How to Succeed at Omnichannel Selling, from the Store to the E-Commerce Site
Key takeaways
- Omnichannel selling lets customers buy wherever they want, moving from one channel to another within the same purchase without losing their basket or their history.
- It relies on concrete setups: click and collect, online reservation, ship-from-store, and returns and payment shared across channels.
- The sales associate becomes a link between channels, able to sell in store a product available online.
- Sales indicators tell you what is happening; customer feedback tells you why a sale fails between two channels.
Summarize this article with:
A customer spots a product on their phone, comes to try it in store, buys it online that same evening and returns it to another shop a few days later. For the customer, it is a single purchase. For the retailer, it is four channels that have to understand each other. Listening to the Voice of the Customer tells you whether this journey runs smoothly, or whether a break makes the sale fail.
This article explains what omnichannel selling is and how it differs from multichannel selling, which sales channels to connect, which setups make it real and what role the sales associate plays. It then covers how to organize stock and orders, the indicators to track to manage it, and how to spot, from what customers say, what holds back sales from one channel to another.
What is omnichannel selling?
Omnichannel selling is a commercial organization that lets customers buy on the channel of their choice, store, e-commerce site, app or phone, and move from one to another within the same purchase. Stock, prices, basket and history are shared, so the sale continues without a break whatever the channel.
Omnichannel selling, omnichannel commerce, omnichannel retail: what are we talking about?
These three expressions describe the same reality from slightly different angles. Omnichannel selling focuses on the act of purchase itself: the moment when the customer chooses, pays and receives the product. Omnichannel commerce covers a broader scope, including the offer, pricing policy, logistics and after-sales relationship. Omnichannel retail, finally, applies these principles to retail, where brands run both physical stores and digital channels.
All three are part of a broader approach, omnichannel, which means making all of a brand’s channels work as a single system. Selling is its most visible part, because that is where customers immediately see whether promises are kept: is the product shown as available really in stock, is the price the same everywhere, is the order placed online recognized in store?
In practice, a sale is omnichannel when customers can start their purchase on one channel and finish it on another without starting over. They can build a basket in the app, find it again on the website, complete the purchase with a sales associate in store, then return the item by mail. At every step, the retailer knows what happened before, and the customer never feels they are changing merchants.
This continuity relies on shared data. Stock must be visible in the same way on every channel, prices and promotions must be consistent, and purchase history must be available to the sales associate as well as to customer service. Without these foundations, omnichannel selling remains a promise displayed on the website that the store or logistics cannot keep.
Omnichannel selling is not only for large retailers. An independent merchant who sells in a shop, on a website and on a marketplace faces the same questions: how to avoid selling online a product already gone in store, how to take back in the shop an item bought online, how to recognize a loyal customer whatever channel they come through. The scale changes, but the logic stays the same.
What sets it apart from simple multichannel selling
A multichannel retailer sells on several channels, but each one runs independently. The website has its own stock, the store its own prices, the app its own promotions. Customers can choose their channel, but they cannot switch along the way: an item bought online cannot always be returned in store, and the sales associate cannot see what the customer put in their basket the day before.
The difference therefore lies in the continuity of the purchase. In multichannel selling, each channel closes its own sales and defends its own results. In omnichannel selling, channels cooperate to close the same sale, whichever one takes the final payment. This difference has direct consequences for organization, team goals and how performance is measured.
In between, many retailers started by building targeted bridges between some channels, such as in-store pickup of an order placed on the website. This cross-channel approach is often a step toward omnichannel selling: it connects a few specific journeys before unifying all data and processes.
Which sales channels should you connect?
An omnichannel selling strategy starts by mapping existing channels. Each one plays a different role in the buying journey, produces different data and has its own points of attention. The table below summarizes the main sales channels and what to watch when connecting them.
