A featured contribution from Leadership Perspectives: a curated forum reserved for leaders nominated by our subscribers and vetted by our MarTech Outlook Advisory Board.
Otto Group
Customer's Experience Management is Cornerstone of eCommerce's Success
Sebastian Walter
Sebastian Walter is the VP for Digital Excellence, Data Labs, and Consulting at the Otto Group. He currently provides advice and supervises the implementation of digital solutions for strategic and transformational issues of the company. Within his two decades of service in the marketing sector, he has successfully supported numerous clients across different industries in identifying and implementing digital solutions. Furthermore, he has accompanied several design thinking processes and user analysis, prototype creation and optimization, and transformation of program management.
COULD YOU SHED LIGHT ON THE RECENT TRENDS IN THE RETAIL INDUSTRY?
The advent of COVID-19 and its subsequent lockdowns across the globe has forced the majority of retail businesses to go online. However, during the pandemic's aftermath, several among them are in the dilemma of continuing to be online retailers. As a result, we might witness some of them returning to being brick-and-mortar retail, while others will continue online.
Furthermore, with COVID-19, remote work or home office practice has also witnessed significant traction. And, technologies like Augmented Reality (AR) have become a virtue within the remote working scenario. Using the technology, businesses are able to provide a better online shopping experience and customer connectivity.
WHAT IS THE CURRENT SCENARIO WITHIN THE ECOMMERCE AND LOGISTICS SECTIONS OF RETAIL BUSINESS?
At present, gatekeepers in the eCommerce space are ruling the industry. Sales in gatekeepers like Amazon and eBay have overpowered online portals of individual brands, and unbranded goods and small businesses have received a more significant market share. Consequently, the ramifications are enormous for individual brands with shopping portals. To sustain in the market, they are witnessing a higher need for providing a better shopping experience to attract more customers to their portals.
As there are several established gatekeepers, the competitive atmosphere within prominent eCommerce portals is high. As a result, gatekeepers are opting to maintain a proper relationship with suppliers to stand out among competitions. They are going beyond the norms of traditional supplier relationships and striving to develop better partnerships with suppliers to provide customers with the best quality products on time and gain a competitive edge.
HOW ARE TECH-SOLUTION PROVIDERS IN THE MARTECH SPACE BENEFITING ECOMMERCE ORGANIZATIONS?
Tech-solution providers facilitate the operations of eCommerce businesses with appropriate innovations. For example, at Otto, we have set up several technologies, which we develop in-house as per the needs of our customers. We have also collaborated with organizations like Apple to provide our customers with technologies like chatbots, voice bots, and AR.
COULD YOU ELABORATE ON SOME OF YOUR RECENT PROJECTS?
As customer experience management has never been more critical for eCommerce organizations like today, we have focused on automated customer response technologies for our eCommerce partners. By doing so, we aspire to provide more transparent communication between eCommerce retailers and their customers. Additionally, we are working heavily on implementing existing state-of-the-art technologies in a more customer-friendly way for our retail partners.
Technologies like Google Sandbox have been a revolution in safeguarding online privacy by eliminating third-party cookies. As a result, we are working to include such technologies into regular eCommerce practices and simultaneously maintain proper customer connectivity.
Also, recently, we have collaborated with the government of Germany to introduce digital identity in the nation. We are going to develop and introduce a social security card that can be used for fraud prevention within a plethora of operations.
HOW DO YOU ENVISION THE FUTURE OF MARTECH SPACE?
Prevailing searching traditions for online products are going to be altered soon. Gatekeepers and price comparison sites are going to be obsolete, as search engines will directly serve the purpose. Customers will look for their desired products on the search engines and purchase directly without logging in to any third-party eCommerce gatekeeper.
WHAT WILL BE YOUR ADVICE TO PEERS IN THE RETAIL SPACE?
Amidst the hugely competitive market of eCommerce gatekeepers, staying at the top will be a major concern. The principle of winner-takes-it-all will prevail, and to gain maximum profitability, businesses must look for different means of gaining a competitive edge. They must combine all their technological and financial resources to develop state-of-the-art innovations focused on providing for all needs of customers.
