Customer experiences in omnichannel retail environments: a thematic literature review

Abstract

The paradigm shift towards omnichannel approaches represents an ongoing fundamental change and a key metamorphic process taking place within the fields of retail marketing and management today. The intertwining of commerce and content across channels and touchpoints requires retailers to reconfigure their strategies and manifests new challenges for grasping concepts like customer experience and customer journeys. In response to these developments, we conduct a thematic review of 64 academic papers addressing customer experiences in omnichannel retail environments, integrating central concepts and approaches and thereby contributing to the body of literature exploring new and alternative approaches and theories to customer experiences along omnichannel customer journeys. We identify 8 overlapping streams of literature in this regard, highlightig that research on the subject tends to be focused on the seamlessness of channel integration and efficiency and thus might benefit from more consumer-centric, interdisciplinary work taking the co-creational aspect of these experiences into account. We contribute to retail–and omnichannel literature as well as retail branding theory and practice.