Omnichannel Customer Experience: Strategy, Examples & How to Measure It

Today’s customers interact with your brand using all the different channels available to them.

In fact, a huge 91% of consumers are omnichannel shoppers. This means they engage with brands over multiple formats. Think online, in person, by phone, and through reviews.

Are they getting a uniform experience? Or is it fragmented and friction-filled?

For any business, achieving perfect consistency is a major challenge. But for multi-location brands, it’s a whole other ball game.

You’ve got different locations, different staff, different systems. And yet, your customers expect it all to feel the same. Every time.

This guide walks you through everything you need to deliver a connected omnichannel customer experience (CX). You’ll learn:

• What omnichannel CX is and how it differs from multichannel
• Which channels are most important and why
• How to launch a strategy that works for every location
• How to measure whether it’s making a positive difference

What Is Omnichannel Customer Experience?

The omnichannel customer experience is the connected, consistent experience customers have regardless of which channel they use to interact with your brand.

Whether a customer calls your location, visits in person, reads your reviews online, or chats with you on your website, the experience feels like one seamless relationship.

For multi-location brands, that means every channel at every location is working together, too.

Omnichannel vs. multichannel

A multichannel customer experience means your brand is present on multiple channels. A customer can reach you by phone, in person, or online, for example.

But those channels don’t talk to each other. Each one operates independently.

Omnichannel means the channels are connected. What happens in one channel carries over to the next.

To summarize:

Feature	Multichannel	Omnichannel
Channels	Multiple, operating separately	Multiple, connected and coordinated
Customer experience	Varies by channel	Consistent across all channels
Data sharing	Siloed by channel	Unified across channels
Context carried over	No, each interaction starts fresh	Yes, previous interactions inform the next
Goal	Reach customers in more places	Deliver one seamless experience everywhere

Why seamless channels matter

When channels are disconnected, customers feel it.

They repeat themselves. They get different answers depending on who they speak to. They lose trust.

They’re fed up and frustrated, which means they’re more than happy to take their business elsewhere.

According to Forbes:

“Audiences no longer experience different channels as separate touchpoints, but as a single, continuous relationship that carries context, intent and trust from one interaction to the next.”

That is the expectation you need to meet. And if you do? Well, there’s a financial reward.

Research shows that omnichannel shoppers give you a 30% higher lifetime return on investment (ROI) than single-channel shoppers.

RELATED ARTICLE — Social Media Customer Service

Why Omnichannel CX Matters for Multi-Location Brands

For a single-location business, managing the customer experience is challenging enough. For a multi-location brand, it’s exponentially harder.

Every location adds more channels and more opportunities for the experience to vary.

Here’s why getting omnichannel CX right is worth the effort.

In-store + online + phone + reviews

Customers don’t typically interact with brands in one place. Instead, they engage with several touchpoints.

These might include:

• In-store: The customer visits a physical location. The quality of that experience depends on the staff and processes at that specific location.
• Online: They browse your website, book an appointment, or fill out a contact form. This channel operates independently of the in-store experience for most brands.
• Phone: They call to ask a question or resolve a problem. What they’re told on the phone needs to align with what they experience in person.
• Reviews: After their visit, the customer leaves a Google review. Their feedback is now part of the experience for every future customer who searches for your brand.

Each of these channels is a separate touchpoint. An omnichannel approach connects them so the customer gets a consistent experience, whichever way they decide to interact with your brand.

Consistency across locations & channels

A customer who visits your brand in one city and then another expects the same experience. When it’s different, they begin to lose trust.

Your reputation takes a hit, and they might not revisit their regular locations again.

Consistency changes that. It locks in trust. It secures loyalty. It means:

• The same service standards at every location
• The same information delivered across phone, web, and in person
• The same process for handling complaints, regardless of which channel the complaint comes through
• Feedback from every channel feeding into one central view so problems are caught and fixed as soon as possible

Key Channels in an Omnichannel Experience

Let’s take a look at the key channels involved in omnichannel customer service.

In-person & phone

In-person and on the phone are your two most personal channels. They’re also the ones where the customer experience is most dependent on individual people.

Any time a customer physically visits one of your locations, they are interacting in person. This is where your brand promise gets tested in real time.

The staff attitude, the wait time, the cleanliness, the way a problem gets handled. All of it influences how the customer feels about your brand.

