Why retail media needs to put the customer first

Value – or the perception thereof – has become an increasingly crucial matter for shoppers over the past two years.

Value

Changing behaviours in the wake of the pandemic and inflation have shown a growing trend towards “value-seeking” strategies.

While retail media isn’t linked directly to price, it can still play a key role in helping customers get more value from their shop. As well as highlighting cost-saving opportunities more generally, retail media can also be used to deliver personalised offers and discounts tailored specifically to the products that shoppers actually buy on a regular basis.

Convenience

Whether they’re online or in-store, grocery shoppers usually want to get what they came for as quickly and easily as they can. As a result, anything that retailers can do to make the shopping experience as convenient as possible is likely to go a long way towards meeting expectations.

Both online and off, retail media provides abundant opportunities to improve the flow of a visit. Smart use of in-store assets can be used to improve navigation and callout deals and offers, ensuring that shoppers can manoeuvre around a store as quickly as they want. From a digital point of view, personalised recommendations, substitutes, and favourites can all help a customer get to the checkout faster.

Inspiration

Cooking at home was one of the major trends to emerge during the height of the pandemic, even in countries where eating out is usually a significant cultural norm. As a result, many customers were looking for extra inspiration in their shop, something intensified by the shift to online.

Here too, personalised recommendations have presented retailers and brands with a way to aid product discovery while simultaneously helping to provide a better service to customers.

Complementary product suggestions, based on what similar shoppers have added to their baskets, offer another opportunity to inspire.

The importance of making retail media a customer-centric endeavour can’t be underestimated. While shoppers tend to be more willing to share their data with grocery retailers than others, that doesn’t make them any less conscious that their experience should improve as a result.

More than anything, a customer-first approach to retail media ensures its sustainability over the long term. So long as shoppers continue to receive a genuine benefit from the communications they receive – whether in terms of time,

money, or anything else – they’re that much more likely to remain receptive to the messages they’re presented with. If that dynamic changes, retailers risk the entire operation coming undone.