What is O2O Marketing?

Nowadays, online marketing significantly influences consumers’ behaviour to buy products and services from online platforms, such as social media channels, websites, and e-commerce platforms. However, traditional marketing is still effective and can actually help drive online sales. Online and offline marketing provides different benefits and limitations. Online channels are unsuitable for some brands because the target consumer predominantly purchases in-store. But, if the business’s target audience is the younger generation who uses social media, online channels would be more appropriate. 

Now it’s time to take a look at the O2O marketing model. Let’s start with the definition of what the O2O business model is, why it’s important in the digital age, and examples of companies in Thailand that apply the O2O business model.

What is O2O Marketing?

Online businesses are continually evolving, but many consumers still prefer buying in-store, which increases the need for O2O marketing.

O2O marketing is the online-to-offline or offline-to-online business model which combines the abilities of the two models to create an efficient marketing model. An example of online-to-offline marketing is using online advertising to attract customers to offline stores. Meanwhile, offline-to-online marketing encourages an in-store customer to follow the brand on social media or discover information on its website, for example.

What Is an O2O Platform?

An O2O platform is any channel for O2O marketing, such as social media. As a brand, you should decide which O2O platforms best suit your marketing strategy and target audience. For example, Twitter or Instagram might be best for a younger audience, and Facebook and TikTok for more of a broad reach.

What Are the Benefits of O2O Marketing?

Meeting the customer’s needs

The number of online and offline stores is constantly increasing. Therefore, brands need to be present across different marketing channels to increase their visibility and be able to service customers both online and offline. This O2O business model meets different customer requirements and helps to maintain a healthy customer base.

Easily reach customers

O2O marketing allows businesses to reach out to more customers across both online and offline channels. If the brand uses online marketing efficiently, the customer can identify the product they want to buy online before purchasing it in-store. This allows the brand to reach more customers and create a good purchase experience for them as well.

Creating brand awareness

Nowadays, the internet is a part of daily life, and online channels are a great way to get your offline brand known online. Brands should update their product catalogue regularly to create awareness and attract customers. As an example, most beauty businesses are good at this; they regularly buy online advertisements to build brand awareness and advertise special offers for offline customers.

Save on shipping costs

Offering in-store pick-up for online purchases reduces costs for the brand, increases profits, and provides customers with another opportunity and medium through which to purchase products. 

Examples of O2O Businesses in Thailand 

Several international brands apply an O2O marketing strategy with great success, such as Beauty Heroes, Allbirds, and Amazon. Let’s take a closer look at how some brands in Thailand are implementing an O2O strategy. 

LINE MAN

LINE MAN, a subsidiary company of LINE Corporation, utilises an O2O model in Thailand. LINE Corporation developed the LINE MAN application to offer food delivery, a messenger service, convenience store deliveries, and postal services. LINE MAN applies the O2O model to connect online and offline services to increase benefits for customers and entrepreneurs.

Lotus’s SMART App

In 2022, Lotus supermarket expanded its O2O business model by launching the SMART APP to allow customers to purchase products online. They apply AI and big data to provide special offers, discounts, and personalised products for each customer.

Lotus is tapping into its strength of having more than 2,300 branches, including hypermarkets and Lotus Go Fresh sites, to act as distribution centres and shorten the delivery time. They offer both same-day and next-day delivery services.

7-11

The well-known convenience store, 7-11, uses O2O marketing to promote products via online channels such as 7-11 delivery, ALL ONLINE, and 24 Shopping. Moreover, they offer cash-on-delivery services and self-pickup services. 7-11 invests heavily in digital technology to analyse customer behaviour, manage costs, and adopt agile working methods.

Summary

O2O marketing combines online and offline marketing to create an effective strategy and consistent communications to drive brand awareness amongst your target audience. If you’re looking for a tool to support online-to-offline or offline-to-online marketing, choose Syndatrace. This platform helps businesses collect offline sales data, track sales, and analyse the market.