…on Retail Media
If you’re reading this, it’s likely you’re aware of, or intrigued by the concept of retail media. If you’re aware, feel free to read on and fact-check me! If you’re intrigued, perhaps I can paint a clearer picture of the concept for you.
Simply, retail media brings together the value of data a retailer holds about their consumers with media inventory. There are a multitude of tentacles from there – the type of data, the type of inventory, the ability to “close the loop” (ie, report on actual impact of investment), and more all comes into play. If we’re keeping it simple, just remember that retailer data + media inventory = Retail Media.
With a bit more explanation, think about how much your favorite retail outlet knows about you. Perhaps you have their app, visit their stores, ship items to your home, share your phone number and birthday for loyalty benefits – you get the picture. The leading retailers aren’t just sending you a 10% off birthday offer – they’re intelligently reading, parcing and building databases about all the “yous” there are, and one application is retail media.
Using all that data – in a privacy-compliant, completely non-identifiable way – coupled with various media channels enables retail media to exist. Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) companies that don’t sell their products directly to consumers, rely on their retail partners to help them understand more about what will drive sales and who will purchase.
Advanced retailers are actively providing a few “bright and shiny” upgrades. One is closed-loop measurement – where the retailer can measure and share true impact of media investment on business outcomes. Meaning – if you put in $5, the outcome generated $25 in return on ad spend (ROAS). Another is called a clean room – this isn’t the kind your parents requested of you at the age of 12. A data clean room is a privacy-compliant space where retailer and CPG can both push data to understand how much of their individual audiences are the same people, to create a more impactful audience targeting strategy.
One component that is imperative, but not always top-of-mind is creative. How advertising looks and feels to consumers is a major consideration. Ensuring brand standards for both retailer and CPG alike are respected, without creating logo soup in a 300x250 ad can be a challenge, but one that has to be solved-for, ideally in a scalable fashion.
If you’re a retailer, a CPG, or simply an interested party, I’d love to chat about how to enhance your approach to retail media. There are so many choices and each one offers it’s own benefits and challenges – because I’ve seen many of them first-hand, I can help navigate the space to amplify your business.
