Category — Digital Marketing
The Social Shopper
Social media provide an unvarnished view of shopper behavior. By Brad Lawless and Mary Tarczynski. Shopper marketers spend their days studying and researching a product, understanding its core demographic appeal and brand positioning. Focus groups (both online and off) allow brands and retailers to moderate discussions with shoppers around specific topics. Aggregated store-level and loyalty-card databases offer historical views into purchasing trends.
However, reports generated from large research data sets tell us at best what, not why, shoppers bought, while other methods suffer from observational bias. We constantly seek better ways to understand the shopper’s mindset as she plans for and executes her weekly shopping trip. How does she compile her list? How does she learn about new products or pricing specials for her favorite products? Once she arrives at the store, how does she find her way around to gather items in her basket? continue …
May 1, 2013 Comments
One Macy’s
With one foot in digital and the other in stores, Macy’s CMO Martine Reardon keeps all eyes on her shoppers.
The modern world has not been kind to the old-fashioned department store. Hammered by shopping malls and specialty shops in the late 20th century, it is now confronted by digitized shopping in the new millennium. And yet Macy’s, founded in 1858, is thriving on a mixture of nostalgia for a storied past and visions of a high-tech future. Where other retailers are scrambling to downsize their stores, Macy’s is renovating its iconic Herald Square flagship. While others submerge into the minutia of the digital age, Macy’s stays afloat with its larger-than-life Thanksgiving Day Parade.
At the same time, Macy’s was among the first to achieve success with QR codes. It has introduced True Fit, an online tool that enables shoppers to find their fit without actually trying on any clothes. It is testing digital mannequins, so that customers can mix and match to their heart’s content. It has more than six million Facebook fans, too. Rather than ceding ground to ecommerce, Macy’s has re-imagined its stores as a nationwide network of “warehouses” that can deliver whatever size, color or style shoppers want regardless of where they are shopping —online, in-store, coast-to-coast. Product assortments are meanwhile tailored on a by-store basis, affording selections according to local culture, events and climate.
As CMO Martine Reardon tells it, it is this intense, technology-enabled customer focus that makes all the difference. “Our motto is that we put the customer at the center of every single one of our decisions,” she says. “It’s almost like she gets a seat at our table as we think about new strategies.” More than any other reason, that’s why Macy’s is still a miracle on 34th Street. read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
Upward Mobility
The future of shopping is in the shopper’s hands.
A roundtable discussion on emerging media, with Michael Minasi of Safeway, Patrick McLean of Capital One, David VanderWaal of LG Electronics USA, Jeanne Danubio of Neilsen NA and Ken Barnett of Mars Advertising.
Is the effect of mobile devices on shopper behavior overstated?
Michael Minasi: If it’s overstated at all, it is only because marketers have a tendency to think beyond the current timeframe and structure of use and project where they think the future will be. But you can’t really overstate the fundamental change that mobile media will have on shopper behavior and how shoppers get information.
As it stands right now, we see Safeway shoppers using mobile primarily as a pre-shop planning tool, which may be to create or maintain a list or to search out and find digital coupons and so forth. The vast majority of use has to do with the utility of shopping and making shopping a bit easier and then saving money with digital coupons. read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
The eRankings Report
New research sets a foundation for excellence in ecommerce. By Jason Katz. Consumer packaged-goods face a critical juncture in ecommerce. This segment is among the fastest growing industries in ecommerce, but is also very much in its infancy. Its explosive growth is shaping a new frontier of consumer engagement and is giving rise to new collaborative models.
The brands and etailers who partner to deliver the right shopper solutions will gain tremendous first-mover advantages. They’ll chart the roadmap for success. They’ll emerge as the early winners and define what’s “best in class.” As Jeff Bezos said — and it’s glaringly evident across the ecommerce ecosystem now —”What’s dangerous is not to evolve.”
The 2012 eRankings Report, co-sponsored by Etailing Solutions, RetailNet Group and the Center for Ecommerce Excellence, is the first in an annual series that will monitor and survey insights into ecommerce for consumer packaged-goods. This report was developed to be a foundation for how to win in ecommerce, and to see it from both the manufacturer and etailer point-of-view. read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
Emerging Behavior
The emerging opportunity is to make connections and build relationships. By Sharon Love. When it comes to emerging media,much of the rest of the world is far ahead of the United States. It’s not emerging elsewhere around theworld; it’s already established as part of the culture.
While most of us already know this, it became glaringly obvious during the recent Consumer Goods Forum Global Summit in Istanbul. Speaker after speaker from around the globe made the point through their case studies and stories.
