5 Takeaways From a Career in Cross-Channel Retail

Thirdly, the key factors for success for each channel are different. Bass said that an easy search and checkout process are the determining factors to being successful selling online. But those factors fall way down the list on whether a retail store is successful.

Lastly, and most importantly, is that e-commerce sites and brick-and-mortar stores have completely different P/L statements, said Bass. Revenues and expenses differ between the two channels, so therefore they can't be run as the same entity.

Lesson No. 2: Organization structure matters. Your e-commerce team should be independent of your other departments and should report directly to the CEO, said Bass. There's so much going on within the retail industry — particularly online — that only a CEO is going to approve spending. Bass advised getting a CRM system that can track customers’ buying behaviors by channel.