Wrapping up Last-Minute Holiday Shopping

Have you finished your holiday shopping yet?  This week I wrote about my experience finding last minute holiday gifts and stocking stuffers at a few dollar stores, CVS and Walgreens. You can read about it here.

The Grinch Who Stole Retail Marketing Effectiveness

Barely a week removed from Black Friday and just days from Cyber Monday, retail marketers are already checking just how “black” Black Friday was and are adding up their earnings from Cyber Monday.  They are also reflecting on how their marketing efforts resonated with their customer: what they did right this year and what needs to be changed moving forward.

Like any retail marketer, I wait with eager anticipation during the days leading up to Black Friday so it is no surprise that last Friday morning, I arrived at my local upscale mall just as it opened. With camera and notepad in hand, I was eager to take several pictures and jot down my observations, but within a short time, disappointment set in. 

There were plenty of creatively designed window displays filled with festive holiday colors, artificial snow and cozy looking scenes. But after seeing what retailers promoted on digital channels,  lacking was much of a sign of coordinated marketing efforts between digital marketers and in-store marketers within the same brand.

The lack of coordination reminds me of the story line from Dr. Seuss’s The Grinch Who Stole Christmas The Grinch was inspired to ruin Christmas for the citizens of Whoville because of all the “noise, noise, noise” of Christmas. He then schemed and then concocted a dastardly plan to ruin Christmas for all.  Do your holiday marketing efforts reflect more “noise” than they do a peaceful coordinated harmony?   If not, below are tips that will help you: 

1.       Integrate online, digital and in-store channels.

If I had looked at your brand’s website, Facebook page and other digital channels, prior to Black Friday, would I have seen an incentive to shop on Black Friday or would I only have been encouraged to buy online?  Offering digital coupons - redeemable in-store – is a good way to get traffic to the store.  Additional discounts could be offered by encouraging customers to register with your brand, thus giving your CRM valuable data to be mined later.

 

Another thought would be to harvest the power of social media. What if you offered in-store deals if your customers and a handful of their friends checked in on Foursquare at your store on Black Friday? Other possibilities include allowing in-store customers to scan bar and QR codes so that they can get additional information on the product or brand.  With all of these ideas, in-store signing is essential to communicate a cohesive message to the customer. 

2.       Does your cause draw customers in-store?

Even if your cash registers are ringing at a higher rate over the holidays, don’t let your cause marketing efforts fall by the wayside.  A worthy cause, promoted seamlessly across multiple channels appeals to a customers emotions and brings them back time and again. 

3.       What can we learn from in other retail segments?

Retail segments all have their strengths and I am a big proponent of learning from our retail counterparts. The quick-service restaurant industry, for example, has a tremendous advantage over other retailers when it comes to omnichanelling their marketing efforts. Have you taken a look at how your colleagues in the restaurant industry market to their customers? While the target demographics for a quick-service restaurant customer differ from that of a high-end retailer, one can still learn from their overall strategy. For example, in this blog note Subway’s efforts were dialed in when they effectively “omnichannelized” their marketing efforts. 

Reality check

Are these ideas worth some additional thought?  Or when reality sets in do you think that putting these ideas into action is insurmountable in light of the challenges you already have in the retail marketing process?  Some of these challenges are addressed in these excellent blogs Curing the Fragmentitous Blues  and Top 5 KPIs for At-Store Marketing.  

Happy holidays and happy retail marketing!

 

How to Destroy Your Brand with Poor At-Store Marketing

In the brief history of this blog, I have taken occasion to highlight retailers which do a great job of connecting to the customer via spectacular at-store marketing. Unfortunately there are plenty of retailers that do a poor or inadequate job. I believe it is necessary to call them out as it helps us learn what not to do.

1. Confusing and Cluttered Environment
In a sense, it is understandable why marketers want to promote all of their products at the same time. But the result is often a cluttered environment which results in a confused or overwhelmed customer - such as the examples we see here from with Dairy Queen and Hartz Chicken Buffet.

Dairy Queen

Hartz Chicken Buffet

Instead of this POP clutter, concentrate on promoting your core brand products, other items will sell just fine around the main items.

2. Non-distinct POP
One example of retailers that fail to set their brands apart is auto parts retailers.  Take a look at the photos below and see if you can tell me at first glance which one is Advance Auto, which is O’Reilly and which is Auto Zone.

