Loyalty 4.0: Marketing to Consumers in Real Time

Photo: LinkedIn

Imagine a couple walking through the grocery store. They have a grocery list and, as they meander through the aisles, they stop at the pet care section. They look down at their list to confirm that dog food is on there and, almost instantly, their smartphone buzzes. A quick swipe of the screen reveals a coupon for a specific brand of dog food, ultimately influencing the sale.

That scenario is close to happening, John Ross, president of Inmar Analytics, said during a presentation Friday morning as part of the Wake Forest Center for Retail Innovation’s second annual Marketing Analytics Workshop. 

The Center for Retail Innovation is a partnership among the Wake Forest University Schools of Business and sponsors Inmar, Bellomy Research, CVS Caremark and SymphonyIRI Group. “Shoppers are getting ahead of retailers,” he added.

“Retailers need to know what shoppers are doing in the moment and proceed from there,” Ross said in remarks geared toward the future of marketing and loyalty programs.

“Loyalty generating moments that take place in the store – that’s where we think this whole thing is going to play out,” he added. “It is all going to catch up through the mobile device. When the shopper is ahead of the marketplace … that’s where you can make real connections.”

The Marketing Analytics Workshop features a variety of speakers from companies such as Inmar, Pepsi and Sam’s Club. The event also features a case competition that pairs up current students with marketing professionals.

In his presentation, Ross also highlighted a number of pitfalls that await retailers who hold on too tightly to the old way of marketing to consumers. They include:

·         Clustering that lags shopper behavior. He gave an example of a company sending out dog food coupons a year after someone has lost their pet

·         Once in, never out marketing

·         Discount strategy v. content strategy

·         Discounts that are out of step with a consumer's purchase cadence. His example involved a store sending marketing for Star Trek items to a Star Wars fan.