GUEST COMMENT Why advertisers need to address how different teams collaborate to ensure success

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GUEST COMMENT Why advertisers need to address how different teams collaborate to insure success

The potential of retail media networks (RMNs) to become an effective channel for advertisers continues to generate excitable headlines, but a lack of internal coordination risks leaving many with sub-optimal outcomes, warns Russell Nuzzo, Global Head of New Client Solutions and Partnerships, Gain Theory

Marketers are investing in RMNs in record numbers. Retail media remains the fastest growing media channel, with GroupM’s Global Midyear Forecast predicting it will grow by 17.5% in 2024.

But there are some key challenges that need to be overcome. A recent ANA report found a lack of standardisation across platforms was the biggest obstacle. However, I’m particularly interested in another challenge on that list – the lack of coordination between the growing number of different stakeholders in advertisers’ media ecosystems who have an influence on RMNs.

The growth in stakeholders is underpinned by another key trend: RMNs expanding their scope to focus on the top as well as the bottom of the funnel. They are doing this is two ways:

  1. Acquisition: the largest RMNs are buying assets outside of their traditional retail footprint. Walmart’s decision to buy connected TV manufacturer Vizio for $2.3b is one recent example.  
  2. Data portability: other retailers have been partnering with programmatic and self-serve ad platforms, trading their first-party shopper data for greater reach. Tesco’s partnership with The Trade Desk demonstrates this perfectly.

In light of this expansion across these two disparate vectors, which brings a wider pool of marketers into play, here are three practical steps you can take to give your retail media investments the best chance of succeeding:

  1. Align all relevant stakeholders around common goals

    Getting everyone who is involved in the planning and execution of retail media to point in the same direction should be your first objective. 

    Without proper collaboration, tension and conflict could arise if teams are pulling in different directions, while insights that could lead to growth may be missed.

    It’s interesting to note that brand has overtaken shopper marketing as the leading source of funding for retail media budgets, according to the ANA report. This is perhaps the best demonstration of how retail media is no longer purely focused on lower funnel activity and driving short-term sales.

    Yet the ANA report also shows that this shift in funding is not replicated by a shift in ownership. Shopper marketing is still more likely than brand to be responsible for the planning, purchase, creative, and measurement of retail media. 

    It’s important not to forget that alongside brand and shopper teams, sales, digital, commerce, and media teams are also involved in delivering retail media success.

    Ensuring every relevant stakeholder works towards the same goals while achieving their individual objectives in a transparent and coordinated manner is crucial. 

    Building a hierarchy of metrics that clearly defines the retail media goal that all teams are aiming for and the KPIs required to measure how it will be achieved is a good way to start. While the metrics may be different for different teams, the goal they are trying to achieve needs to be the same.

    As well as providing clarity of purpose, a hierarchy of metrics provides a level of transparency and creates a shared language between different teams that can help to mitigate any potential disagreements.

    Every company’s hierarchy will be different, so having deep and transparent conversations to improve understanding, get agreement of where you’re headed, and who is responsible for what, is critical.

    2. Ensure different teams understand the different measurement approaches

    Historically, the primary measurement focus of brand media teams has been cross-channel performance and how media drives business KPIs, notably overall sales and profit. 

    Conversely, traditional retail media teams (i.e. those focused on lower funnel outcomes) have concerned themselves with driving revenue from specific retail partners by maximizing media’s impact within each retailer’s footprint. They have also sought to understand the purchase context when their products are bought, such as basket analyses, to drive consumer insight.

    Both approaches are right, but to maximise impact it’s important that different teams understand the wider measurement picture so that all parts of the funnel work harmoniously together.

    As RMNs move up the funnel and into broader ecosystems, retail media-focused teams must become comfortable with cross-channel measurement to truly understand the full impact of their media. For example, media placed within the further reaches of Walmart’s or Amazon’s RMNs may generate sales outside Walmart or Amazon.  

    Similarly, brand media teams will need to become comfortable with in-retailer measurement approaches, such as basket analysis, to shape their understanding of the consumer and the role their products play in their lives.

    “We have a clear framework around the measurement of and KPIs for retail media,” says Roger Dunn, Retail and Performance Media Lead at Diageo. “It’s important to be aware that different parts of the funnel have different objectives and KPIs. It’s also important to have an omnichannel view so you can understand, for example, how onsite and offsite drive in-store sales.”

    3. Drive more value from the data you have

    Getting timely access to retail media data is challenging, which makes measurement hard to perform. 

    Nevertheless, there is more advertisers can do internally to ensure they get more value from the data they do have.

    Creating common data sets and then making them available to all relevant teams is one important step. Ensuring these teams are using the most appropriate analytic tools and techniques that enable performance to be measured in the most effective way is another.

    An omnichannel analysis Gain Theory undertook for a major CPG brand threw up some unexpected results, for example.

    We employed a unified measurement framework featuring MMM and SensorTM, our privacy-compliant attribution solution, to analyze 14 RMNs within a multi-channel media plan. Specifically, the brand wanted to understand which RMNs were best at driving bricks-and-mortar sales.

    Walmart was the best performer, which was not surprising given it’s primarily a physical retailer, but Amazon finished as high as fourth. This was surprising given we were not measuring Amazon performance against e-commerce sales, or sales at Amazon-owned bricks-and-mortar properties. In essence, Amazon media was helping to drive sales outside the Amazon ecosystem.

    It’s a great example of what happens when RMNs start to move up the funnel and why different teams need to collaborate and coordinate in a transparent way to drive business-wide results.

    This insight sparked a re-evaluation of RMNs at the CPG brand and the role they can and should play.

    Destination growth

    Retail media is a fast-moving environment that requires advertisers to adapt as the market evolves if they are to achieve hoped-for outcomes.

    Getting relevant stakeholders aligned, ensuring different teams understand different measurement approaches, and driving more value from existing data are proactive steps that will ensure marketing organizations collaborate better and help advertisers reach their most important goal – profitable and sustainable growth.

    Author

    Russell Nuzzo is Global Head of New Client Solutions and Partnerships, Gain Theory

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