4 Ways an In-Store Marketing Platform Can Help You Succeed
In-store marketing campaigns play a key role in branding, customer experience, product promotion—as well as the overall store experience.
But many businesses find themselves misaligned between campaign expectations and the actual execution.
Consider these surprising statistics from our audit of a national retail drugstore chain:
Discarded assets:
- On average, their stores discarded two out of every three signs shipped.
- Only 17 out of 50 shipped marketing elements were actually merchandised.
Best performing locations:
- Even the best performing locations only merchandised 66% of their marketing elements and discarded a third of their signs.
Worst-performing locations:
- As for the worst performing locations, their compliance rates were 11% or less.
In this example, there is a clear disconnect between the marketing strategy and reality. Experiencing similar problems? It may be a sign you need an in-store campaign management platform.
To understand why, let’s take a closer look at how these platforms work and what they can offer.
A Centralized System for Your In-Store Campaigns
In-store marketing is complex. Success requires deftly handling deadlines, vendors, budgets, and more across multiple locations.
Then why are so many businesses using subpar technology to manage it all?
Our research found that more than 1 in 5 brands rely on desktop software—a strategy that surely creates more frustration than problems it solves.
Rather than trying to run the in-store marketing strategy with spreadsheets, emails, or project management software, a comprehensive platform brings every element together under one simple, but robust solution.
In fact, an in-store marketing platform gives you a centralized system for:
- store profiling
- ordering assets
- field distribution
- verification
- data and reporting
And the list goes on…
Since the platform would serve as the single source of truth, it becomes much easier to communicate and provide accurate updates with your vendors, your operations teams, your field teams—basically anyone and everyone involved in your in-store marketing programs.
So if that’s what a platform is, how does it help your campaigns to succeed? Here are four key ways.
1. You have greater insight and transparency with comprehensive store profiles
One of the great benefits of an in-store marketing platform is that it maximizes efficiency.
Every retailer has experienced this at some point:
- Signage that doesn’t fit.
- Incorrect signage.
- Too much or not enough signage.
Poor branding can lead to a bad customer experience.
Fortunately, comprehensive store profile can detail the specifics of each store location to effectively eliminate those challenges.
What’s more, the profiles can be configured with the characteristics and segmentation that matters to your programs—even as they change throughout the year.
Accurate store profiles are the cornerstone of a successful omnichannel marketing strategy.
When you can rely on data to show you the needs of each of your stores, you’ll enjoy the peace of mind that comes with knowing you’re looking at current, up-to-date information every time you access the platform.
Creating store profiles and planograms can require tracking hundreds of data points. Need to improve your in-store marketing audits? We've got you covered.
2. Your campaign planning is easier and more scalable
Juggling bowling balls, spinning plates, herding cats—no matter what metaphor you use to describe it, planning and executing a successful campaign requires that you stay on top of many different elements at once.
One of the most common challenges when it comes to in-store campaigns is being able to execute on time.
Eliminate that worry with the right platform.
Your in-store marketing platform can leverage automation to help you keep it all straight, keep it moving on time, and keep up with growth.
Leveraging centralized and comprehensive store profiles enable you to manage and update in-store marketing inventory, build and customize kits at scale, and see all of the details of your marketing campaigns—all in real-time.
The result: Less waste and more time and cost savings.
How?
As you connect the dots from data to planning to execution, you’ll be able to quickly scale campaigns, ensure each location gets just what they need, and eliminate wasted time and materials.
3. You can more easily manage orders (and control who you give access to)
Another big benefit of an in-store marketing platform is that it centralizes the management, ordering, and budgeting of in-store marketing materials. A good platform will provide a single e-commerce portal for all of it.
It can also be further customized to the precise way you do business.
With user roles and groups, access is centrally managed to make sure field teams get the precise materials they need—no more or less than what is relevant.
Budget and approval controls ensure they stay within their spending authority.
With the right platform, self-service is automated without the risk of users accidentally ordering the wrong items or spending spiraling out of control.
4. You can improve your campaigns based on accurate data
If you can’t measure how your in-store marketing campaigns are performing, how can you make them better?
You need access to data. And not just any data—accurate data.
That way, you can see how your campaigns are doing and where there’s room for improvement.
A good platform helps you manage in-store marketing verification while providing you with clear reporting and helpful dashboards. With this information at your fingertips, you can track progress, verify delivery and setup, and refine what you do in the future—giving you better ROI and creating less waste.
From start to finish, in-store marketing platforms enable your success with more accurate metrics, deeper insight, and greater control of your projects.
Ready to maximize your marketing efforts and make every campaign a great one?
