August 27, 2007
BrainTrust Query: Is in-store digital media for branding, sales lift…or both?
By Laura
Davis-Taylor, Founder & Principal, Retail Media Consulting
As in-store marketing strategies – both traditional and digital – are heating up in retail and Madison Avenue workrooms, an interesting thing is taking place. It’s highlighted quite well in a MediaPost article last month that digs into NBC’s push into retail media and the new category of out-of-home television networks. Tempting the marketing industry with the promise of capturing hard to reach people with brand messages, the piece explores some past challenges and whether this media will indeed be branding’s “next big thing.”
The article sparked plenty of conversation in the digital signage industry, as, like other articles before it, sides lined up to debate the primary purpose of these increasingly popular digital screens appearing within retail stores. On the one side, driven by advertising and media people, is the argument that digital signage is the ideal brand-building vehicle for delivering media messages to people while they shop. They are present in stores; why not hit them with the brand messages struggling to secure mass reach on home televisions? On the other side is the notion that any store messaging, digital included, should be utilized first and foremost to deliver targeted messages designed to lift sales.
Joe Mandese, the author of the piece and MediaPost’s editor, explored many of the fits and starts in “in-store TV’s” past and made a key point: “The only question is whether they (industry players) have learned from its past, and now understand what makes TV work inside stores – where it didn’t work before.”
But is a TV broadcast network the right way to look at this burgeoning media? And for what primary purpose?
Discussion
Questions: Should marketers be focusing on building brand value with in-store
digital media or is it strategically naive to veer away from a laser focus
on sales lift? Can both be accomplished? Why revert to the “in-store TV” model?
[Author’s
commentary] We did some freelance work last year with a major media firm
that was in the midst of an integrated pitch to a large CPG manufacturer.
To their merit, they were seeking to extend their brand and media campaign
to the store, a new “media vehicle” for the firm. As we delivered the in-store “media
plan” to the CPG, we were surprised to find that they weren’t interested in
what it would do strategically for their company, the retailer and the shopper.
Instead, they were fixated on the GRP value of each idea. For readers not familiar, this abbreviation stands for “Gross Rating Points,” a
way to measure a traditional media vehicle for efficiency. We tried to help
them understand that stores don’t merchandise against GRP value, as their goals
are rooted in sales.
The point is that interactive agencies look at this kind of store media and view it as a method to translate web strategies in-store. Media firms see GRPs, reach and frequency. Traditional advertising firms see branding. Direct marketing firms see targeting opportunities and POP folks see it as digital merchandising. You get the drift.
My firm’s view of the world is that the overarching goal of these new digital media tools should be sales. How you connect relevantly with shoppers to get there – be it sexy, engaging branding messages, targeted and day parted animated messages, valuable interactive screen strategies or powerful animated POP – is part of the strategic challenge. But if the end result can’t be tied concretely to sales, it’s simply not going to fly in the long run. This is not to say that the branding aspect is not still important, but it certainly should not be the driving force. After all, it’s a store, not a living room!
BrainTrust
Recent Discussions
Discussion Questions
Poll
Building brand and building sales are not mutually exclusive endeavors. True brand building should have as its end result a lift in sales.
Hey Laura,
I get asked this exact question all the time, and after working on both brand-building and sales-boosting projects, I’ve come to a conclusion that now seems pretty obvious: neither the medium nor the technology are sufficient to direct a retailer/advertiser to choose branding over sales lift, or vice versa.
If you’re working with a big box retailer that uses posters and POP displays to sell product, they will expect the digital signs to do exactly the same thing. They’re just dynamic posters, after all. However, take the same exact technology and put it into a high-end fashion boutique (where art photos and lifestyle shots of happy people in expensive clothing adorn the walls) and the screens will be used for branding and improving the in-store experience, because that’s what the static fixtures are already doing.
Can digital signs be used to help a retailer or advertiser expand into new advertising strategies and techniques? Absolutely. But those who install digital signage networks and think they’ll suddenly be able to flip their retail marketing and merchandising strategies on their heads need to realize that it’s just another medium for the kinds of creative things that they’ve been doing all along.