Phone, in contrast, is usually the first channel a customer uses when something goes wrong.

What they’re told on that call needs to line up with what they’ll experience when they visit in person. Inconsistency between phone and in-person creates confusion. Your customer is left thinking:

“The person on the phone told me one thing, but when I got there it was completely different. Who do I believe next time?”

That doubt can be tricky to recover from.

Here’s what to get right on both channels:

• Staff trained to the same standard at every location
• The same answers to common questions
• A process for escalating complaints

Web, chat & mobile

Your digital channels are where most customers go first. They search for you online and browse your website.

They likely form an opinion about your brand before they make in-person or phone contact.

Let’s take a closer look:

• Website: Customers use it to find location information, book appointments, learn about your team, and read about your services. If the information is outdated or hard to find, they’ll go elsewhere.
• Live chat: Customers expect fast, personalized responses. A chat that goes unanswered for 10 minutes is a missed opportunity.
• Mobile: More customers than ever are interacting with brands on their phones. Your website needs to work well on mobile. And, any booking or contact process needs to be easy to complete on a small screen.

Reviews & social

Reviews and social media are public-facing channels. They influence new customers who search for your brand.

• Online reviews on platforms like Google are part of your customer experience whether you engage with them or not. That’s because 96% of consumers read them when researching local businesses. Responding to reviews, including negative ones, tells potential customers that you take feedback on board.
• Social media is where customers ask questions, tag you, learn about the human side of your brand, and share their experiences.

For multi-location brands, reviews and social interactions need to be monitored at the location level.

How to Build an Omnichannel CX Strategy

When creating an omnichannel CX strategy, you’ll want to deliberately map how every channel in your business works together to deliver one consistent customer experience.

Map the cross-channel journey

Before you can improve, you need to understand what your customers experience right now, as the journey currently stands.

Here’s how to map it:

Step 1: List every channel your customers use. Include in-person visits, phone calls, your website, live chat, email, online reviews, and social media. Don’t leave anything out.

Step 2: Walk the journey as a customer would. Call your own location. Visit your website on a mobile phone. Read your most recent Google reviews. Note down every friction point you find.

Step 3: Map what happens at each touchpoint. For each channel, write down:

• What the customer is trying to do
• What they actually experience
• Where the experience breaks down or creates confusion

Step 4: Identify where channels disconnect. Look for moments where a customer moves from one channel to another and the experience changes. For example, a customer books online but gets told something different when they arrive in person.

Unify customer & feedback data

One of the biggest blockers to an incredible omnichannel CX is data that lives in separate places. None of it connects.

Unifying that data means bringing it together so you can see the complete picture of each customer’s experience.

Here’s what that involves:

• Set up a single system where feedback from every channel gets collected and tagged by location.
• Make sure post-visit surveys, phone interactions, and online reviews are all captured in the same reporting view.
• Tag every piece of feedback with the channel it came from so you can compare performance by channel.

Coordinate channels around the customer

Coordinated channels deliver the same information, the same standards, and the same experience.

People shouldn’t have to adapt to your channels; your channels should adapt to them.

Follow these best practices:

• Train all staff, in all locations, to the same service standard. This should be upheld whether they’re answering phones or serving in person.
• Make sure your website information is the same as what customers are told on the phone and in-store.
• When a customer raises an issue on one channel, make sure the resolution is visible on every channel that customer uses.
• Set a response time standard for every channel and hold every location accountable to it.

RELATED ARTICLE — How to Measure Customer Experience

Omnichannel Customer Experience Examples

The best way to understand omnichannel CX is to see it in action. Here are some examples of what it looks like when channels work together, and what it costs when they don’t.

Retail & franchise examples

A national clothing retailer

A customer searches for a jacket online. They check availability at their nearest store and reserve it through the website.

When they arrive, the staff already know they’re coming and the jacket is waiting. The customer pays in-store and receives a follow-up email asking for feedback.

Every channel worked together:

• The website showed real-time stock availability.
• The in-store team was informed before the customer arrived.

The customer never had to repeat themselves. The experience was effortless.

A franchise restaurant group

A customer orders online from one location and has a great experience. Two weeks later, they visit a different location and find:

• Unfriendly staff
• A long wait time
• Food that doesn’t match what they expected

They leave a one-star Google review.

