A little while ago I met with a potential client – a highly experienced Director at a blue chip organization. We spoke about shopper marketing and had a great conversation but at the end of it he said (and I’m paraphrasing):
“That’s all very well, but I just don’t see it happening. All is see in-stores is generic, ordinary – I can’t see the shopper marketing difference. Come back and show me what shopper marketing can do.”
Well that got me thinking. It got me thinking about the work we do, and the work I see around the world, and whilst there are exceptions, an awful lot of what I would call great shopper marketing is actually rather ordinary in execution. A great piece of advertising can be seen, it has a wow factor: the brilliance is typically there to be seen, so why isn’t this true about shopper work?
I began to review some of the work we’ve done recently. For a TV manufacturer in China, we painted the walls red in-store; for a milk company the major strategic output was re-arranging the product on the shelf. Not that dramatic and (in the case of the milk) probably invisible if you didn’t actually shop that particular fixture. In the image here (courtesy of my friends at @insightshopper) it’s just displaying two products together.
Behind each of these simple executions (certainly in the work we did) however there was hours of analysis, crunching, prioritizing and deliberations. Specific segmentations were developed, channels analyzed, re-cut and prioritized again. Investment costs were calculated and rebalanced to create the maximum ROI. But none of that is visible to the observer. The reality is that great shopper marketing is great marketing and marketing isn’t done in a store – it happens in offices, in meeting rooms and at desks. The brilliance of great marketing lies in the fabulous insights, the identification of different ways of looking at a situation, and turning that into something which is actionable and impactful. It doesn’t have to be beautiful to be brilliant marketing – it has to work. Indeed given the many constraints on in-store execution for it to be actionable, it often has to be really simple.
So, how do you spot great shopper marketing?
If great shopper marketing isn’t necessarily highly visible: how do we know that something is great? Your shopper marketing is great when:
It creates a behavioral change in a target shopper
If there is no change in shopping behavior then there is no growth. It’s as simple as that. There are many shoppers whom we wish to keep buying as they normally do, but they wont’ drive growth of our brands. If you are a marketer and need to grow your brand (who doesn’t?) then shoppers need to behave differently.
It drives incremental consumption
If incremental purchase takes place but there is no increase in consumption, then there is a danger our activity is just filling up the larder. In some categories we have found up to 80% of incremental purchases have not driven any change in consumption – i.e. product sits in a cupboard and just delays the next purchase. In the long term, no extra product is bought. If shopper activity also drives, enables or supports a change in consumption behavior, then as long as the consumption is rewarding, we are well on the way to a follow up purchase.
It creates habitual changes in shopping behavior
One purchase is nice, but if the shopper switches back to their old habits the next week then the gain is small. If the change is made permanent, habitual, then long term growth is assured.
It facilitates habitual changes in consumption behavior
Now we are really talking. Getting a consumer to take on our brand on a long term basis assures consumer demand, and this is one of the best ways of creating or reinforcing a shopping habit.
It supports the long term goals of the brand
If the brand goal is to be positioned as premium, then how does that deep price discount affect that? If the brand is looking to penetrate new users, how does the buy two get one free deal help? If the brand is looking to drive into new usage occasions, then how can our shopper marketing connect to that?
It supports the commercial and strategic goals of the retailer.
Until all of our activities are conducted outside of the real estate owned by retailers, their collaboration and support will be required. Shopper activities which drive incremental sales and profit for the retailer will get more support, period. Activities which go against a retailers strategy may not. For example, I was once witness to a presentation by a brand owner to Tesco which stated that the goal of the activity was to steal share from the Tesco label product. Needless to say it didn’t get the green light from the buyer!
It delivers a measurable ROI
Beyond all of this, marketers exist to make money for their companies, and shopper marketers are no exception. If it doesn’t make a decent return, then it isn’t great shopper marketing, regardless of how clever the creative is.
When we work with shopper marketing agencies – they often complain that there brilliant creativity is never allowed to shine – that their amazing ideas for transforming brands at retail never see the light of day. When we work with clients (and retailers!) they complain that what is presented by agencies and brand owners is just too complicated to work across hundreds of stores. Perhaps agencies are trying too hard? Perhaps they are trying to justify their fees, and feel that the concept and execution has to be amazing. This is fallacy. In consumer marketing perhaps there is more space for brilliance in insight AND execution. But for now I feel that adding value in shopper marketing is more about the insight end of the spectrum – execution is more about, well, ensuring it gets executed, and that often means keeping it simple
It doesn’t have to be flashy – it needs to work.