Building sales and building brand should share equally in any media model. Engaged interactive in-store digital media introduces an opportunity to move beyond legacy solutions which have become noise in the shopper’s mind. Building sales – not just case movement – but true incremental sales, results from a solving shopper’s problem better than the competition. That problem might be boredom with their current routine, a health related issue, or a need to be entertained.
Pitching in-store media through flat screen displays for the sole purpose of selling more stuff may sound like a great idea to some sales guy struggling to hit his numbers, but from a shopper’s perspective…? What’s in it for them?
Digital media can be about sustainable, authentic, engaged brand building to earn the sale. Done right, it sells. Done free, it fails.
The focus of in-store electronic signage should be almost exclusively on the shopper. Anything else is misguided.
What do shoppers want, especially when they are in the store? In my experience they have very little need to hear about the brand, unless the brand message is tied to something useful. Usually they want some information about a product or a line that they are interested in. Unfortunately, in store product information is woeful in almost all stores, even consumer electronics stores.
How does it work?
What is it made out of?
Who made it?
What does it go with?
What are the key features that make it different?
How long will it last?
How do I care for it?
What are the costs to own it?
How is rated by independent research groups?
Where is the product designer going with this item?
Product marketers, if you use your new displays and interactive gadgets to provide this type of useful information, sales will increase. And, yes, build your brand in the background, unobtrusively.
If we are talking about the digital signage medium in general, I believe that it is not only a brand building and a sales building medium, but it can be a source of entertainment while waiting on longer-than-expected checkout lines, and the sign can be an interactive medium for actual sales and information gathering activities things. I think digital signage is one of the new, exciting, and promising developments into which retailers should put some of their thinking and R&D money.
We live in a diverse marketing world that allows for various kudos to be granted for many different objectives and there, by sooth, our competitive needs and structures, but each reward has a certain value. Just as the purpose of a business is to make a profit so it can sustain itself, the purpose of promoting products once they in the stores is a “sales lift.” While building brand value is truly important, recognition by the Madison Avenue fraternity for GRP value is the next best thing to being able to move products into consumers baskets. True, brand building and “sales lifting” go hand-in-hand but without a continued sales force – with results – the recognition plaque on the living room is just that – a plaque.
Some marketers push “brand building” instead of “sales” because deep down they don’t know how to build sales more productively. So they go for the “easier goal”: gross rating points. The accusation: it’s easier to buy an audience than get an audience to buy. It would be surprising if in-store media were solely for branding or sales, not a mixture of both.
As a Trade Marketer by profession, I am always slanted to take the side of increased sales lift! This is surely a result of my training and a point of view that in-store investments need to deliver increased sales lift and reach a return on investment hurdle rate.
I also think that there are ways that these types of tools can be used to grow brand equity with the consumer but the advertising message must be tailored to be an inclusionary (not a primary) focus of the in-store advertising. This might be as simple as including the brand’s tag line or product claim to fame in the copy.
With time pressures faced by consumers today, the last thing an advertiser might want is to be viewed negatively as a time-waster or invader of privacy in the shopping environment…I think that leading retailers will also be sensitive to this risk.
Is anyone listening to what the shopper has to say? This is a huge opportunity for many brands and retailers to become jointly involved in testing, listening and learning. Smart brands will apply the learning appropriately.
The practice of effective in-store marketing and promotion has for many years been rooted in the fact that you can indeed combine equity building messages with promotional offers. Fitting the message to the medium is the challenge, but the opportunity is to let the shoppers help us get it right.
This is the same, old “whose store is it anyway?” argument. My answer is – the consumers’. The cross purpose of brand building versus sales building will not solve the problem. Both have value and neither is the optimum answer. One should look outside the retail food industry for a better answer.
Apparel retailers have used in-store video to create images and moods which enhance shopping and thus sales. Home improvement has used video to teach and educate. Here is how to do it and this is what you need. In-store video should improve the shopping experience, not just sell.