That’s a disconnected omnichannel experience. The brand failed to deliver consistency, and the customer’s trust in the whole brand, not just one location, is damaged.

Home services & fitness examples

A multi-location home services company

A homeowner books a plumbing service through the company’s website. Here’s what a connected experience looks like from start to finish:

• Confirmation email sent immediately with the technician’s name and arrival window.
• Technician arrives on time and completes the job.
• Satisfaction survey sent by text that afternoon.
• Feedback routed into the location manager’s reporting dashboard.
• Manager reviews and responds within 24 hours.

Every step connected. Every channel doing its part.

A fitness franchise

A member signs up online and attends their first class at one location. They later visit a different location, and the front desk staff can see their membership details and class history.

They don’t have to re-register or explain who they are.

That connected experience tells the customer their relationship is with the whole brand rather than just one location.

How to Measure Omnichannel CX

To measure omnichannel CX, you need to keep an eye on how customers rate their experience on every channel and at every location. Here’s how.

Cross-channel metrics (NPS, CSAT, CES)

These three metrics are the foundation of omnichannel measurement.

Here’s what each one means and where to use it:

• NPS (Net Promoter Score). Asks customers how likely they are to recommend your brand. Use this at the end of a full experience, like after a completed service or a multi-visit relationship. It measures overall loyalty.
• CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score). Asks customers how satisfied they were with a specific interaction. Use this after a phone call or an in-store visit. It measures individual touchpoints.
• CES (Customer Effort Score). Asks customers how easy it was to get something done. Use this after booking or any process that involves multiple steps. It measures friction.

Track all three at the relevant stage of the journey. Be sure to tag the responses you get with the channel and location it came from.

Channel & location breakdowns

Aggregate scores hide problems.

Say your NPS is 45. You think things are ticking along just fine.

But when you filter by channel, you find that customers who contacted you by phone are giving you a score that puts that channel firmly in negative territory. 

That’s a serious problem that your overall score was covering up.

Good customer feedback software lets you filter results by channel, by location, and by time period. That means you can identify precisely where the experience is frustrating the customer. From there, you can take targeted action to fix it.

RELATED ARTICLE — How to Build a Customer Experience Management Strategy

Common Omnichannel Pitfalls

Even well-intentioned omnichannel programs run into problems. Here are two of the most common.

Siloed data & disjointed handoffs

When your channels don’t share data, customers are forced to repeat themselves. That’s frustrating, and it makes your brand look disorganized. 

Fix it by centralizing your feedback and customer data into a single system.

Inconsistent experience by location

Your brand is only as good as your worst location.

If one location is delivering a great experience and another is letting customers down, your brand takes the hit either way.

Customers don’t separate locations in their minds. They just decide whether they trust you or they don’t.

So, set the same standards for every location, measure adherence, and keep all locations accountable.

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are some of the questions you might have about omnichannel customer experience.

What is omnichannel customer experience?

Omnichannel customer experience is about delivering a unified experience across every channel. This includes in-person, online, by phone, on social media, and through reviews.

Every channel works together like a seamless ecosystem. The customer gets the same quality experience however they choose to interact with your brand.

What’s the difference between omnichannel and multichannel?

The difference between omnichannel and multichannel is integration. Omnichannel transfers context from one channel to the next. Here’s a closer look:

• Multichannel means your brand is available on multiple channels, but they operate separately.
• Omnichannel means those channels are connected and share information.

How do you measure omnichannel CX?

Use NPS, CSAT, and CES surveys at each stage of the journey. Tag all of your responses with the relevant channel and location.

A feedback analytics platform lets you filter results. That way, you’re able to see exactly which channel, at which location, is underperforming

Conclusion

Your customers don’t think in channels. They think about your brand.

Every time they call, visit, search, or leave a review, they’re building an impression of who you are and what you stand for.

If those experiences are all over the place, that impression suffers. If they’re consistent and connected, however, your brand wins trust.

Start improving how cohesive your customer experience is today:

• Read your last 10 Google reviews. Look for any complaint that appears more than once.
• Jot down every channel your customers use to contact your brand. Would the customer have to repeat information if they moved between them? Take note of which ones you still need to connect.
• Decide on one service standard that every location should be delivering.
• Research what a post-visit survey would look like for your business. Think about which metrics would be most useful and when.