Omnichannel marketing Archives

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How To Evolve Omnichannel Marketing Strategies: 19 Expert Tips

February 19, 2026 No Comments

Sourced from Forbes

Omnichannel marketing was once assessed by how many platforms a brand could show up on and maintain a presence over time. As consumer expectations have evolved, however, so too has the definition of “omnichannel.” Audiences no longer experience different channels as separate touchpoints, but as a single, continuous relationship that carries context, intent and trust from one interaction to the next.

This shift has made a cross-channel marketing strategy less about scale and more about cohesion, requiring brands to connect data, emotion and experience across the moments that increasingly shape loyalty and decision-making. Below, 19 members of Forbes Agency Council share how the meaning of omnichannel marketing has evolved over time along with strategies brands are using to market more effectively in response.

1. Recognize Customers Across Channels

Omnichannel doesn’t mean doing everything, everywhere. A consistent brand experience across all platforms strengthens brand identity and helps customers recognize and trust the brand everywhere they encounter it. People now expect a brand to recognize them across channels, not restart interactions from zero. Competitive differentiation is increasingly based on experience, not presence alone. – Tripp Donnelly, REQ

2. Offer Deep Engagement Throughout The Brand Ecosystem

“Omnichannel” marketing has evolved from a static checklist of disparate channels (traditional media, social platforms, basic advertising) into a dynamic, multi-touch ecosystem designed for seamless brand awareness and education across every customer interaction. There is a need for deeper engagement in a fragmented media landscape, where consumers encounter brands through countless touchpoints. – Jay Deutsch, BDA, Inc.

3. Carry Emotional Intent Across Platforms

Omnichannel has shifted from being everywhere to delivering the same emotional impact and experience everywhere. Brands invest millions to create a feeling in major ad moments, then abandon it in their loyalty efforts, promotions and everyday interactions. That gap breaks trust. The evolution is about carrying emotional intent from the media into experiences that actually sustain loyalty. – Andrew Mitchell, Brandmovers Inc

4. Use Data To Craft Seamless Cross-Channel Experiences

Omnichannel strategy has evolved from simply being present across various platforms to emphasizing the importance of delivering a unified, seamless audience experience across the channels where your audience is. This shift highlights the significance of data in achieving effective continuity in marketing across multiple channels, rather than just the quantity or variety of media channels used. – Jeff Kaplan, TARA Media

5. Show Up On The Right Channels, Earn Trust And Guide

Omnichannel has evolved from simply being on every channel to actually connecting those moments in a meaningful way. Today, it’s about showing up where your audience is, earning their trust over repeated interactions and quietly guiding them toward a decision throughout their entire buying journey. – Ajay Prasad, GMR Web Team

6. Leverage Identity-Based Targeting And Attributions

The most significant evolution is the shift to identity-based targeting and attributions. It moves past simply being on multiple channels. Today’s strategy must link every touchpoint back to a single persistent customer identity using identity graphs. This is critical because it allows brands to reach the right person with personalized messages and accurately attribute revenue to the right channels. – Ajay Gupta, Stirista

7. Connect Channels Into A Single Unified Journey

The term omnichannel is becoming obsolete. While it emphasizes the need for multiple touchpoints, it also signals a siloed approach. In 2026, brands need a strategy that connects their channels into one, unified experience for their audiences. Today’s consumers want to move simply and seamlessly across touchpoints, and research shows Gen Z and Gen Alpha will demand it. – Dani Mariano, Razorfish

8. Plan More Integrated, Flexible Strategies

With omnichannel marketing now extending to different outlets that range from digital to terrestrial radio to sponsorships, the evolution is significant. This evolution is due to brands that must plan more integrated, flexible strategies that meet consumers at multiple touchpoints rather than relying on a single channel approach. – Jessica Hawthorne-Castro, Hawthorne Advertising

9. Unify Identities Across Touchpoints To Personalize Content

Omnichannel with personalization wins. This means connecting data, unifying identity, then using that to adapt content, offers and experiences across every touchpoint—store, site, app, email, social, marketplaces and even packaging. The hard part is knowing your customers inside and out. Then, mastering the channels becomes the easy part of omnichannel marketing. – Stephen Rosa, (add)ventures

10. Move From Siloed Presence To Data-Driven Integration

“Omnichannel” has shifted from multi-channel presence to identity-driven continuity—delivering a connected experience powered by unified customer data. It matters because brands can no longer think in silos; audiences expect relevance and consistency across every touchpoint, making data quality and integration the real foundation of success. – Paula Chiocchi, Outward Media, Inc.