The smart people at Capgemini shared a study that reported significant differences between shoppers in developing markets and those in mature markets, like the US. In developing markets, digital-savvy, social shoppers are using technologies in all phases of the shopping journey. According to Capgemini, two-thirds of consumers are interested in finding out about new products via social media. read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
Wired To Please
Retail’s past offers clues to its digital future. By Lauren de Simone. For thousands of years, markets have been at the center of communities. Shoppers went to market to buy, see and hear about what was new, and in many ways to dream of something better. Not so long ago, small neighborhood groceries, run by local “experts” like my grandfather, provided help, service, social news (a.k.a. gossip) and introductions to new and better things.
My grandfather’s store, Roxy’s Market, was a small grocery in the East Bronx: think Sam Drucker from Green Acres. The man knew everything and everyone, and shoppers came away from their trips to his store richer in many ways. They left with so much more than a bag of flour; they came away with my grandmother’s special one-egg cake recipe that they could now make for their own celebration. If anything went wrong, help was just an old-fashioned phone call away!
Reflecting on those days got me thinking: Might digital’s future in packaged-goods retail reside in putting people, and the personal touch, back into the shopping experience? If store employees were to help shoppers enjoy a more technologically integrated experience by educating and informing them on how to use, leverage and thread together online and offline experiences, would markets once again become the center of the “new community”? read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
The Third Moment
What happens after the sale is just as important as the other moments-of-truth. By Michael LeBeau. We’re all aware that much has changed now that “social,” “mobile” and “local” have taken hold. However, when considering the traditional path-to-purchase in light of these major technological disruptions, several questions remain.
For example, is there really a “preference” phase, or has technology allowed consumers to move from “consideration” to “buy” at a blinding pace? Where is social networking — specifically the act of sharing opinions about brands — reflected in the path? Is “loyalty” a consumer step, or an intended (hopefully) outcome? Is the path really linear? Does it just end after loyalty?
All of the above affect the path-to-purchase, which has proven to be an effective model to guide both planning cycles and the execution of marketing initiatives. It is a model that is focused, logical and linear — something that keeps us all on track and moving in the right direction. The logic remains solid. Awareness is created. Consideration takes place. Preference is established. Purchase occurs. Usage happens. And we have a loyal customer for life (hopefully). read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
Mixed Results
We’re a long way from digital-only communications in retailing. By Bill Bishop. Two years ago, after a lifetime of research and consulting in the retail industry, I decided to focus exclusively on writing, reading, researching, and speaking about how consumer technology use is changing the way people shop and how this, in turn, is changing retailing. I was present when the barcode was introduced, the last technology that transformed the business, and remain fascinated by the transformative potential of the digital age.
It’s been a messy, fascinating time. Shoppers are clearly in the driver’s seat, eagerly mixing new media with the old. Promoters are often overly enthusiastic about the newest thing. Retailers are trying to make sense of it all so they can give shoppers what they want. Here’s some of what I’ve learned.
It’s still about what shoppers want. For all the breathless hype, I’ve been struck by the fact that new tools don’t change the fundamental truth of retailing: To learn what shoppers want, you still need to look at things from their point-of-view and listen closely. read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
Big Bang Media
The medium is the insight. By Tim Manners. For days, weeks, months, years — decades now, actually — I’ve watched digital media’s minute-by-minute emergence with a mixture of wonder and dismay. The wonder is wrapped up in the inherent magic of the medium itself, which, as it turns out, is, in fact,”a series of tubes” (see page 46). The dismay is mired in a fog of questions about what it all means, and how, exactly, it is changing our lives.
Are digital media making us smarter or dumber? Are they making us more efficient or are they wasting our time? Are we better off now than we were 15 years ago? The easy answer to all of these questions, I think, is an emphatic “yes.” As marketers, however, the questions pile up like dirty plates in a sink and the answers are anything but easy.
The one thing that seems clear is a nearly irresistible tendency to shoehorn old tactics into these new media. This has been true from the very beginning; when the internet first burst on the scene, many viewed it as just another channel for television commercials. Now that mobile devices are all the rage, the vision is typically no larger than that of a Jetsonian coupon dispenser. read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
App-ocalypse Now!
Are apps a life-changer, a black hole, or just pleasant diversion? According to The Wall Street Journal, Apple alone offers about 640,000 apps and consumers have so far downloaded some 30 billion apps. We thought it would be app-ropriate to ask our readers if they are app-oplectic or app-gnostic.
So, we created a survey about smartphones, tablets — app-friendly devices of every kind — and their life-changing (or not) app-lications. We even invited the opinions of those who don’t have an app-friendly device and have never downloaded an app. Most of our respondents were Gen Xers (44%), followed by Baby Boomers (38%), Millennials (12%) and Silent Generation (6%). Fifty-three percent were female and 47 percent were male.
