Not long ago, requesting reviews for online purchases was one of your only options for getting feedback on products and services. Products purchased in-store were often reduced to an item on a receipt, and the only review a retailer received was if the customer needed to return the item. Now, big box stores like Home Depot have tapped into a new dimension of customer reviews, and it is powered by unified commerce. 

Recently, Home Depot customers began receiving emails prompting them to review items that they had purchased in-store. While this practice seems like a simple concept, the organization and utilization of data needed to effectively accomplish this are monumental. In their unified backend system, Home Depot is collecting and organizing valuable data such as which products were bought, who bought them, when, where, and more. Then, they’re leveraging this data to keep in touch with their customers through digital means.  

This data collection is much more familiar for online purchases, which naturally use this information for content and order management systems to operate. When it comes to in-store purchases, many stores do not have these capabilities. 

For the retail industry, this technological advancement has ironically used digital transformation to improve the physical store experience. Using unified commerce, retailers can simplify their backend processes to track and serve consumers across multiple channels, allowing a frictionless buyer journey, from keyboard to cash register, and offering personalized insights and conveniences. Unified commerce takes retailers a step closer to treating customers as more than just a number – they are identified as individuals with unique preferences and behaviors, and individualized marketing and sales initiatives are more easily accomplished.  

Like most customer experience and loyalty advancements, it will also soon come to be expected by customers in every transaction. Customers will expect their in-store register to immediately recognize them as important customers who might have had items in their digital cart or requested that their online orders be available for pickup that day. They’ll want to know that their loyalty programs and rewards are available to them regardless of where they choose to shop. They’ll expect their dedicated store mobile apps to help them find inventory in their local store, read reviews about it, confirm that it’s the product they need, and even check out digitally. Finally, they’ll be much more likely to provide feedback and reviews when they feel important to their favorite stores.  

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On Tuesday, June 13, 2023, Perficient will deliver a workshop during the Retail Innovation Conf & Expo in Chicago. In this workshop, you’ll use our Now/New/Next framework to quickly benchmark and prioritize your unified commerce capabilities to determine: 

Where you stand relative to customer expectations and competitive forces 
Which priorities you should focus the most time, money, and attention on to drive your unified commerce objectives 

How to balance your experience portfolio to make the most of limited time and resources 

Workshops are available as an add-on for retail and brand executives attending #RICE23. If you are interested in registering, click here and log into your account, and add Workshops to your cart. If you would like to meet with me or my colleagues Kim Williams-Czopek, general manager of global commerce at Perficient, and Rupa Amin, Director, Commerce Strategy, at the conference, please connect and let us know.