11. Deliver A Consistent Narrative At Every Touchpoint

Omnichannel has evolved from being channel-centric to experience-centric. It’s no longer about being everywhere, but about delivering a consistent narrative across paid, earned, owned and AI-driven touchpoints. This matters because trust and recognition now depend on message continuity, not channel volume. – Boris Dzhingarov, ESBO Ltd

12. Recognize Omnichannel As The Baseline, Not Extra

I’ve not heard the term “omnichannel” for some time. Not because it’s not relevant, but simply because the best marketing campaigns are all omnichannel. Thinking with a siloed mentality is outdated and ineffective, and omnichannel shouldn’t be something extra; it should be everyday marketing thinking. – Mike Maynard, Napier Partnership Limited

13. Prioritize Consistency Over Breadth Of Coverage

Omnichannel has shifted from being everywhere to creating a seamless brand experience. Today, consistency across platforms matters more than coverage. Brands win when their story feels connected, not scattered. – Manuel Machado, CCOMGROUP Inc.

14. Showcase Value By Teaching Instead Of Selling

Omnichannel used to be about being everywhere. Now, it’s about showing up with value. As consumers tune out marketing noise, they gravitate toward channels where they learn and feel more in control of decisions. That shift makes it essential for brands to turn to integrated, education-led strategies that immerse buyers by teaching, rather than selling. In turn, your brand builds trust and stands out. – Kim Lawton, Enthuse Marketing

15. Guide Decisions By Removing Friction In Buying

Omnichannel has evolved from coordinating channels to guiding decisions. It is no longer about being everywhere or even being consistent; it is about removing friction as customers move from awareness to confidence. Brands that win today design omnichannel strategies around decision moments, not media plans, so every touchpoint answers the next question a customer has. – Robert Burko, Elite Digital Inc.

16. Build Credibility In The Right Places With Strong Content

The big shift? AI is now infused into every app, search tool and platform your buyers use. That means brands no longer need to address every channel individually. Focus on building credibility and creating solid content in strategic places. AI handles the proliferation. You get true omnichannel reach without the omnichannel headache. – Christine Wetzler, Pietryla PR & Marketing

17. Reinforce The Same Story To Inspire The Same Action

Omnichannel has shifted from “be everywhere” to “be consistent and useful everywhere your audience actually is.” It is no longer about channel count. It is about connected signals, shared data and one clear experience across touchpoints. That matters because brands cannot afford scattershot efforts now. You win when every channel reinforces the same story and moves people toward the same action. – Lars Voedisch, PRecious Communications

18. Bolster Internal Operational Capacity; Deliver Consistently

Omnichannel shifted from channel coverage to experience alignment. The real challenge isn’t reaching customers everywhere. It’s keeping your internal systems stable enough to deliver consistently across those channels. Brands fail when back-end workflows can’t support front-end promises. Strategy now starts with operational capacity, not channel expansion. – Meeky Hwang, Ndevr, Inc

19. Engage Sales Teams To Work In Concert With Marketing

Omnichannel is still as relevant as ever. Omnichannel is a content engagement strategy used to reinforce or support a customer journey; they are not one and the same. The biggest gap in successfully deploying omnichannel strategies is the lack of sales engagement. If the sales team is not engaged and working in concert for a holistic customer experience, then marketing is just yelling into the void. – Tyler Back, Mitosis

Feature image credit: Getty

Sourced from Forbes

In News

The Myth of Omnichannel Marketing and the Rise of the Branded Ecosystem

July 7, 2023 No Comments

By Mike White

A few years ago, you couldn’t go three sentences at an advertising conference without hearing the word “omnichannel.” The notion of omnichannel marketing went hand-in-hand with digital transformation, and promised to seamlessly integrate the consumer experience across digital and physical environments.

It was the ultimate challenge for the CMO in 2015. But since then, many of us have come to understand that omnichannel marketing is a myth. Seamlessly integrating experiences across environments, it turns out, is not exactly what humans want. What we actually want is context-dependent experiences that are customized based on channel and behaviour. And for those experiences to be personalized, but also make us feel like part of an exclusive community – all while protecting the sanctity of our data.

Enter branded ecosystems

So what’s the next iteration of omnichannel? How do you capture the touchpoints that you have with consumers, but honour that those interactions should look different depending on the moment and the environment?

