The modern customer journey is deeply personal and fluid. HubSpot’s 2023 State of Consumer Trends survey found that customers discover products across various channels, like physical stores, social media, digital marketplaces, and ads.
Retailers are recognizing the importance of meeting customers across different channels. Segment’s 2024 State of Personalization study found that 89% of leaders believe personalization is crucial to their business success over the next three years.
The big challenge? Most fail to adapt to customers’ unique preferences and behaviors across touchpoints. When a loyal online customer walks into a physical store, they expect the same level of personalized service they receive digitally.
The next phase of retail belongs to brands that can deliver sophisticated, omnichannel personalization, creating experiences that speak to each customer as an individual, wherever and however they choose to engage.
What is omnichannel personalization?
Omnichannel personalization involves creating a customized experience for each person, no matter where they interact with your business. Customers can shop in your store, browse your website, or engage through social media and still get the same consistent customer experience.
Think of it as knowing your customers so well that you can give them exactly what they want, when and where they want it. For example, when a customer walks into your store, the sales associate can see on their POS system that they recently bought a black blazer online. The associate can then show them matching pants in their size or offer to order complementary pieces from another store location if unavailable.
This approach isn't theoretical. Shopify POS retailers have reported a 150% quarterly growth in omnichannel sales, showing the tangible impact of personalized experiences.
A unified customer data model built on first-party data is key to a successful omnichannel personalization strategy. It integrates this data—which your customers have opted-in to share with you—across all touchpoints, and creates a holistic picture for each customer.
Omnichannel vs. multichannel
Many businesses sell through multiple channels, but there’s a big difference between just having many channels and having them work together smoothly.
Multichannel means you sell through different places: a website, a physical store, and marketplaces. But each channel operates separately and has its own customer data and inventory records.
Omnichannel takes it further by connecting all these channels. When your online store and POS system share the same foundation, everything works as one. Your inventory updates automatically across all channels, data flows freely between online and in-store experiences, and shoppers get a consistent experience no matter how they buy.
Benefits of omnichannel personalization
Improved customer loyalty
When customers feel recognized and valued, they come back more often. Our data shows that customers using Shop Pay are 77% more likely to buy again from any Shopify store. This happens because every touchpoint works together:
- Your store staff can see what customers bought online
- Online shoppers see recommendations based on their store visits
- Product suggestions match real shopping history
- Checkout is fast because customer details are saved
Instead of treating each sale separately, the system remembers customer preferences and history across all channels. When a customer walks into your store or visits your website, you already know what they like.
Increased revenue
When you understand your customers better, you can sell more effectively. Personalization makes customers feel good, yes, but it also drives real business results.
Retailers using a unified customer model to power omnichannel personalization see measurable gains:
- Overall sales improve by 8.9% on average with unified commerce
- In-store sales jump up to 40% using an “endless aisle” that lets customers browse your full catalog
- Orders are up to 20% larger when using personalized customer profiles
Higher efficiency and cost savings
A single unified system means more than just cost savings. With one source of customer data that’s always accurate, you avoid building up technical debt from complex integrations and workarounds.
Your team needs less training since they’re only learning one system. Built-in personalization tools work automatically, while fewer data handoffs mean fewer errors to fix. You won’t waste time reconciling mismatched data between systems or maintaining complicated technical connections.
A unified system cuts costs in several key ways:
- 22% lower total cost of ownership compared to other systems
- Up to 50% lower customer acquisition costs through better targeting
- Reduce tech costs by eliminating the need for multiple systems and integrations
How to create an omnichannel personalization strategy
1. Build your customer data foundation
Creating truly personalized experiences starts with getting customer data right. Use a unified platform like Shopify to collect and house all your data in one place. As mentioned, you want to focus on first-party data—data you own—which comes from:
- Point-of-sale (POS) systems
- Website, app, or product analytics
- Feedback and reviews
- Customer surveys
- Email marketing platforms
- CRM data
- Omnichannel loyalty programs
With Shopify’s approach, every tool in your marketing stack, whether email platforms like Klaviyo, review apps like Yotpo, or social platforms like Meta and Google, works from the same customer data. You can collect customer data however you want using metafields that integrate with any app in your stack.