In its truest embodiment, in-store media includes everything down to the labels on the products. Each is a medium or, in its plural form, part of the media. Every product screams at us from the shelf, and that’s where the real battle for consumer attention takes place. Everything else is simply ancillary. Shoppers visit stores to choose products from shelves. Period. Rambunctious perimeter messages may be somewhat entertaining (or distracting), but don’t support the shopper’s primary objective.
The two schools of thought regarding technologically new forms of in-store communication are these: 1.) Promote stuff that’s sold in the store or, 2.) Promote stuff and services not sold in the store. Option #1 is far more constricting for retailers, demanding PFP (that stands for Pay For Performance). PFP can be manifested as anything from warehouse transfers to traditional ad support to item sales velocity. In other words, this type of support must be tangibly earned by the retailer. Option #2 is like traditional TV (as previously mentioned by the author), relying on measured or extrapolated exposures to generate GRP numbers.
Retailers encourage both of the above options by selling advertising to manufacturers and service providers. In fact, supermarket retailers usually make more bottom-line dollars from this practice than from selling stuff to you and me. From weekly newspaper screeds to the coupons on the backs of register tapes, everything can be had for a price. Thus, retailers will sell ad space to anyone who can pay. Their objective for these new media is to cash in, regardless of the objectives of the medium or the advertisers. Sorry, but this diametrically disagrees with Phillip Straniero’s comments about retailers being sensitive to the risk of wasting shoppers’ time or invading their privacy. Simply isn’t true.
In-store or at home, consumer impressions are cheap and probably worth less than we pay for them.
But the shopper media environment offers layers of higher value for brands – measurable interactions, purchases and repeat purchase behavior – that should be more valuable than gold to brands.
Don’t let the glowing screen fool you. This is not TV. Shoppers view in-store media on their feet, in a distracting, highly-stimulating environment, while engaged in a utilitarian, decision-intensive chore. If we deliver and document customer actions, ranging from “show me more information” on up to loyal behavior, we should expect brands to pay lavishly.
So the burden lies with retailers and the networks they host to deliver provable results that go way beyond GRPs and a good bit farther than promotional lift. Both are necessary, but only measures of actual short-term and long-term consumer behavior will deliver the full promise of shopper media.
Yes, yes, and yes! In-store digital media is about sales, AND brand building, AND entertainment for the shopper (particularly when you’re talking about waiting in line).
But the implementation costs should be justified by the sales lift alone. If you can get enough value out of your implementation from the promotional opportunities to justify the investment, then the rest – “soft” benefits from a business case perspective – are bonus.
The thing to remember is that in-store media can’t be 100% ads 100% of the time – you need other content to break it up. That’s where branding and entertainment come in.
Having media or advertising people debate what the role “ought” to be is irrelevant in today’s world. As Anne said earlier, what do the consumers see, say and buy?
My limited study indicated that consumers watch the in-store screens an average of 15 seconds and the lift in sales was associated with the content of the short piece.
In-store promotions can be used for a variety of goals, depending upon how the message is created and whether customers pay attention.
I believe that the primary reason sales lift is the dominant use of in-store media is that the brand objective (at the retailer level) has already been met. The consumer has already chosen to shop there, and the beneficial value of reinforcing the belief system through additional brand message delivery is relatively low – particularly when compared to the opportunity cost of using that time and space for an objective NOT met.
If the retail brand objective isn’t sustained by the shopping experience, using in-line screens to deliver it isn’t going to change the overall consumer affect. Too many experiential variables are already in play, with much greater impact.
From the CPG point of view, it’s a myopic tendency to ignore the reality of those “eyeballs”. Whether the consumer has already made a point in time purchase, most categories are characterized by multiple purchases over a relatively short time frame. Using in-store media to deliver brand messages, ultimately, makes more sense than simply using it to drive sales. From the CPG point of view, you really don’t care where the consumer buys your product. If they shop multiple stores (most do) and your brand assortment is available in most locations (most are) then you are reaching your target consumer. I know….preaching to the choir.
My take on this is to reinvent the content so that it accomplishes both purposes. If the product being presented manifests the brand message (and shouldn’t it?), it is possible to script the content so that both product specific messages and brand reinforcement are delivered. If the brand positioning has nothing to do with the product benefits, you have a bigger problem than how to use in-store media properly.