| Channel | Role in the buying journey | Data produced | Point of attention |
|---|---|---|---|
| Store | Trying, advice, immediate purchase, pickup and return | Checkout sales, footfall, conversations with sales associates | Recognizing the customer and accessing their online history |
| E-commerce site | Research, comparison, purchase, order tracking | Browsing, baskets, orders, reviews | Showing reliable stock and lead times, store by store |
| Mobile app | Quick purchase, loyalty, preparing the store visit | Usage, preferences, notifications, basket | Keeping the same basket and benefits as on the website |
| Marketplace | Wider visibility and new customer acquisition | Sales and reviews on the platform, often partial data | Ensuring the same service quality and a consistent offer |
| Social media | Discovery, inspiration, sometimes direct purchase | Interactions, messages, comments | Responding quickly and directing to the right sales channel |
| Phone and telesales | Personalized advice, assisted purchase, follow-up | Calls, contact reasons, orders placed | Sharing history with the other channels |
| B2B sales | Recurring orders, negotiated terms, customer accounts | Contracts, orders, exchanges with sales reps | Aligning pricing, availability and tracking across all channels |
Not all channels carry the same weight in every sector. In home furnishings, the store often remains the place of decision, while the website mainly helps prepare the visit. In fashion, the app and social media play an important role in discovery. In B2B sales, the online portal coexists with field sales reps and customer service. What matters is not connecting everything at once, but starting with the channels customers move between most often.
Online habits make this question unavoidable. According to the Baromètre du numérique published by Arcep, the French telecoms regulator, and its partners, 74% of people aged 12 and over in France made at least one online purchase in the past twelve months. For most retailers, online customers and store customers are therefore largely the same people.
Each added channel also multiplies data sources. Successful omnichannel selling means being able to link this data to the same customer, to understand their journey as a whole rather than channel by channel. It is this unified view that makes personalization possible: offering the customer a product consistent with their previous purchases, whatever channel they are on.
Which setups make omnichannel selling real?
Omnichannel selling takes shape through setups that customers use directly. To see how they connect, here is an example of an omnichannel buying journey told step by step, at a sporting goods retailer.
- Online research: a customer looks for running shoes on the retailer’s website, compares several models, reads reviews and checks that her size is available in the store near her office.
- In-store trial: at lunchtime, she goes to the store. The sales associate finds the model she viewed online and suggests a second one, better suited to her stride.
- Purchase: the second model is not available in her color. The sales associate orders it from the store using warehouse stock, and the customer pays directly in the shop.
- Pickup: two days later, she gets a notification on her phone and collects her order at the pickup counter, without queuing at the checkout.
- Return: after a few runs, the size turns out to be too tight. She returns the shoes to another store of the same retailer, near her home, which finds the order and exchanges them on the spot.
At every step, a specific setup made the transition possible. When even one of them fails, the whole sale is weakened.
Click and collect, online reservation and ship-from-store
Click and collect lets customers order online and pick up their purchase in store or at a pickup point. It combines the freedom of online shopping with the speed of on-site pickup. For the retailer, it also brings footfall to the store, and therefore opportunities for additional sales. The setup works if the order is ready at the announced time and pickup does not turn into a wait.
Online reservation goes further in the logic of trying: the customer reserves a product online to come and see it, try it or compare it in store before deciding. It is particularly useful for products where touch, size or advice matter: clothing, shoes, bedding, technical equipment. It requires reliable visibility of store stock, otherwise the customer travels for nothing.
Ship-from-store reverses the usual flow: an order placed online is prepared and shipped by a store that has the product, rather than by the central warehouse. It makes it possible to use stock available in store, shorten delivery times and avoid online stockouts while the product exists somewhere in the network. In return, it requires store teams to fit order preparation into their daily work.
Returns, exchanges and refunds whatever the purchase channel
The return is often the moment when the omnichannel promise is put to the test. A customer who bought online expects to be able to bring the item back to a store, and a customer who bought in a shop sometimes expects to be able to send it back by mail. When these options exist, they reassure at the time of purchase and remove a major barrier to conversion.
The store must still be able to find the order, check the return conditions and process the refund without sending the customer to customer service. Return rules must be the same on every channel, or at least clearly explained when they differ. A customer who is refused a return in store that the website accepts experiences this difference as a contradiction.
The exchange is a particularly interesting variant of the return: rather than refunding, the sales associate offers another size, color or model, possibly ordered from online stock. Handled well, it turns a moment of disappointment into a new sale, and strengthens the customer’s loyalty to the retailer.
Payment, loyalty and basket shared across channels
A shared basket lets customers find on one channel what they selected on another: items added in the app appear on the website, and the sales associate in store can view them with the customer’s consent. This setup saves the customer from starting their selection over and gives the sales associate a concrete basis for advice.
Payment must follow the same logic. A customer should be able to pay online for a purchase they will pick up in store, pay in the shop for an order shipped home, or use a credit note obtained on one channel for a purchase on another. Every payment restriction between channels creates friction at the most sensitive moment of the sale.