Today’s most successful retailers understand that customer data shouldn’t live in separate systems. They treat each customer’s story as one complete picture, not disconnected pieces. But it all starts with bringing that data together in one place.
2. Set up customer profiles
Next, customer profiles with Shopify should be set up. A customer profile is created when a shopper shares their email or phone number with your store, whether they make a purchase or not. It’s like a digital file that automatically records everything about that person’s interaction with your business.
Your customer profiles collect:
- Who the customer is (contact info, preferences)
- What they bought
- How they browse your store
- Which marketing they respond to
- Their interactions across both online and in-store purchases
You can add any extra information you want to track through metafields. These custom data fields let you record things specific to your business, like shoe size preferences or favorite product categories.
3. Create customer segments
When you start with a unified customer data model, your customer segments work from one source of truth: your first-party data. It’s the most accurate and reliable way to create a segment.
Plus, it automatically updates across all your sales channels and marketing tools. Your store staff, website, marketing campaigns, tools and partners all work from the same customer understanding.
You can create unique segments based on:
- Shopping patterns across online and in-store visits
- Customer value and purchase frequency
- Product category preferences
- Shopping channel choices (web, mobile, in-store)
- Customer lifetime value
- Response to past marketing campaigns
The real power comes from Shopify’s ability to dynamically update these segments in real time as customers interact with your brand. You don’t need multiple tools or databases. Everything works from one secure customer data platform that helps you comply with privacy regulations like GDPR and CCPA.
4. Create personalized shopping experiences
Buyers today want shopping experiences designed for them. Nearly 9 in 10 respondents to a 2022 survey said they enjoy receiving personalized offers based on their interests and past interactions with the brand.
With your customer data and segments in place, you can now create those shopping experiences. Shopify’s commerce operating system makes this possible by connecting your online store and physical retail locations through one platform. Customer profiles update in real time, so you always have the latest data to provide immediate personalization.
Here’s how to put your customer data to work through Shopify’s platform:
- Help store staff provide better service using customer purchase history from both online and in-store.
- Offer clienteling tools that let staff see customer preferences and past purchases.
- Let customers buy online and pickup in-store.
- Show in-store shoppers if items are available online.
- Recognize and reward loyal customers wherever they shop.
Tecovas, a western-wear brand with more than 30 retail locations, uses custom POS UI extensions to give staff instant access to customer information directly at checkout.
With this real-time customer data in their Shopify POS system, store staff can provide personalized product recommendations based on purchase history and track loyalty program participation across online and in-store purchases.
The integration helps Tecovas deliver on its “radical hospitality” brand promise by making sure every customer interaction is tailored and memorable, whether someone is buying their first pair of boots or is a longtime customer.
5. Implement automated campaigns
Marketing automation can help reach buyers across all your channels, using fewer resources. That’s why Shopify built marketing automation tools that work together on one unified platform.
- With Shopify Email, you can create and automatically send email campaigns to customers who’ve signed up for your email list. You can group customers by location and promote specific events or sales in your nearby store.
- For more advanced automation, Shopify Flow lets you create custom workflows through a visual builder. You can automatically tag VIP customers for special treatment, send restock notifications to shoppers, or trigger loyalty rewards based on total spending.
- The Shopify App Store offers various marketing automation tools to automate customer interactions.
Start with Shopify’s pre-built segment templates to quickly identify opportunities like high-value customers, repeat buyers, and abandoned checkouts. Then, customize your segments further using filters and custom attributes to create highly personalized marketing campaigns that drive sales.
For example, you could:
- Target high-value customers with exclusive discounts
- Re-engage past customers who haven’t purchased recently
- Create automated campaigns for cart abandonment
- Personalize communications based on shopping preferences
Best of all, you can create unlimited segments, and they’ll automatically stay up to date as your customer base grows and evolves.
6. Measure and optimize
Understanding your personalization efforts requires a complete picture of how customers interact across all channels. Most marketers use eight to 10 different technologies to manage retail personalization programs, but it’s hard to see the impact of their efforts.
Shopify Analytics addresses this challenge by putting all your data in one central place. Data from your partners, in-store interactions, and online channels routes into one unified view of customer behavior.