Couldn’t tell?  Neither could I. It would be better for auto parts retailers to be unique with their signage. For instance, develop a consistent theme or aesthetic that is unique to your brand. Utilize this aesthetic in all of your marketing channels (including at-store marketing) to ensure that consumers will recognize your marketing and associate it with your brand at every touch-point. Good branding, along with a well-thought-out marketing strategy, inspires loyalty in consumers.

3. Hastily made POP 

Nothing is worse than hand-written POP that is hastily written and placed.  While this may be effective for moving merchandise quickly, it has lasting detrimental effects on overall brand image. Subconsciously, it devalues the brand in the minds of the consumer, therefore hasty POP may actually drive customers away from your stores. Ultimately it screams to consumers that there was no strategy or thought put into this signage. If this grocer really thought through their at-store marketing, they would have known there would be leftover Halloween candy. Why not plan for this well in advance and have professional-looking signage and marketing messages ready?

 These have been just a few examples of poor execution in at-store marketing.  In a day when retailers are fighting tooth-and-nail for customer loyalty, brands can ill-afford to be sloppy.  Marketers, have you seen at-store marketing that makes you cringe?  On the other side of the coin, what retailers inspire you to be loyal to their brand?

Subway rises to the QSR Omnichannel Marketing Challenge

Multichannel marketing is defined as the use of many different marketing channels to reach a customer. Better than multichannel marketing is omnichannel marketing which is using one-upping multichannel marketing and linking several channels together to form a cohesive message.   These terms and definitions are simple enough and have been on the front of marketers’ minds for several years.  Why though is it still not practiced as cohesively as it could be, specifically in the quick-service restaurant (QSR) world?   In fact it is so rare in QSR’s that I find it refreshing when it is practiced well.

Thinking about this, I did a check-up on a few QSR’s.  One chain that stood out as a great example is  Subway. They are doing a stellar job promoting their latest limited time offer, the Tuscan Chicken Melt.  Here are several of my observations about what I feel they are doing right.

Web page

On the web, Subway effectively captures the attention of the visitor by splashing the Tuscan Chicken Melt front-and-center on within seconds of opening the web page.  They also effectively engage visitors by throwing out a brief teaser to the promo (above) before the heart of the promo is shown on the web (below). 

Web page

Thirdly, Subway encourages additional engagement with the promo by offering a reason to engage with it and the brand by offering  a grand prize of a trip to Tuscany, Italy.  Clicking on the circled icon takes the visitor to a second marketing channel, Twitter.  Here, visitors are encouraged to upload a photo of the sandwich, along with a Diet Coke and use a Twitter hashtag to enter the contest.

Twitter

Changing over to the next channel – Facebook  - Subway encourages additional participation by highlighting not only the sandwich but what appears to be a photo lodging the contest winner will enjoy.



Facebook



On these three channels  - the web, Facebook and Twitter - Subway clearly does a superb job. But the real test was still to come as I had yet to visit restaurant in person – and this is where I find most restaurants fall short. (I’ll get to why in a bit.)  So, I drove to my local restaurant and, as I pulled in to a parking space, I noticed that they were off to a good start: front-and-center, looking right at me, was a large window decal announcing the Tuscan Chicken Melt. 

Window Decal

As I walked into the restaurant, I was equally impressed with several pieces of POP signage advertising the Tuscan Chicken Melt: on the tops of tables, by the register, above the chips basket, on the beverage cooler and on the menu board.  

Chips basket



Menu Board

Based on this evidence Subway clearly did a great job of promoting the Tuscan Chicken Melt through multiple channels. They also connected the dots for omnichannel marketing as they gave customers an incentive to engage with the promotion on all of the above channels.  Not only that, but the visual of a smart or cell phone in several pieces gave visual clues about how to register for the Twitter contest. 

Let’s revisit the earlier question; why do many QSR’s successfully promote their offerings on all channels except the most important one (at-store)?  I have found that when corporate marketing seeks to get approval for at-store pieces, the process often becomes mired in cumbersome processes taking eight weeks or more, when it should be a one-month turnaround from idea creation to having signage at-store.  For that reason, many marketers throw up their hands in frustration and they end up refusing or not promoting specials well at-store.

But it doesn’t have to be this way: as there is a solution.  Read more about this on the links below:

Top 5 KPIs for At-Store Marketing

Curing the Fragmentitous Blues

QSR marketers, are you effectively promoting your offerings, using all available channels, and are they all tied together to form a cohesive, unified, and engaging message?  If not, what is hindering you from doing this?