The loyalty program, finally, must recognize the customer everywhere. Points earned, benefits and personalized offers must be the same in store, on the website and in the app. A customer who discovers that their benefits do not apply on the channel they chose feels treated less well, even though they are loyal to the same retailer.
What is the role of the omnichannel sales associate?
In omnichannel selling, the store sales associate is no longer responsible only for sales made in their shop. They become a link between channels, able to draw on all of the retailer’s resources to close a sale, even when the product is not on the shelf.
A sales associate who draws on global stock and customer history
The omnichannel sales associate has access to the retailer’s global stock: that of their own store, but also that of other shops, the warehouse and the website. They can therefore tell the customer where to find a product, how soon it can arrive and by what means. This visibility turns a stockout into a simple matter of organization.
They also draw on the customer’s history, when the customer agrees to be identified: previous purchases, products viewed online, orders in progress, exchanges with customer service. This information allows personalized advice, based on what the customer has actually done rather than on assumptions, and avoids asking questions the customer has already answered elsewhere.
This access requires suitable tools, often a tablet or a mobile terminal, but also training. The sales associate must know where to look for information, how to present it to the customer and how to respect their choices regarding personal data. A powerful tool that is poorly mastered produces less value than a simple tool used with ease.
Selling in store a product available online
The most emblematic case of the omnichannel sales associate’s role is selling in store a product available only online. The customer is there and needs a product that is not on the shelf: rather than letting them leave empty-handed, the sales associate places the order for them, from warehouse stock or another store, with home delivery or later pickup.
This simple gesture raises a delicate question: who gets credit for the sale? If the store does not, the sales associate has little reason to offer this service, and the sale risks being lost to a competitor. Retailers that succeed at omnichannel selling set clear rules that recognize the store’s contribution to the sales it initiates, even when they are shipped from another location.
This role also requires changing team goals. A sales associate assessed only on revenue taken in their shop will be tempted to steer the customer toward what is on the shelf, even if it is not the most suitable product. A sales associate assessed on customer satisfaction and on all the sales they helped close will have every reason to use all available channels.
How do you organize stock, orders and logistics?
Omnichannel selling relies on a logistics organization able to keep the promise made to the customer. This topic is covered in detail in the article on omnichannel distribution; a few essential principles remain from a sales point of view.
Real-time stock visibility is the first condition. A product shown as available online must really be available, and a sales associate must be able to tell the customer, without hesitation, whether an item is available in another store. Poorly synchronized stock produces the worst friction: the order cancelled after payment, the wasted trip to the shop, the delivery promise not kept.
Order orchestration then means deciding, for each order, where it will be prepared and shipped from: the warehouse, a store near the customer, a pickup point. These decisions take into account lead times, costs and team availability. They must remain invisible to the customer, who only sees the result: a product delivered or ready to pick up within the announced time.
In-store preparation, delivery and returns management complete this setup. Every store that prepares online orders or receives returns becomes a link in the logistics chain. This requires space, time and clear procedures, otherwise sales teams are absorbed by tasks that take them away from the customers present in the shop.
Which indicators should you track to manage omnichannel selling?
Managing omnichannel selling means measuring each channel while keeping an overall view of the journey. Indicators inherited from multichannel, built channel by channel, are no longer enough.
Measure each channel without putting them in competition
Each channel keeps its own indicators: revenue, conversion rate, average basket, traffic. These measures remain useful for understanding what happens on each channel. The risk is using them to put channels in competition, when omnichannel selling requires them to cooperate.
A website whose revenue falls because its visitors buy in store is not a failing channel: it is playing its role of preparing the purchase. A store that takes in less because it ships online orders still contributes to the retailer’s performance. Channel indicators must therefore be complemented by overall indicators, focused on the customer rather than the channel.
Among these overall indicators, customer value across all channels, the share of customers who use several channels or the repurchase rate give a more accurate view of omnichannel success. A study published in the Harvard Business Review in 2017, conducted among customers of a retail chain, showed that customers who used several channels spent more than those who used only one.
Attribute the sale to the right channel and the right store
Sales attribution is one of the most delicate questions in omnichannel selling. When a customer prepares their purchase on the website, tries it in store and orders it in the app, which channel should get credit? And when a sales associate places an online order for a customer present in the shop, which store does the sale belong to?
There is no universal rule. Some retailers attribute the sale to the store closest to the customer, others to the store that initiated the order, others share the value across channels according to rules set in advance. What matters is that these rules are known, understood and seen as fair by teams, so that no channel has an interest in holding back a sale closed elsewhere.