You can track metrics like:
- Customer acquisition patterns across different channels
- Shopping behavior both online and in-store
- Marketing campaign performance by segment
- Customer profile completeness and quality
- Conversion rates for personalized versus standard experiences
- Return customer rates and purchase frequency
When all your customer data flows from one source, you can better understand which personalization tactics actually drive results.
For example, you can see if customers who receive personalized product recommendations have higher average order values, or if certain segments respond better to specific types of content.
📚 Learn: What is Retail Business Intelligence? Examples & Best Practices
Examples of omnichannel personalization
Venus et Fleur
Venus et Fleur implemented Shopify to unify customer data and improve personalization efforts. This allowed it to:
- Create personalized greeting card messages. It added a personal touch to the brand’s luxury gifting experience, enhancing the premium nature of its Eternity® flowers.
- Offer customer delivery date selection. This created a custom checkout calendar for precise delivery scheduling online, and developed a POS UI extension to bring the same capability in-store. Abandoned checkouts reduced by 12%, by giving customers control over delivery timing.
- Provide personalized product recommendations. This gave retail staff access to real-time customer data, including past purchases and preferences across all channels.
With a unified commerce foundation from Shopify, Venus et Fleu is providing omnichannel personalization at scale, with sacrificing efficiency or customer experience.
;Without a holistic view of our customers’ journeys, we knew it would be very difficult to tailor recommendations, personalize communications, and reward loyalty across every sales channel.
Mizzen+Main
Men’s performance apparel brand Mizzen+Main is another retailer that is thriving with omnichannel personalization. The brand connected customer profiles and purchase histories across all channels, which allowed it to offer tailored size and style recommendations online and in-store.
Part of its personalization strategy included giving retail staff access to loyalty points through Yotpo integration, plus using Endear CRM for targeted customer outreach. It also used Shopify’s ship-to-customer feature, which allowed store staff to check real-time inventory across all locations and have items shipped directly to customers when specific sizes weren’t available in-store—accounting for 20% of weekly transactions.
The unified approach delivered impressive results:
- Retail revenue grew 27% year-over-year
- Online revenue increased 15%
Most importantly, this seamless integration of online and in-store experiences helped create its highest lifetime value customers through consistent omnichannel engagement.
Monos
When luxury luggage brand Monos decided to expand from digital-only to physical retail, it faced a challenge: how to maintain its signature customer experience across all channels.
Using Shopify’s commerce platform, Monos could solve two crucial customer pain points:
- Letting shoppers buy bulky items in-store and have them shipped home instead of carrying them.
- Allowing online customers to check local store inventory for immediate pickup.
The power of this unified approach quickly became evident in the brand’s results. Regions with physical stores saw a 40% year-over-year revenue growth, and organic web traffic surged from IP addresses near store locations. The platform’s efficiency was equally impressive on the operations side, staff could be fully trained on the POS system in just half a day.
Monos also enhanced customer service using Shopify. Store staff could access complete purchase histories to provide personalized recommendations, while online support could check real-time store inventory to help customers find items locally.
For Monos, whose name draws from the Japanese concept of appreciating life’s beautiful moments, this unified commerce approach helped them deliver exactly that: elegant, simple, and memorable shopping experiences across every touchpoint.
Sell more and improve cost efficiency with Shopify
It’s clear that personalized, omnichannel experiences are not just a passing retail trend. They are here to stay. But you can’t create these experiences with scattered platforms and data silos. With Shopify’s commerce platform, retailers can build a strong foundation of first-party data, deliver consistent personalization across touchpoints, and drive measurable results.
Omnichannel personalization FAQ
What are the 4 Cs of omnichannel?
The 4 Cs of omnichannel are commerce, customer, content, and channel, all built on a single data foundation. A unified commerce system combines these elements by having one source for product data, customer information, and sales across every place you sell.
What are the 4 pillars of omnichannel?
The four main pillars of omnichannel retail are customer data management, checkout optimization, personalized storefronts, and targeted outreach campaigns. These pillars work together on one platform to create a complete view of customers and their shopping habits, whether they buy in stores or online.
What is customization in omnichannel marketing?
Customization in omnichannel marketing means showing each customer relevant products and experiences based on their shopping history and preferences across all channels. This includes personalizing everything from store displays to email campaigns using customer data collected from online and in-store purchases.
