The aim of a shopper marketing campaign is to influence consumers at the point of purchase, whether that’s in store or online. It seeks to make a connection with them in order to help drive sales, increase brand and product awareness, encourage product sampling or reward brand loyalty.
To execute a successful shopper marketing campaign, it is important to take a structured and collaborative approach. It is particularly important to fully comprehend the retail environment, determine who the target shoppers are and match marketing activity to the target shoppers.
- Embrace joint planning
For shopper marketing campaigns to be successful it is essential that brands, retailers and specialist agencies which can enhance particular aspects of the customer journey all agree to work together. Collaboration between the departments of the organisations involved is also important. The joint planning should ideally begin several months before the shopper marketing campaign is set to begin.
- Collect customer data and generate shopper insights
Starting well in advance, gather data about customers and use it to build a picture of shoppers. Develop insights into how they connect with the retail experience and what tips them into purchasing.
- Understand the retail environment
Be clear how both the physical retail environment and the virtual retail environment work, what customers’ expectations of those environments are and how they navigate the key touch points.
- Identify the target shopper
Draw on a range of demographic and behavioural research, plus knowledge of the retail environment and brand objectives, to define a primary target shopper. This gives a clear focus for the shopper marketing campaign.
- Set marketing objectives
Shopper marketing objectives should always take account of the specific retail environment, and be closely tied to both brand and retail partner objectives. For instance, increasing footfall or improving category profitability might be marketing goals for the retailer, so those must be factored in. Once objectives are in place, it may also be appropriate to develop an overarching shopper marketing strategy.
- Choose the right marketing approach
The marketing approach must match the brand objectives, retailer objectives and retail environment, but beyond that there is a wide range of marketing devices available to shopper marketing teams. These include, for example, branded end-of-aisle displays, in-store product sampling, on-pack promotions, unique content tailored to the customer and digital coupons, among others.
- Execute and analyse
The planning and collaborative work should really pay off when it comes to the execution stage, but be sure to track and analyse the key metrics in order to measure the success of the campaign. The return on investment (ROI) delivered by shopper marketing is usually calculated by setting the increase in sales due to the shopper marketing campaign against the cost of that campaign.
What are the essential elements of successful shopper marketing campaigns?
- Embrace joint planning
- Collect customer data and generate shopper insights
- Understand the retail environment
- Identify target shoppers
- Set marketing objectives
- Choose the right marketing approach
- Execute and analyse
Prizeology can enhance successful shopper marketing campaigns and deliver against your shopper marketing objectives by running on-pack and online promotions.