Blurring the Lines in Retail Marketing

This week I had the terrific opportunity to write on our company blog about some of the challenges facing retailers today.  With so many retailers vying for the same consumer dollar and attention, how do we keep our marketing and strategic focus while pursuing new markets at the same time?  I hope you enjoy this blog.

The Silver Lining on the Golden Arches

This week I had the terrific opportunity to write on our company blog about some of the challenges facing retailers today.  With so many retailers vying for the same consumer dollar and attention, how do we keep our marketing and strategic focus while pursuing new markets at the same time?  I hope you enjoy this blog.

Approved: Foot Locker and NBA Stars Create a Buzz

It is no surprise that celebrity endorsements wield a powerful influence on the buying decisions of consumers. The Nielsen Company furthered the impact of this when they revealed in this study that “64 percent of adult U.S. Internet users who follow a celebrity also follow a brand – this means the celebrity follower is four times more likely to follow a brand than the average U.S. adult online.”

It is clear that Foot Locker understands this based on the media blitz they launched last week.  Here is a look at what Foot Locker did and how they used multiple channels to drive home their message.

Foot Locker enrolled the talents of NBA stars James Harden, Russell Westbrook, Kevin Love, Chris Bosh and Carmelo Anthony to humorously promote their clothing line. See one of the commercials here 

My personal favorite was this commercial featuring Carmelo Anthony and “Melo number 5” 

To engage fans even more and utilize humor in doing so, Foot Locker created a behind-the-scenes look at the commercials. Take a look at the commercials for a closer look.

 

 

Understanding that one marketing channel is not nearly sufficient to promote a product line, Foot Locker further drove home their message with social media via Facebook and Twitter. Note the use of humor in both.  

Foot Locker also utilized Twitter  to promote the product line by utilizing the hashtag,  #approved. Note also how the use of word approved fits nicely into their branding and matches their celebrity endorsement theme.

Foot Locker further drove home their message with tweets from the celebrities themselves to create more of a buzz about the clothing line and even partnered with @sportsnation on Twitter.

Only time will tell in how successful these ads will be in driving online and in-store sales for Foot Locker.  One thing is for sure though: Foot Locker put some serious strategy into the ads. If creating a buzz was their goal, they certainly have been successful: as one of the ads is already being talked about by ESPN as the best spot of the year.

Retailers, this Foot Locker example is just one on how marketers have successfully used celebrity endorsements to create emotion and motivate consumers to buy. More examples can be found here. 

As a retail marketer, have you used celebrities in your marketing efforts?  What was your strategy and thought process in doing this?  Did you utilize multiple marketing channels? Did you, like Foot Locker use a cohesive message and theme in your marketing? Have you ever brought celebrities in-store via celebrity cut-outs or other point-of-purchase marketing for an even more complete marketing effort?

How to Avoid Hitting a Sour Note with Your At-Store Marketing

This week I’ll look at a convenience store chain that really understands how to influence its customers via multiple marketing channels and how these channels crescendo in the at-store environment. Hopefully you’ll take away some ideas on how to better engage your retail customers.

If I asked you to come up with an example of a masterpiece what comes to mind? Usually it is something like a classic painting, opera or symphony. Is it possible for something common to be considered a masterpiece? One only need consider how Apple transformed the common computer to a work of art to answer this question.

Like the common computer, few would consider it possible for a convenience store to be considered a masterpiece. But that is exactly what I found when I visited a Sheetz convenience store (or as Sheetz calls it, a convenience restaurant). Retail marketers, I invite you to continue reading. Do you agree with my conclusions?

As I thought about Sheetz, and prior to my arrival at a store, I thought about what piqued my excitement about their brand - it was a number of factors, or channels, if you will.  I remember how Sheetz fans post fun pictures of their in-store experience on Facebook and how Twitter comments were genuine and full of passion. This was reinforced even further as on my way to a Sheetz as I spotted a billboard reflecting that same emotion on my way to their store.

To put it one way my pre in-store experience thus far had been like listening to a symphony. I had heard the string, horn, acoustic, and keyboard sections all tuning their instruments. They all sounded great by themselves, but what about together? As I approached the store, I studied their building for a moment, I thought about the great colors I saw, the café-style outdoor seating and the “MTO” (Made to Order) signage that made it feel more like a fast-casual restaurant than a c-store. 

