Chapter 9: Virtually the Same: Understanding Consumer Experience in an Omnichannel Environment

As a response to the environment and our current circumstances, there have been extensive and continuing changes in the way we shop, meaning that consideration of shopping across touchpoints and channels is key – leaving no space to view physical and digital channels as distinct [2]. For consumers, this means new shopping experiences with increased, and more complex, customer-firm interactions [3].

This chapter examines how to understand consumers' decision-making across touchpoints and channels and identify the factors that influence their omnichannel journey. Its goal is to combine different perspectives and approaches, arguing that to meaningfully examine contemporary omnichannel customer experiences, multidisciplinary methods are essential. To do this, the chapter first considers literature on customer experience, store environment and the omnichannel to offer a combined conceptual framework. This is then used to enable three forms of analysis of a consumer journey, that are then woven together to offer richer insights and illustrate a journey pattern. These vivid outcomes support the use of a more holistic approach to omnichannel customer experience analysis and demonstrate implications for both research and business practice.