OMD and Omnicom Commerce Group Reveal New Shopping Insights in "The Why Behind the Buy"

Nothing has defined the economics of the pandemic era like the massive changes in shopping From the initial run on toilet paper and paper towels to the reconfiguring of stores to accommodate curbside delivery and quotshop from homequotamp160to the crossgenerational transition to ecommerce the very fabric of consumer shopping behavior was ripped apart and rebuilt in a matter of months Yet given the global regional and local differences of approach to the vaccine the input around what to do and how to do it has not been consistent Add to that the various waves of opening lockdown reopening and now the Delta variant and it certainly appears the volatility around consumers39 attitudes and shopping behaviors are unlikely to end anytime soonWith this backdrop of uncertainty OMD and OCG embarked on a longitudinal pulse research project Future of Commerce The Why Behind the Buy to guide brands across these uncharted waters by getting under the headlines and providing real and nuanced consumer insightsIn interpreting the research study results coauthors Sophie Daranyi CEO of Omnicom Commerce Group and Jean Paul Edwards Chief Product Development Officer of OMD EMEA viewed the responses through three consumer mindsets referred to in the report as quotWow Right NowquotWow The importance of rich interactive experience online and offlineRight Orchestrating value price and purpose messaging in the right place at the right timeNow Delivering seamless ease through technology channel integration and service deliveryquotWow Right Now is an organizing framework to fundamentally inter link experience and multichannel relevance together with technology to drive the ease and speed of deliveryquot Daranyi explainsWhile the pandemic has radically changed shopping behaviors across all demographics especially older demos that had been more resistant to ecommerce the research study clearly showed a preference for ROPO research online purchase offline Fifty percent of respondents said that researching products was the top reason for online shopping while only 32 said that purchasing products was their goalHowever even prior to the pandemic brickandmortar retail was having severe challenges quotSome of the specific challenges of innercity retail are linked to broader commercial and economic factorsquot Daranyi says When it comes to overall physical retail she believes that a complete reinvention is necessary quotOne of the headlines of the report is that consumers think of shopping as a lifestylequot she continues quotIt39s a mix of socializing leisure events entertainment eating and drinking To be successful it has to be part of a broader ecosystem of experience and entertainment that a consumer is looking for In the UK when Nike London reopened and had DJs events and personalized experiences there were queues around the block We can no longer look at shopping in isolation especially for locations like malls and city centers We need to reinvent this ecosystem that shopping sits in to create a rich experience that shoppers enjoyquotGiven the variants the authors admit that there is no way of knowing what behaviors will look like six months from now but Edwards says that there are telltale signs when you look at the differences between certain markets quotA big part of this is actually scenario planningquot he notes quotYou look at the markets that are doing better in the pandemic and see how their behaviors have changed which may be a helpful indicator of what will happen when those markets that have done worse recuperate Behaviors have been disrupted Consumers have been forced to shop a different way which means traditional cycles have been broken The big unknown is will they stick with those behaviors Will they revert back further in 39revenge shopping39quotWhile reviewing the data from the research Daranyi and Edwards uncovered a few results that stood out One of those says Daranyi was around the persistent hesitancy in the minds of consumers to share data quotSixtysix percent of people said that they39re not prepared to share data with one brand which we found to be higher than expectedquot she explains quotThat39s a high level of data hesitancy that the brands and retailers really need to consider and how they reframe the value exchange for consumers to be ready to share dataquotAnother somewhat surprising insight from the study was the similarity across generations of shopping online quotGen Z and Baby Boomers were on the same levelquot Daranyi adds quotAs marketers we tend to stereotype behaviors We say 39ecom39 is rising but what this is saying is that online and offline are of equal importance There39s not an online shopper or an offline shopper they are the same person that wants the same thing Generationally there39s much less of a gap than we39d assumequotFor Edwards one of the most surprising insights was the greater hesitancy of Gen Z to return to urban shopping than Baby Boomers Edwards postulates that as Gen Z has always lived their lives online they likely didn39t see the need especially as they may never have developed those retail behaviors of city shopping quotWhile this could be an alarming sign for retailers it39s also an opportunity to learn how to market to this cohort in a more integrated mannerquot he says quotFor example they are far less likely to use search to drive shopping choices which they view as 39old39 technology but more likely to be influenced by social and some of the digital assistants such as Amazon EchoquotFuture of Commerce The Why Behind the Buy is a timely thorough and actionable report for brands to activate on to prepare for the future of commerce You can download it at no charge hereClick the social buttons to share this story with colleagues and friendsThe opinions expressed here are the author39s views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNetamp160

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OMD and Omnicom Commerce Group Reveal New Shopping Insights in "The Why Behind the Buy"

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