There is only one way to answer this question definitively, and that is to test. We could run an in-store TV campaign in one retailer and measure the change in sales in that retailer and all similar retailers in the market. The hypothesis is that people shop multiple stores and we should see a change in behavior (i.e. brand switch, new trial or additional use) across all of their shopping trips. In conjunction, conduct a pre and post on brand awareness and key equity measures. Until that happens, we can only speculate.
We have successfully deployed two of the largest narrowcast networks in North America, and it is safe to say that the decision to embrace digital signage was firmly rooted in its ability to substitute for other technologies that were already in place (POP, Co-op, Branding). The decision was an evolution in existing corporate culture rather than a revolution driven by promises of new co-op dollars and sales lift (though there has been an abundance of both.)
It is important to remember that the necessary “change-agents” with their necks on the line in a digital signage deployment include departments that are not rewarded or motivated by customer satisfaction or advertising relevance. These are the behind-the-screen folks that are overworked, underappreciated and get blasted if a newly approved in-store system slows down, goes offline or otherwise generates displeasure…and though they never have the ability to “buy” the system, they can make it next to impossible for anyone else to. This fact just reinforces the status-quo mentality that pervades the decision-making process.
The challenge for those of us that believe in digital signage is to help our clients justify a deployment on evolutionary grounds so that they are positioned to easily experiment with, and realize, the expanded benefits of future revolutionary uses.
In today’s hectic consumer world, it has been reported that shoppers prefer to get ‘in and out’ of the grocery store. Probably, the only segment of consumers who may be different are the senior adults.
Let’s assume the shoppers of a supermarket are notified of a new line of CPG products, or meals from the kitchens of the Chef Shoppe, before they go to the food and goods outlet. Has research by the retailer and advertiser shown that a brand commercial will be of value?
Like most situations, if the advertisers can’t secure enough commercial exposures of their brand via the home, why do we think the exposure will be any better in a supermarket? There may be a possibility to use the video screens as a reminder to buy. But it would be difficult for a CPG brand’s commercials to be seen, or partially viewed, in almost any retail environment…and less so in a supermarket. And, then, does such a brand’s commercial selling message to purchase penetrate the consumer’s mind at the supermarket… during a jammed day of needs and activities?
There are better ways to utilize the brand’s advertising and consumer promotion budget. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
I think customers respond well to LCD displays in stores. Because of the new technology, I’m always observing customers huddling around these screens, especially when they are mounted on endcaps with new merchandise. A large grocery chain here in Canada has taken it a step further and has installed screens at the checkouts so as the customer watches the order being tallied up, they are also shown promo material. In this case, this chain plugs its loyalty program and actually shows how many points can add up as the order is pulled through the scanner. These screens are great at both tasks and can really help explain new products or promotions that are going on at the time.
One recommendation I made to a client was to provide an interactive information kiosk at the front entrance where customers can look up store directories or even bridal and newborn registries. The cost of these screens has come down substantially so implementing an LCD program is not as expensive as it seems and can provide an invaluable marketing tool to any retailer.
The questions being raised here are an important dimension, but “in-the-store” is almost a meaningless concept, without a consideration of the microenvironment of the store. Would anyone ask the question of whether they should advertise in the Chicago market without considering to whom and with what media?
Inside the store is NOT an amorphous mass, but a great number of distinctive locations, generally very poorly understood, even by people spending hundreds of millions of dollars to deploy “solutions” there. This has led to tragic failures of in-store media in the past (the 90’s) and simply better technology won’t save the day today, although the continuing weakening of mass media does lower the bar for all competitive media, including in-store.
A simple example of the microcosms in the store is that some aisles may get 5% of the shoppers down them, and others may get 80% down them. And the reasons shoppers are going down an aisle is most often that that aisle leads to someplace they want to get to (the other end).
These are the “inconvenient truths” that are being ignored as too complex, background noise or whatever. Unless people become as astute at evaluating in-store locations as they are outside the store (neighborhood, city, region) locations, we are looking at another incipient train wreck. I don’t find it fascinating, but deplorable.