Attribution directly influences behavior. Poorly designed rules can push a store to discourage pickup of an online order, or a sales associate to refuse to order a product missing from the shelf. Reviewing these rules is often one of the first decisions to make to succeed at omnichannel selling.
Bring sales indicators together with customer feedback
Sales indicators tell you what is happening: how many orders, on which channel, with what average basket. They rarely tell you why a sale did not happen. A rising basket abandonment rate, a drop in store pickups or an increase in returns can have many causes, which figures alone cannot identify.
Customer feedback provides that explanation. A review mentioning a missed delivery time, a survey describing a pickup that took too long, a ticket reporting a blocked refund give the reason behind a gap seen in the indicators. Bringing the two together lets you move from a measured observation to an identified cause, and therefore to a possible action.
This requires being able to link each piece of feedback to a channel, a step in the journey and, where relevant, a store. Only then does customer feedback become a real tool for managing omnichannel selling, just like sales indicators.
Your customers describe what blocks their purchases between two channels in their reviews, surveys and conversations. See what Glanceable brings out from your own data.
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The barriers to omnichannel selling almost always sit between two channels: when the customer moves from the website to the store, from order to pickup, from purchase to return. These are the moments each channel’s indicators see least clearly, and the ones customers talk about most.
Listen to customers on availability, pickup, delivery and returns
Four moments concentrate most of the pain points in omnichannel selling. Availability first: a product shown in stock that is not, or a lead time that does not match reality. Pickup next: an order not ready, a wait at the counter, a sales associate who cannot find the parcel. Delivery, with its delays and damaged parcels. Returns, finally, when the store refuses an item bought online or the refund takes too long.
Customers describe these moments precisely in their online reviews, survey answers, messages to customer service and conversations with sales associates. Analyzing them lets you measure the customer experience where omnichannel selling plays out, and spot the transitions that lose sales or erode loyalty.
That is the role of an AI expert in Voice of the Customer like Glanceable: analyzing feedback from every channel, whether reviews, surveys, tickets or conversations, identifying pain points and their root causes, and linking them to the journey involved. Glanceable is neither a sales solution nor point-of-sale or inventory management software: it draws on the feedback your customers already leave to tell you what is holding back your sales.
Assign each pain point to the team that can act: stores, supply chain, e-commerce, customer service
Spotting a pain point only has value if someone is in charge of addressing it. Every barrier identified must therefore be assigned to the team able to act. Stores for a pickup that takes too long or a refused return, the supply chain for a stockout or a delivery delay, the e-commerce team for incorrect product information or a faulty payment journey, customer service for a poorly handled request or a blocked refund.
This allocation keeps pain points that sit between two channels from going unowned. By definition, they do not fully belong to any team, and that is precisely why they are often known to everyone without being fixed. In retail, where brands run many stores, tracking by point of sale also helps tell a local problem from a general one.
Tracking over time then lets you check that actions have a real effect. If feedback on in-store pickup mentions waiting less often after the counter was reorganized, the action worked. If the same pain points keep coming back, another cause must be found. This loop between listening, assignment and verification makes omnichannel selling a continuous improvement process rather than a one-off project.
Ultimately, omnichannel selling is not about being present on every channel, but about letting customers move from one to another without the sale getting lost along the way. It relies on shared data, reliable setups and teams whose goals point in the same direction. And the best way to know whether it works remains listening to what customers say about each step of their purchase.
Sources: Arcep, Crédoc and partners, "Baromètre du numérique, édition 2026", infographic; Emma Sopadjieva, Utpal M. Dholakia and Beth Benjamin, "A Study of 46,000 Shoppers Shows That Omnichannel Retailing Works", Harvard Business Review, 2017.
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FAQ
Omnichannel selling describes the goal: letting customers buy on every channel without a break. Unified commerce refers rather to a technical approach to get there, which consists of managing stock, orders, customers and payments in a single system rather than in separate tools. Unified commerce is therefore a means serving omnichannel selling.
It is best to start with the transitions customers already use most, often between the website and the store. Click and collect, online visibility of store stock and in-store returns of online purchases are frequent starting points. Customer feedback helps identify the transitions that cause the most problems.
Training should cover tools, such as access to global stock and customer history, but also practices: ordering for a customer a product missing from the shelf, handling a return of an online purchase, offering an exchange. It is more effective when sales associates’ goals recognize sales made on other channels.
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