Today’s best brand marketers are those that thoughtfully orchestrate interactions across an ecosystem (a collection of brand touchpoints) in ways that build sustainable and context-based relationships with audiences. In other words, being intentional about building ecosystems can foster deeper relationships across environments – from mobile devices to in-person events and immersive web experiences.

One of the best environments to create those relationships has always been in real life. The dwell time and actual engagement with in-person events consistently over-delivers compared to other areas of channel marketing and the post-pandemic landscape has shifted attention toward physical touchpoints and experiences.

Capturing this formula and experience and implementing it into bespoke ecosystems is the creative challenge of marketers today. Moreover, owned ecosystems can give advertisers first party data at a time when direct relationships with consumers is more critical than ever.

The new data landscape

When Google introduced paid search, it solidified our ad-supported internet. For a while, advertisers felt like they had hit the Holy Grail – brands had never had access to such rich and actionable data about how consumers behave.

Fast-forward to 2023, and consumers are increasingly aware of the ramifications of an internet that’s powered by ads. From political polarization to mental health crises, it turns out that exploiting our digital behaviour has serious consequences.

This has spurred a call for legislation which has been codified with Europe’s GDPR and California’s CCPA and subsequent CPRA. These pieces of legislation are largely felt to be incomplete, but they signal the beginning of a reckoning with the “surveillance capitalism” structure that’s been the bread and butter for Big Tech.

Even Google responded, vowing to rid Chrome of the third party tracking cookie by next year. This move could turn digital advertising on its head and leave advertisers and publishers scrambling for ways to meaningfully target consumers online. Meanwhile, digital ad practices have made it all the way to the US Supreme Court, with a case about the potential for algorithmic distribution to lead to violence.

In light of heightened sensitivity to data privacy, in addition to emerging technologies like generative AI that threaten to use data in more invasive ways, the major consulting firms point to trust as a key focus area for consumers.

What does this mean for brands? Traditional digital ad targeting is on the decline, and a premium is placed on direct relationships between brand and consumer. Put another way, first party data is the new Holy Grail in the advertising ecosystem and the brands without a first party data strategy are at risk of becoming obsolete.

Experiential media

Advertisers pairing back investments in social media and programmatic advertising are likely to point to brand safety concerns and budget cuts as a reason to moderate display ad spend. As social media content becomes more extreme and polarizing, and targeting becomes less certain, brands forced to rethink their digital ad allocations are looking at where display advertising is most effective in their customer journey.

What they’re learning is that display advertising, at least with respect to conversion and ROI, may be more lucrative in theory. In The Subprime Attention Crisis by Tim Hwang, Hwang paints a picture of an advertising ecosystem built on a house of cards, rife with fraud and falsely attributed ad conversions.

Faced with budget cuts, an uncertain economy and a precarious tech industry and supply chain, advertisers need to identify media buys that are sure to provide a return on investment while authentically engaging with and providing value to real audiences. It turns out, the road to ROI is to own the supply.

Investing in building owned ecosystems is one way to have unmitigated access to data that’s not corrupted by advertising fraud like bots or beholden to the walled gardens of Big Tech. We call this type of media buy “experiential media,” and it’s attracting advertisers for good reason.

Creating an owned infrastructure for meaningful touch points with brand ambassadors has several perks. Ensuring accurate and transparent relationships with consumer data enables a brand to personalize without overstepping privacy bounds. Moreover, owning the media channel eliminates a large percentage of ad spend that’s traditionally spent on fraud at a time when marketing leaders need to be more agile with their approach to brand-building. The media channels that will earn spend focus on advertising that leads directly to conversion and increased lifetime value of the consumer.

Moving fans through the ecosystem

In short, experiential media understands that brand experiences are far more than data points. It captures an understanding of how to build a brand across all landscapes simultaneously while fortifying relationships into increased lifetime value of the consumer through reciprocal exchange of value.

It’s different from omnichannel marketing, in that it activates a customer base through meaningful campaigns, and leverages the power of different channels for different events while capturing data transparently and mindfully to serve and delight members of the ecosystem.

Here’s how it works: brands orchestrate touch points across platforms in the ecosystem, from display advertising and earned media to digital and in-person events. Touch points serve as an entry point into a platform of brand-managed exclusive experiences that enhance relationships and move customers from a transactional piece of data to a complex individual in an enriching and engaging community.