The answer is not a blanket solution and is determined solely by the objectives of the in-store media project. It would be ideal if we could say that in-store media is for sales lift only and that when executed properly it will return “x” on investment. It would also be nice to be able not require the proof in the numbers and evaluate success solely on whether it improved a customer’s identity with the brand. Although we should perhaps ask, “Is it really possible to conduct a transaction without somehow affecting brand perception?”
In trying to clearly define, “What should in-store digital media be used for?,” it is often lost what the real benefit of in-store digital media is – that being the flexibility it has as an informational and communications tool. The fact that the medium provides the possibility of two-way communication with the customer and real time data about impact at the time and place where the purchase is made is critical. Marketers may be better suited to ask, “What can a digital in-store network do to teach us more about our customers and the shifts in their behaviors based upon the time, the place, and the type of message we are conveying?” Or perhaps, “What questions could we answer about our brand with the tool of an in-store media network?”
When aligned with the goals of the brand’s entire marketing mix and used skillfully, I believe that the medium provides the flexibility to cater to the needs of the marketer and do all of the above when asked.
I would have thought marketing/advertising best practices will dictate that every marketing/corporate communication must be measured for its sales, branding and customer relations effect. These three elements get affected by every action… whether the effects are immediate, shorter term or longer term.
The direct response effects of store digital media will of course be to promote sales, but it will inevitably have other effects which needs to be considered both in planning, execution and monitoring stages.
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Building brand and building sales are not mutually exclusive endeavors. True brand building should have as its end result a lift in sales.
Hey Laura,
I get asked this exact question all the time, and after working on both brand-building and sales-boosting projects, I’ve come to a conclusion that now seems pretty obvious: neither the medium nor the technology are sufficient to direct a retailer/advertiser to choose branding over sales lift, or vice versa.
If you’re working with a big box retailer that uses posters and POP displays to sell product, they will expect the digital signs to do exactly the same thing. They’re just dynamic posters, after all. However, take the same exact technology and put it into a high-end fashion boutique (where art photos and lifestyle shots of happy people in expensive clothing adorn the walls) and the screens will be used for branding and improving the in-store experience, because that’s what the static fixtures are already doing.
Can digital signs be used to help a retailer or advertiser expand into new advertising strategies and techniques? Absolutely. But those who install digital signage networks and think they’ll suddenly be able to flip their retail marketing and merchandising strategies on their heads need to realize that it’s just another medium for the kinds of creative things that they’ve been doing all along.
Building sales and building brand should share equally in any media model. Engaged interactive in-store digital media introduces an opportunity to move beyond legacy solutions which have become noise in the shopper’s mind. Building sales – not just case movement – but true incremental sales, results from a solving shopper’s problem better than the competition. That problem might be boredom with their current routine, a health related issue, or a need to be entertained.
Pitching in-store media through flat screen displays for the sole purpose of selling more stuff may sound like a great idea to some sales guy struggling to hit his numbers, but from a shopper’s perspective…? What’s in it for them?
Digital media can be about sustainable, authentic, engaged brand building to earn the sale. Done right, it sells. Done free, it fails.
The focus of in-store electronic signage should be almost exclusively on the shopper. Anything else is misguided.
What do shoppers want, especially when they are in the store? In my experience they have very little need to hear about the brand, unless the brand message is tied to something useful. Usually they want some information about a product or a line that they are interested in. Unfortunately, in store product information is woeful in almost all stores, even consumer electronics stores.
How does it work?
What is it made out of?
Who made it?
What does it go with?
What are the key features that make it different?
How long will it last?
How do I care for it?
What are the costs to own it?
How is rated by independent research groups?
Where is the product designer going with this item?
Product marketers, if you use your new displays and interactive gadgets to provide this type of useful information, sales will increase. And, yes, build your brand in the background, unobtrusively.