As I swung open the door, all of those marketing channels came together, just like a crescendo in a well-orchestrated concert.  Here are some things I noticed that Sheetz did well:

·         Their fun “feel the love” theme was reflected well in-store with bright, visible signage with engaging messages

·         The similarity in their messages was striking. Notice the “2 for 99c” is both on their outdoor advertising and in-store

·         They had opportunities to reconnect with the brand via signage that highlighted social media and online specials

·         The nostalgic look was very consistent in their use of fonts, images, colors and store fixtures

·         Their self-service touch screen menu was easy to use and had POP which explained how to order

After my visit, I came to the conclusion that my experience at Sheetz was worthy of calling it a masterpiece as they executed their marketing efforts well in every channel and didn’t hit a sour note anywhere.  If you'd like other examples of c-stores that do a great job of marketing, see C-Stores: Breaking Bad Habits.

Retail marketers, does your brand connect on multiple channels?  What in-store marketing efforts have you employed that synched all channels together? How has this affected your in-store revenues and bottom line?

At-Store Marketing That Makes the Grade

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of writing about how creatively office supply retailers were going about drawing in back-to-school shoppers.  This week, I've expanded this and looked at a cross-section of retailers and their in-store back to school efforts. See At-Store Marketing That Makes the Grade via www.pointsmith.com

Office Supply Goes Back-to-School

For Retailers, back-to-school season is second only to holiday shopping season.  According to this National Retail Federation Survey, the average person with children in grades K-12 will spend $688.62 on their children, up $84.99 from last year.  Total back-to-school spending is expected to be $30.3 billion. 

This week I've taken a look at how office supply retailers are communicating to BTS shoppers.  How do you think they measured up?  What retail brands are your favorites for BTS?

http://www.pointsmith.com/blog/office-supply-goes-back-to-school/

Transparency in Engagement Marketing, Part 2

Last week, we partially defined engagement marketing and covered some examples of quick service restaurants and a convenience store chain that put it into practice.  This week we’ll look at a few more examples of how this strategy has worked well for others.  To further define engagement marketing Greg Ippolito, Creative Director of the engagement marketing agency; Annodyne, argues that traditional top-down marketing results, largely, in the production and communication of white noise. Whereas engagement marketing assumes a different approach:

“Think of a salesperson who walks up to you in a store. You tell him thanks, you’re okay, you’re just looking.  But he hovers and looms, finds a way to insert himself into your activity, and is a general annoyance. That’s what typical marketing feels like: intrusive and disruptive.  Engagement Marketing is the opposite. It’s a salesperson who hangs back and engages you if/when you need help. Who can sense what you want to do, and help you arrive at that decision.”  “Engagement Marketing done well, means connecting with audiences who want to hear from you, in relevant, meaningful, interesting ways.”

Domino’s used the power of engagement when in 2010 they reinvented themselves as they made public focus group comments about their pizzas. “Worst excuse for pizza I’ve ever had!”, “the sauce tastes like ketchup” and “totally void of flavor” were some of the comments they made public. Domino’s used these comments as a rallying cry when their CEO, Patrick Doyle stated; “You can either use negative comments to get you down or you can use them to excite you and energize your process and make it a better pizza, we chose the latter.” Everybody in this [headquarters] building, our job is to figure out how to best support them so that we reduce the time and energy that it takes to get done what they need to get done." Source 

Another form of practicing transparency in engagement marketing has been used by an industry as a whole.  Last fall the convenience store industry had a segment on the History Channels Modern Marvels series on convenience stores  In this fascinating piece, viewers were shown the behind the scenes of the convenience store industry.  We see not only the “c-store” industry history but also how the floor plan is methodically planned to optimize revenue in several “zones”.  Take a look at this and you’ll see how even handles on coolers are placed on either the left or right side of the cooler to direct traffic through other profitable c-store zones.

Engagement marketing works well for several reasons, these three being among them:

1.     As is highlighted in the Modern Marvels c-store segment, consumers like to think that they have the inside scoop on what really goes on behind the scenes. This satisfies the sense of curiosity that is indwelt in in all of us

2.     It has a tremendous positive effect on store level employees. What store employee doesn’t want to see his boss get his hands dirty and to have him or her show humility on national television?

3.     Third, it gives “the boss” great ideas to take back to corporate which he or she can then implement. This comes full circle when it is brought back to the store level.

Are you practicing engagement marketing with your consumer and store employees?  What best practices have you put in place, which have had a positive impact on sales, perception in the marketplace and on store employees? 

