James Black |
Exactly what constitutes shopper marketing has always been a source of confusion. One common shortcut is to define it as marketing created by shopper marketers, typically those working most closely with the manufacturers' sales teams at top retailers (e.g., Walmart, Costco, Kroger, CVS, etc.). However this notion can be somewhat narrow as a lot of marketing the shopper encounters happens outside of these organizations, most notably packaging or other vehicles developed further upstream by global brand and/or initiative teams.
A second shortcut, then, is to consider any marketing that the consumer encounters -- in and out of store -- as shopper marketing. This definition, however, can be too broad. While conceptually attractive because it drives focus on the shopper, it is not that practical in use, as shopper-marketing teams too often lack influence over this broad range of work.
A further source of confusion is all of the trade promotions that happen every year, often out of sight. These, too, are easily lumped into the definition of shopper marketing. Ultimately, traditional consumer marketing (that the shopper encounters), shopper marketing, and trade promotions could be viewed as existing in some sort of continuum. Strong shopper marketing can build off of its interface with both consumer marketing (e.g., by amplifying initiatives in-store) and by combining efforts with trade promotions to deliver stronger results.
The squeeze
While it can appear that shopper marketing operates along a
continuum (consumer marketing; shopper marketing; trade promotions)
a caution for this is that shopper marketing does not have to play
out as a zero-sum game. All too often shopper marketing is getting
squeezed between the other two types of work.
Many leading companies have retrenched their shopper-marketing efforts, and attention has often shifted away to today's hot topic: digital marketing. In many instances, dollars and resources associated with shopper marketing get reallocated to increase attention on digital marketing -- not that digital marketing isn't an important enabler to a winning shopper-marketing strategy, as digital cues often provide solutions to help the shopper along the various stages of her path to purchase.
Trade promotions, meanwhile, are often a sacred cow as they are relied on to deliver the base at key customers. Thus trade promotions are generally a consistent priority and not likely to be displaced.
Confounding this problem is the often difficult nature of calculating an ROI on shopper marketing. Sometimes if a manufacturer's marketing mix model identifies a strong ROI for shopper marketing vs. other vehicles (e.g., TV, print, etc.) it may be hard to understand what is contributing to the success. Arriving at a shopper marketing ROI can be more difficult than the media ROI because the number relies on so many more components. Thus, it can be difficult to understand what to do differently next time.
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