If we are talking about the digital signage medium in general, I believe that it is not only a brand building and a sales building medium, but it can be a source of entertainment while waiting on longer-than-expected checkout lines, and the sign can be an interactive medium for actual sales and information gathering activities things. I think digital signage is one of the new, exciting, and promising developments into which retailers should put some of their thinking and R&D money.
We live in a diverse marketing world that allows for various kudos to be granted for many different objectives and there, by sooth, our competitive needs and structures, but each reward has a certain value. Just as the purpose of a business is to make a profit so it can sustain itself, the purpose of promoting products once they in the stores is a “sales lift.” While building brand value is truly important, recognition by the Madison Avenue fraternity for GRP value is the next best thing to being able to move products into consumers baskets. True, brand building and “sales lifting” go hand-in-hand but without a continued sales force – with results – the recognition plaque on the living room is just that – a plaque.
Some marketers push “brand building” instead of “sales” because deep down they don’t know how to build sales more productively. So they go for the “easier goal”: gross rating points. The accusation: it’s easier to buy an audience than get an audience to buy. It would be surprising if in-store media were solely for branding or sales, not a mixture of both.
As a Trade Marketer by profession, I am always slanted to take the side of increased sales lift! This is surely a result of my training and a point of view that in-store investments need to deliver increased sales lift and reach a return on investment hurdle rate.
I also think that there are ways that these types of tools can be used to grow brand equity with the consumer but the advertising message must be tailored to be an inclusionary (not a primary) focus of the in-store advertising. This might be as simple as including the brand’s tag line or product claim to fame in the copy.
With time pressures faced by consumers today, the last thing an advertiser might want is to be viewed negatively as a time-waster or invader of privacy in the shopping environment…I think that leading retailers will also be sensitive to this risk.
Is anyone listening to what the shopper has to say? This is a huge opportunity for many brands and retailers to become jointly involved in testing, listening and learning. Smart brands will apply the learning appropriately.
The practice of effective in-store marketing and promotion has for many years been rooted in the fact that you can indeed combine equity building messages with promotional offers. Fitting the message to the medium is the challenge, but the opportunity is to let the shoppers help us get it right.
This is the same, old “whose store is it anyway?” argument. My answer is – the consumers’. The cross purpose of brand building versus sales building will not solve the problem. Both have value and neither is the optimum answer. One should look outside the retail food industry for a better answer.
Apparel retailers have used in-store video to create images and moods which enhance shopping and thus sales. Home improvement has used video to teach and educate. Here is how to do it and this is what you need. In-store video should improve the shopping experience, not just sell.
In its truest embodiment, in-store media includes everything down to the labels on the products. Each is a medium or, in its plural form, part of the media. Every product screams at us from the shelf, and that’s where the real battle for consumer attention takes place. Everything else is simply ancillary. Shoppers visit stores to choose products from shelves. Period. Rambunctious perimeter messages may be somewhat entertaining (or distracting), but don’t support the shopper’s primary objective.
The two schools of thought regarding technologically new forms of in-store communication are these: 1.) Promote stuff that’s sold in the store or, 2.) Promote stuff and services not sold in the store. Option #1 is far more constricting for retailers, demanding PFP (that stands for Pay For Performance). PFP can be manifested as anything from warehouse transfers to traditional ad support to item sales velocity. In other words, this type of support must be tangibly earned by the retailer. Option #2 is like traditional TV (as previously mentioned by the author), relying on measured or extrapolated exposures to generate GRP numbers.
Retailers encourage both of the above options by selling advertising to manufacturers and service providers. In fact, supermarket retailers usually make more bottom-line dollars from this practice than from selling stuff to you and me. From weekly newspaper screeds to the coupons on the backs of register tapes, everything can be had for a price. Thus, retailers will sell ad space to anyone who can pay. Their objective for these new media is to cash in, regardless of the objectives of the medium or the advertisers. Sorry, but this diametrically disagrees with Phillip Straniero’s comments about retailers being sensitive to the risk of wasting shoppers’ time or invading their privacy. Simply isn’t true.
In-store or at home, consumer impressions are cheap and probably worth less than we pay for them.
But the shopper media environment offers layers of higher value for brands – measurable interactions, purchases and repeat purchase behavior – that should be more valuable than gold to brands.
