India's Retail Sector Embraces Omnichannel 2.0 for Enhanced Customer Experience

Transforming Retail with Omnichannel 2.0

New Delhi, Aug 4: The retail landscape in India is poised for a significant transformation as it adopts Omnichannel 2.0, which emphasizes real-time and seamless interactions between digital and physical environments, according to a recent report.

Market intelligence firm 1Lattice highlights that modern consumers expect a cohesive and personalized experience across various digital and physical platforms.

With over 450 million users on WhatsApp, 60% of whom interact with businesses weekly, this platform has emerged as a vital tool for commerce and customer engagement.

Additionally, short-form video content is becoming increasingly popular for shopping, particularly among Gen Z and Millennials, who often rely on influencer recommendations for discovering new products.

The report notes that the growth of open commerce platforms, especially those powered by ONDC like Paytm, PhonePe, and WhatsApp, allows small and medium enterprises to digitize quickly without substantial technology investments.

Generative AI is also playing a crucial role in enhancing personalization, optimizing pricing strategies, and automating service delivery, which helps reduce support costs and improve demand forecasting for early adopters.

While the potential of the Omnichannel experience is promising, challenges remain.

Brands often find it difficult to meet the content demands across platforms like Reels and WhatsApp, leading to inconsistencies in pricing, inventory, and promotions due to disconnected systems.

Moreover, a lack of digital talent, changing data privacy laws, and onboarding challenges for smaller sellers add to the complexity of the situation.

Nevertheless, Omnichannel 2.0 is seen as a catalyst for growth, integrating speed, personalization, and convenience into a unified experience, as emphasized in the 1Lattice report.

Innovative formats such as video shopping, live commerce, and WhatsApp checkout are transitioning from experimental phases to becoming standard expectations.

As the retail ecosystem in India continues to evolve, brands are encouraged to move from a mere multichannel approach to a more intelligent, real-time engagement strategy.

1Lattice specializes in providing data-driven insights and comprehensive research services across various sectors, including consumer and retail, healthcare, industrial manufacturing, financial services, technology, and logistics.