If the pandemic taught us anything, it’s that integration and collaboration is a must and real human relationships matter. Advertisers that are thoughtful about the integration across channels through experiential media spend will be the brand leaders in the new age of advertising.

Feature Image Credit: TTstudio

By Mike White

Mike White has been a leader in the brand experience industry for 25 years. His agency, Lively Worldwide, is leading the charge for the future to be hybrid. The agency was launched in 2017 to champion Live Marketing, which Mike describes as the sweet spot between physical and digital where they create engaging campaigns for brands. Mike has created immersive, interactive, and entertaining experiences for Spotify, Ericsson, Twitter, Virgin, Mazda, and The Guardian, making him one of the leading figures in the world of hybrid activity. Mike is a hybrid and virtual strategist, live marketing leader, speaker, and influencer.

Sourced from Brandingmag

In News

How Omnichannel Marketing Feeds Into Stronger Customer Experiences

September 1, 2022 No Comments

By Jennifer Torres

Omnichannel marketing is the key to meeting customers where they’re at and ensuring cohesive experiences across channels and devices.

It’s midnight in Arizona, and Martin can’t sleep. He opens his iPad and begins scrolling through a collection of flat screen TVs on the Walmart website. Within ten minutes, one catches his eye, and he drops it in his cart and finalizes the purchase.

Across the country in Florida, it’s 3 a.m., and Emily is on her smartphone eyeing a set of golf clubs a local pro shop advertised in an email. With a flick and click, they’re hers.

Once relegated to after-work hours or weekends, shoppers now make purchases around the clock — while at work, lunch, during their commute, on vacation and when they can’t sleep at 3 a.m.

And they often switch between multiple devices throughout the day. There’s the work computer, a personal laptop, home desktop, smart phone and iPad. And that doesn’t account for brick-and-mortar shoppers that want an in-store experience.

Brands can meet these customers where they are by offering products and services across various online and offline channels — on a website, app or social media account, via email or text, at retail locations and public events. Companies can capture it all through omnichannel marketing.

What Is Omnichannel Marketing?

Customers desire a positive, seamless experience — no matter the path they take or device they use. Omnichannel marketing seeks to enable that desire by creating a cohesive, unified journey for each customer across all brand channels.

Cohesiveness across channels is a critical component. As opposed to multichannel marketing, which includes multiple channels that remain separate, omnichannel allows all online and offline channels to work in unison across touchpoints, devices and departments. With it, customers can bounce from smartphone to laptop to retail store and have a smooth experience.

Major Retailers Embrace It

Many large retailers have already incorporated omnichannel strategies, making the customer journey easier and more convenient.

Starbucks provides an app for use both online and in-store, incorporating a rewards program that allows customers to avoid lines and order ahead, gain free refills, use birthday bonuses and earn points for free products.
Amazon aligns its experience across a retail website, streaming service, mobile apps and connected Alexa devices and smartwatches.
Walgreens unifies its brand between in-store and online purchases through a customer loyalty program app that provides rewards, discounts and information about in-store events and sales.
Home Depot offers an app to help customers find products online and in-store, also including live chat and image search.
Disney app and loyalty cards allow visitors to check ride times and book tickets without standing in a long line.

Social Media Sells

With an active, integrated presence on social media accounts, brands have the opportunity to create a community.

A report from Statista predicted that by 2026, worldwide sales through social media platforms will reach $2.9 trillion — with the most influential content for buyers coming from posts made by acquaintances and connections.

McKinsey & Company reported that, with 60% to 70% of consumers researching and making purchases online and in-store, omnichannel is here to stay and will continue to grow. Their research also revealed that social media channels influence all age groups — particularly younger customers.

Outstanding Omnichannel

If the message a brand sends is unified and consistent across all channels, it better be a good one. Knowing what’s important to consumers today can help organizations create the best communications and serve to reflect their commitment to providing a positive customer experience.

Salesforce’s 2022 analysis of consumer and business buyer data revealed several factors worthy of consideration when creating an omnichannel platform, including:

Favourite Channels

Phone
In-person
Online chat

Channel Surfing

Customers turn to an average of nine different channels to communicate with companies.
57% of customers prefer to engage through digital channels, but 43% prefer non-digital channels — meaning satisfying customers generally requires great experiences both online and offline.

Loyalty

83% of customers say they’re more loyal to companies that provide consistency across departments.
71% of consumers switched brands at least once in the past year. The top three reasons were better deals, better product quality and better customer service.