Don’t let the glowing screen fool you. This is not TV. Shoppers view in-store media on their feet, in a distracting, highly-stimulating environment, while engaged in a utilitarian, decision-intensive chore. If we deliver and document customer actions, ranging from “show me more information” on up to loyal behavior, we should expect brands to pay lavishly.
So the burden lies with retailers and the networks they host to deliver provable results that go way beyond GRPs and a good bit farther than promotional lift. Both are necessary, but only measures of actual short-term and long-term consumer behavior will deliver the full promise of shopper media.
Yes, yes, and yes! In-store digital media is about sales, AND brand building, AND entertainment for the shopper (particularly when you’re talking about waiting in line).
But the implementation costs should be justified by the sales lift alone. If you can get enough value out of your implementation from the promotional opportunities to justify the investment, then the rest – “soft” benefits from a business case perspective – are bonus.
The thing to remember is that in-store media can’t be 100% ads 100% of the time – you need other content to break it up. That’s where branding and entertainment come in.
Having media or advertising people debate what the role “ought” to be is irrelevant in today’s world. As Anne said earlier, what do the consumers see, say and buy?
My limited study indicated that consumers watch the in-store screens an average of 15 seconds and the lift in sales was associated with the content of the short piece.
In-store promotions can be used for a variety of goals, depending upon how the message is created and whether customers pay attention.
I believe that the primary reason sales lift is the dominant use of in-store media is that the brand objective (at the retailer level) has already been met. The consumer has already chosen to shop there, and the beneficial value of reinforcing the belief system through additional brand message delivery is relatively low – particularly when compared to the opportunity cost of using that time and space for an objective NOT met.
If the retail brand objective isn’t sustained by the shopping experience, using in-line screens to deliver it isn’t going to change the overall consumer affect. Too many experiential variables are already in play, with much greater impact.
From the CPG point of view, it’s a myopic tendency to ignore the reality of those “eyeballs”. Whether the consumer has already made a point in time purchase, most categories are characterized by multiple purchases over a relatively short time frame. Using in-store media to deliver brand messages, ultimately, makes more sense than simply using it to drive sales. From the CPG point of view, you really don’t care where the consumer buys your product. If they shop multiple stores (most do) and your brand assortment is available in most locations (most are) then you are reaching your target consumer. I know….preaching to the choir.
My take on this is to reinvent the content so that it accomplishes both purposes. If the product being presented manifests the brand message (and shouldn’t it?), it is possible to script the content so that both product specific messages and brand reinforcement are delivered. If the brand positioning has nothing to do with the product benefits, you have a bigger problem than how to use in-store media properly.
There is only one way to answer this question definitively, and that is to test. We could run an in-store TV campaign in one retailer and measure the change in sales in that retailer and all similar retailers in the market. The hypothesis is that people shop multiple stores and we should see a change in behavior (i.e. brand switch, new trial or additional use) across all of their shopping trips. In conjunction, conduct a pre and post on brand awareness and key equity measures. Until that happens, we can only speculate.
We have successfully deployed two of the largest narrowcast networks in North America, and it is safe to say that the decision to embrace digital signage was firmly rooted in its ability to substitute for other technologies that were already in place (POP, Co-op, Branding). The decision was an evolution in existing corporate culture rather than a revolution driven by promises of new co-op dollars and sales lift (though there has been an abundance of both.)
It is important to remember that the necessary “change-agents” with their necks on the line in a digital signage deployment include departments that are not rewarded or motivated by customer satisfaction or advertising relevance. These are the behind-the-screen folks that are overworked, underappreciated and get blasted if a newly approved in-store system slows down, goes offline or otherwise generates displeasure…and though they never have the ability to “buy” the system, they can make it next to impossible for anyone else to. This fact just reinforces the status-quo mentality that pervades the decision-making process.
The challenge for those of us that believe in digital signage is to help our clients justify a deployment on evolutionary grounds so that they are positioned to easily experiment with, and realize, the expanded benefits of future revolutionary uses.