Transparency in Engagement Marketing, Part 1

“Why does your food look different in the advertising than what is in the store”?  This question was recently asked by a consumer and was answered by Hope Bagozzi, Director of Marketing, McDonald’s Canada.  Rather than brushing this question under the rug, McDonald’s seized upon the opportunity and used it to show how food photography  is produced and followed it up with an expose on how secret sauce is made. With a combined 5 million views on their You Tube videos it is easy to see that McDonald’s achieved marketing nirvana by practicing transparency in their marketing efforts.

What does it mean to be transparent in your marketing efforts?   Simply put, it is one of the best ways to practice engagement marketing.  While it is hard to find a concise definition of engagement marketing, it is best defined as:

Engagement Marketing: a marketing strategy that directly engages consumers and employees. It invites and encourages both to participate in the evolution of a brand.

In short, engagement marketing helps customers and store employees develop a relationship with the brand.

Here are some examples that have been used in the quick service restaurant and convenience store industry and why they work:

CBS’s hit series, Undercover Boss, has profiled many industries and has touched the Quick Service Restaurant and C-store industries.  In February, Undercover Boss profiled Checkers restaurants as they went behind the scenes with CEO Rick Silva. 

In one situation, Silva had a tense situation when he encountered a restaurant manager who was verbally abusing his employees.  Silva kept his cool, yet took action when he temporarily closed down the restaurant and rather than fire the manager, chose to have him retrained.  Throughout the piece, Silva showed his poise and humility when he admitted that he had a lot to learn as he had several “Lucille Ball” moments. This is exactly what consumer’s and employees like to see, a boss that freely admits he doesn’t know everything and one that takes decisive actions but treats others fairly.

In another episode of Undercover Boss, 7-Eleven seized on the opportunity to put their CEO, Joe DePinto on the front line.  He was first put on an orange 7-Eleven smock to handle rush hour at a busy store on Long Island. (See this link when DePinto, aka: “Danny” teams up with 18 year store veteran Delores.) DePinto then got to try his hand at making doughnuts in the corporate bakery in Baltimore and thirdly, distribute fresh food and sandwiches on the night shift in North Texas.  Since its premiere, DePinto's Undercover Boss segment has rerun twice on CBS and been picked up all over the world. Like other CEO’s featured on the show, DePinto gained a new appreciation for store-level employees:  "Our franchisees and our store managers are the ones who get it done every day with our customers.  

So what does a leading national franchise do when their focus group tells them that their product is “the worst they’ve ever had? We’ll look at this next week.  We’ll also further define engagement marketing in very practical terms.

Menu Adjectivity

Restaurant Marketers, when was the last time you optimized your menu descriptions? 

Roger Dooley, in his book, Brainfluence, makes this a point when he states, “Compelling, emotion-rich adjectives can give bland (menu) copy a major boost in effectiveness.” Notice how this “after” example invokes mouth-watering images that excite the palette? 

Before:   “Ham, egg & cheese on wheat bread sandwich”

After:  “Our Breakfast Power Sandwich starts with lean, hardwood-smoked ham and a freshly-cracked egg. Then we add Vermont white cheddar for its tangy sharpness.  Finally, we grill everything on our freshly baked whole grain bread to bring out the grains’ nutty, smooth flavors.”

Dooley states that adjectives “turn an average sandwich into a mouth-watering, tantalizing sales magnet:

Our Breakfast Power Sandwich starts with lean, hardwood-smoked ham and a freshly-cracked egg.  Then we add Vermont white cheddar [cheese] for its tangy sharpness. Finally we grill everything on our freshly-baked whole grain bread to bring out the grains’ nutty, smooth flavors. 

Further, Dooley points to this study where descriptive food labels “increased food sales by 27% and improved the attitude towards the food and restaurant.”

While this may be no surprise to experienced restaurant marketers, it does serve as a reminder to review your menu descriptions and change them on occasion to invite additional interest and increase sales.  Before blindly deciding to change menu descriptions, however, there are factors to consider, such as:

·         Do your menu descriptions fit your overall brand strategy?

·         What are the costs and benefits of making changes?  Restaurant  menu design, how it will be posted on the web and how it will be promoted in-store via point of purchase marketing must be considered. This underscores the need for proper brand strategy .

·         Once menu descriptions are changed, do they accurately  reflect the taste of the menu items or are they just fluff to make them sound better?

·         Are your menu changes reflected in your in-store marketing? For ideas on how to wow the customer in-store, click here.

·         Don’t go it alone: get advice on your descriptions from a cross-functional team, such as the culinary team, restaurant servers, brand marketers and focus groups.

When was the last time you reviewed and updated your menu descriptions? What effect did it have on your restaurant sales? 

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