Non-users were a very tiny minority — with 96 percent reporting that they use an app-friendly device of one kind or another. Of those, 97 percent said they had downloaded at least one app. Eighty-one percent said they used the Apple platform, with 20 percent on Android, 13% on BlackBerry and just two percent on Windows (some respondents use more than one platform). read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
Cool News
Tin Pan Valley. At the turn of the 20th century, Tin Pan Alley songwriters hoped that, with enough exposure, they could sell sheet music and phonograph records. They would hire”‘song pluggers’ to sing songs in public, while making payments to top Vaudeville performers.” A pop song, it was said”was just a clever advertisement set to music.”
At the turn of the 21st century, appmakers dream of similar fortunes, and “hire ‘pay-for-install’ companies that guarantee installations of new apps.” Sometimes they spend heavily for such exposure in hopes the hype will eventually generate a profit.
In the early 1900s, songwriters would “mimic a popular song, often by subtle tweaks in title or song chorus.” Today, appmakers similarly “mimic a popular game or utility app, often by subtle tweak of features or game characters.” Where “selling records helped sell record players,” selling apps helps sell mobile phones and tablets. read >>
September 1, 2012 Comments
Digital Empathy
Listen closely to real people to develop emotional insights. By Whitney Browne. I recently sat through a series of focus groups in which a broad cross-section of consumers in Atlanta and Los Angeles spoke about their relationships with technology, particularly their mobile devices. The participants ranged in age from early twenties to late sixties, and they came from a wide array of socio-economic backgrounds.
While the various groups were organized by demographics, I noticed a startling theme that wended its way through all groups. This theme manifested itself in varying ways — depending on who was sharing — but the message was quite clear: we have an uneasy relationship with the new marvels of technology that more and more have come to dominate our time and attention.
One woman in particular said something that struck me. We were talking about mobile devices and she said, “I had a touchscreen phone for two days. I loved it but I saw myself going down a dark path, so I returned it and went back to BlackBerry” … read >>
May 1, 2012 Comments
Your Own Beeswax
Your Own Beeswax
How much do you trust Facebook and Google with your personal information? An executive summary of a Hub Magazine survey. If trust is the bedrock of a great brand, then some of today’s hottest brands seem to be built on pebbles. The latest Hub Magazine survey detected considerable doubt among readers that the online brands they know and use can be trusted with their personal information.
We listed eight popular online brands — Facebook, LinkedIn, Google, Twitter, Bing, Amazon, Zappos and iTunes — roughly an even mix of social media sites and e-commerce leaders. We simply asked readers to indicate whether each brand was “trustworthy” or “not trustworthy.”
Zappos and LinkedIn scored highest by far, with Zappos earning the trust of 82 percent of respondents and LinkedIn trusted by 80 percent. Amazon, at 73 percent, was next highest on the trustworthiness scale, followed by iTunes at 63 percent and Twitter at 58 percent … read >>
May 1, 2012 Comments
Retailandia
Fight digital fatigue in the aisles and along the path. By Dustin Lehner and Jennifer Butcher. In the smart and quirky cable television show, Portlandia, Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein perform a sketch in which Fred gets caught in a technology loop — he moves from photos of puppies on his laptop to text messages on his phone, then there’s the Netflix queue to reorder, another text, email, DVR, Facebook, Tumblr and back through each again.
He can’t help himself. Carrie tries to save Fred by showing him a picture of himself in high school, before he even owned a computer. It’s a happier, simpler time, full of personal connection. Of course, this fails. He’s pulled into the loop and shuts down, literally, like a machine. It’s a sharp example of how we consume media, our growing addictions to technology, the lack of relevance in content and how it all can contribute to fatigue in the digital world … read >>
March 1, 2012 Comments
Shop Social, Live Total
Social shoppers redefine the shopping experience. By Lisa Diehlmann. Social shoppers are people who use social media to learn about, interact with, and purchase brands. That may not sound remarkable, but they have completely reframed the idea of a full, engaged life and the shopping experience that results. They are also changing the rules of shopping as they go.
The world of the social shopper is a richly connected network of people, brands, products, retailers and channels. There are distinct benefits to being this socially plugged-in. Not surprisingly, their numbers are on the rise, as are their activities … read>>
May 1, 2011 Comments
Digital Love?
Are shoppers as enamored with technology as we are? By Sarah Chow and Diana Boynton. It’s undeniable: The use of technology among consumers is growing. It’s something we must recognize, respect and, most of all, pursue. But we have to ask ourselves: What happens when consumers turn into shoppers? Are we blinded by the bright and shiny, double- and triple-digit increases in consumer digital adoption?
Let’s take a step back and remember the big picture. While the spending on and execution of digital vehicles are growing, what is the actual penetration and growth of engagement among shoppers? Those numbers may not be quite as bright or nearly as shiny … read>>
May 1, 2011 Comments
Digital Campfire
May 1, 2010 Comments