In today’s hectic consumer world, it has been reported that shoppers prefer to get ‘in and out’ of the grocery store. Probably, the only segment of consumers who may be different are the senior adults.
Let’s assume the shoppers of a supermarket are notified of a new line of CPG products, or meals from the kitchens of the Chef Shoppe, before they go to the food and goods outlet. Has research by the retailer and advertiser shown that a brand commercial will be of value?
Like most situations, if the advertisers can’t secure enough commercial exposures of their brand via the home, why do we think the exposure will be any better in a supermarket? There may be a possibility to use the video screens as a reminder to buy. But it would be difficult for a CPG brand’s commercials to be seen, or partially viewed, in almost any retail environment…and less so in a supermarket. And, then, does such a brand’s commercial selling message to purchase penetrate the consumer’s mind at the supermarket… during a jammed day of needs and activities?
There are better ways to utilize the brand’s advertising and consumer promotion budget. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
I think customers respond well to LCD displays in stores. Because of the new technology, I’m always observing customers huddling around these screens, especially when they are mounted on endcaps with new merchandise. A large grocery chain here in Canada has taken it a step further and has installed screens at the checkouts so as the customer watches the order being tallied up, they are also shown promo material. In this case, this chain plugs its loyalty program and actually shows how many points can add up as the order is pulled through the scanner. These screens are great at both tasks and can really help explain new products or promotions that are going on at the time.
One recommendation I made to a client was to provide an interactive information kiosk at the front entrance where customers can look up store directories or even bridal and newborn registries. The cost of these screens has come down substantially so implementing an LCD program is not as expensive as it seems and can provide an invaluable marketing tool to any retailer.
The questions being raised here are an important dimension, but “in-the-store” is almost a meaningless concept, without a consideration of the microenvironment of the store. Would anyone ask the question of whether they should advertise in the Chicago market without considering to whom and with what media?
Inside the store is NOT an amorphous mass, but a great number of distinctive locations, generally very poorly understood, even by people spending hundreds of millions of dollars to deploy “solutions” there. This has led to tragic failures of in-store media in the past (the 90’s) and simply better technology won’t save the day today, although the continuing weakening of mass media does lower the bar for all competitive media, including in-store.
A simple example of the microcosms in the store is that some aisles may get 5% of the shoppers down them, and others may get 80% down them. And the reasons shoppers are going down an aisle is most often that that aisle leads to someplace they want to get to (the other end).
These are the “inconvenient truths” that are being ignored as too complex, background noise or whatever. Unless people become as astute at evaluating in-store locations as they are outside the store (neighborhood, city, region) locations, we are looking at another incipient train wreck. I don’t find it fascinating, but deplorable.
The answer is not a blanket solution and is determined solely by the objectives of the in-store media project. It would be ideal if we could say that in-store media is for sales lift only and that when executed properly it will return “x” on investment. It would also be nice to be able not require the proof in the numbers and evaluate success solely on whether it improved a customer’s identity with the brand. Although we should perhaps ask, “Is it really possible to conduct a transaction without somehow affecting brand perception?”
In trying to clearly define, “What should in-store digital media be used for?,” it is often lost what the real benefit of in-store digital media is – that being the flexibility it has as an informational and communications tool. The fact that the medium provides the possibility of two-way communication with the customer and real time data about impact at the time and place where the purchase is made is critical. Marketers may be better suited to ask, “What can a digital in-store network do to teach us more about our customers and the shifts in their behaviors based upon the time, the place, and the type of message we are conveying?” Or perhaps, “What questions could we answer about our brand with the tool of an in-store media network?”
When aligned with the goals of the brand’s entire marketing mix and used skillfully, I believe that the medium provides the flexibility to cater to the needs of the marketer and do all of the above when asked.
I would have thought marketing/advertising best practices will dictate that every marketing/corporate communication must be measured for its sales, branding and customer relations effect. These three elements get affected by every action… whether the effects are immediate, shorter term or longer term.
The direct response effects of store digital media will of course be to promote sales, but it will inevitably have other effects which needs to be considered both in planning, execution and monitoring stages.