Multichannel Synergy

What exactly does this term mean? Multichannel synergy. Using the dictionary, it would appear to mean the behavior of different channels of retail distribution acting in concert to produce a result different than if they were managed independently. So where, exactly, is this happening today?

Too often this phrase is used to describe such tactics as making store inventories visible online, or ship-to-store, buy online and pick up in store, using the website to make local store promotions visible....etc. Are these things really causing a unique outcome different than if the channels were acting independently? Not really.

In the end, it appears that multichannel synergy has become jargon for marketing techniques that use one channel to stimulate sales in another channel. How is this synergistic? Smart marketing....absolutely. If you have millions of monthly unique visitors to your website, it is a good idea to try to influence those people to shop your brick and mortar locations as well. Or at least to facilitate any latent or activated intention which exists regarding your brand. Similarly if you have millions of monthly footsteps moving through your brick and mortar chain, it makes sense to try to stimulate awareness of your online channel (although not quite as much sense as the reverse). But are these efforts truly synergistic?

What would multichannel synergistic behavior look like in the retail world? What if you could visit a retail website, and download/print the forms (postage prepaid) to return something you bought in a store? Certainly the online channel would not act in this way independently, and certainly customer service, and by extension brand appreciation would be enhanced. Alternatively, what if you could return an online purchase in any brick and mortar location? ALl you had to do was bring the item in, know your name, and the POS system would look you up, verify that you had bought it, and refund your money. Right there. In that amount of time. Certainly taking back unsellable returns from the online channel is NOT a way that the brick and mortar store would act independently....it takes time and effort with limited personnel resources to then actually send the product back somewhere....time and effort without immediate benefit to that channel.

So ask yourself: are you actually producing multichannel synergy? Or just being smart marketers.