Experience

88% of customers say the experience a company provides is as important as its products or services.
94% say a positive customer service experience makes them more likely to purchase again.

Emotion

62% of customers feel an emotional connection to the brands they buy from most.

A recent Forrester report indicated that while customer experience rankings decreased for 19% of brands in 2022, the highest rankings were achieved by brands that provided customers with “high emotional quality” across their experiences.

And happy customers are a forgiving bunch — with data revealing that 54% of customers who feel happy, valued and appreciated are more willing to forgive brand mistakes.

Omnichannel in Action

Karla Medrano, a registered nurse and founder and operator of SGM Medical Marketing, said omnichannel marketing isn’t just about using every available channel for marketing, although that’s important too. It’s also about breaking down an organization’s various customer-facing channel-based silos.

“Being omnichannel is about taking a consumer-centric view of marketing tactics,” Medrano said. “In other words, the consumer’s experience comes first and your organization needs to be seamless in its branding, messaging and online and offline presence.”

When tasked with assisting AmbitCare in developing a stronger digital presence, Medrano employed an omnichannel strategy.

AmbitCare, a provider of free resources to physicians, caregivers and patients affected by rare diseases, had an inadequate social media presence. Medrano’s agency began to define content pillars and cohesive messaging across all channels to help potential patients learn about services. They also created content for the Spanish-speaking population.

After 60 days, said Medrano, the total net audience increased 81.3%.

Recently, her team implemented an omnichannel marketing strategy for a health/wellness start-up app specializing in post-partum. It’s still in the testing phase, but so far, Medrano said the results have been promising.

The app creators came to the agency with the issue of poor adherence rates; they wanted to find a way to help participants finish the program. Medrano created video content, personalized email templates and a system to respond to questions and concerns in a timely manner.

As a result of this strategy, Medrano said adherence rates improved by 40%.

“My omnichannel approach via texts, emails, video content and therapeutic communication to help moms through the program made them feel heard and supported,” she explained.

Omnichannel Oversights

According to a McKinsey & Company report, while the right omnichannel approach can potentially increase brand value, a disjointed or disorganized strategy can destroy it.

Medrano said that a few common errors in the omnichannel strategy include automating everything and thinking that being on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc., is enough.

“Sometimes people need to know that there is a human on the other side so they can feel supported,” Medrano said. “A brand can have 10 channels and have rotten customer service vs. a brand that can have three channels and have quality customer service that includes a chat box, timely email responses, personalized attention, courtesy calls, flexible pay options, SMS and more.”

She said another mistake is not asking for customer feedback and not providing staff with proper training to ensure a cohesive conversation, tone and branding.

“Leadership doesn’t interact directly with customers, so they don’t always know what works and what doesn’t,” Medrano explained. “Every single interaction customers have with your brand…should help them feel heard and supported. Otherwise, you can potentially lose customers, receive bad reviews and lose revenue.”

Branding Blunders

With over 15 years of experience guiding large consumer brands to develop customer experiences that deliver shared value, Freelance CX Strategist Jenny Neilsen offered her list of the recurring mistakes brands make in their omnichannel marketing strategy:

Brands trying to scale their high-level brand messaging across channels without considering the devices or experience. Each marketing asset should be helping to move the prospect through the funnel, not just shouting the same tag line at them.
Saying they do omnichannel, but there is little coordination between in-house teams and agencies executing or designing the assets. All that equates to is running a lot of advertising simultaneously with little cohesion.
Not using what they know about their audiences to execute a smart campaign.

“Brands need to understand and use online and offline data points to deploy personalized experiences across channels and physical locations,” Neilsen said. “Every brand has hurdles when it comes to the shape and location of their data, so they either need to roll up their sleeves and make the data work for them manually or invest in technology to help them do it faster.”

It’s Not for Everyone

As founder of Jennis Consulting Group and co-founder of Founders Compass, a mentoring consultancy for new start-ups, Steve Jennis places omnichannel marketing at the bottom of the priority list for start-ups.

He believes omnichannel marketing is good for customer retention because customers return to places where they have a good buying experience. But for a new business, he classifies it as a “back-end operational process that comes after marketing and sales have been successful.” A good product coupled with solid marketing and sales should come first.

“Without good marketing and sales, omnichannel is useless as customers don’t have a good reason to buy anyway,” Jennis said. “As such, it’s pretty low down as a priority for a start-up unless it gives you a real competitive advantage. But better products, marketing and sales will be more effective at that than channel choices.”