interaction remains a very important element for consumers, which is why the new trend in retail, the Phygital experience, manages to connect the physical (offline) and digital (online) environments in order to create an interactive ecosystem with the user, providing much more complete and deep experiences.

Bringing together physical stores, social networks, and e-commerce is not only a requirement but also allows for optimizing the omnichannel experience that is so much demanded. The boundaries separating the online and offline worlds are blurred. They are now interconnected, and one depends on the other; therefore, we should not follow isolated strategies but rather opt for an integrated experience. The consumer is one and interacts in both worlds indiscriminately.

The Phygital strategy proposes to connect the online and offline worlds to create much closer, efficient, and human customer experiences. TTo achieve Phygital customer service, we share the following key points:

1 – Customer Experience management must be a priority
More than 70% of consumers place experience as one of their top three factors when choosing a brand. Bringing together physical stores, social networks, and e-commerce allows for optimizing the omnichannel experience and merging online and physical store experiences.

2 – Know your customers
Implement an integrated big data model to track 100% of interactions using speech analytics, use surveys, and measure customer satisfaction.

3 – Develop a successful omnichannel strategy
Provide your customers with a solid experience across voice channels, chats, websites, apps, and social networks and provide self-service tools.

4 – Maximize customer satisfaction, loyalty, and retention
Satisfaction drives loyalty, and loyal customers spend more. Develop recovery strategies, as only a +5% retention is needed to increase profits by 25%.

5 – Automate and provide Fast Self-Service options
Customers value speed and 24/7 availability of self-service solutions. 44% of customers require automated services, such as chatbots and intelligent digital agents.

Understanding, designing, and managing the best experiences allows increasing customer satisfaction, brand loyalty, and ultimately company revenues. It’s important to remember that currently, the customer is in control, defines, asks, and designs what they expect from companies, knowing how to listen to them and meet their demands will be the key.