The key to RMN’s success is how interactions with brands can enhance the shopper experience. Digital media experts at Kroger and The Home Depot have spent years developing media networks keeping this key point in mind. If a branded ad interrupts the customer’s journey, it doesn’t help the brand, the retailer or, most importantly, the customer.

Helping when customers research products

Where can brands get involved in the customer journey? At The Home Depot, a supplier approached the retailer about retargeting customers on social media. Soon, the company created opportunities for other suppliers to deliver ads that drove customers to the retailer’s product pages.

This was back in 2018. In 2019, The Home Depot’s Retail Media+ (known as RM+) was launched. Brands now have opportunities to show ads on company owned properties, including homedepot.com, the retailer’s app, in-store and email, as well as offsite media channels like social and video.

“We didn’t want it to disrupt the customer experience,” said Melanie Babcock, vice president, Retail Media+ and monetization for The Home Depot. “Our customer spends a lot of time researching on our site before making a decision. They’re thinking about if they have the right tools, skills, time and capabilities for a project. You have a light to install, should you do it on your own? The consideration time is much less for traditional retailers.”

Because of this longer, more involved customer journey, the retailer decided  decided to let suppliers have the lion’s share of the RMN ad inventory. That means that most of the ads served to customers during their journey are endemic products, ones that can be bought at Home Depot.

“Onsight and in-store are very connected,” said Babcock. “We see that in our customers’ behaviors, and we wanted to be additive to that by keeping the customer in mind and not just monetizing the website. We’re bringing the supplier into the customer journey.”

Personalized precision with customers

Supermarket chain Kroger is another major retailer with a robust RMN, called Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM). KPM is managed under a wholly-owned subsidiary, 84.51˚.

“The common denominator is data science,” said Brian Spencer, KPM’s marketing director. “We have a legion of data scientists available under 84.51˚. There’s shelf assortment and other areas of personalization in our stores. That same talent base is what fuels the personalization behind Kroger Precision Marketing as well.”

Prior to starting its retail media business, Kroger built digital experiences for customers to search products, create grocery lists and receive digital coupons. These tools made it possible for KPM to introduce brands in a relevant way.

Unbranded search terms are 90% of the top 500 searches in Kroger digital touchpoints, Spencer said. That means many customers are looking for products without a specific brand in mind. Directing those customers to a specific brand or product is a logical next step in their journeys.

And, because digital customers are multi-taskers, they aren’t only looking for products available at a Kroger store. For instance, you could be planning a Super Bowl party and need to buy snacks. But what if you also are considering a new TV? Cases like that, but also many others, are where non-endemic brands fit in.

“As we explore non-endemic opportunities, top of mind is that this is activated in a way that isn’t intrusive or obnoxious to our consumers,” said Spencer. “If it’s something that makes sense for our shoppers, we’ll take a look.”

Expanding to offsite journeys

“Retail media data is very advantageous to all kinds of brands, particularly in the grocery category,” said Spencer. Grocery shoppers make purchases several times a month, and often multiple times per week. And these purchases cut across many categories. 

“That kind of information is obviously necessary for consumer packaged goods, but outside of CPG there’s greater interest because some of these non-endemic brands are looking for relevant ways to reach audiences,” he said. “Automotive brands or fast food brands, they may think of our data set as another way to activate across the open web.”

Offsite RMN opportunities are the fastest-growing area for KPM. Kroger has been a partner with streaming service platform Roku for three years. And this week, Disney Advertising announced a partnership with KPM for some Disney media properties, beginning with Hulu.

Dig deeper: CTV added to Kroger’s retail media network business

“Brands, but more typically agencies, are able to go in and activate programmatic display and CTV through a DSP of their choice, and set their own safety standards and activate through a self-service portal — and see sales results and optimize against in-store and online sales,” said Spencer.

“Retail media is more and more being considered as just media,” he added. “It’s more and more part of the total touchpoint consideration set that agencies are looking at. The traditional lines between shopper marketing and brand marketing are becoming more blurred.”

The Home Depot is also looking at how to expand RM+ offsite into CTV. It’s also piloting in-store video screens at 50 locations, currently, to see how shoppers’ digital journeys can be enhanced when they get to the store.

“We’re the last mile in advertising, which is always the most expensive part of the journey,” said Babcock. “There’s huge value to our supplier to connect to that customer and also to know more about that customer.”

The post How Home Depot and Kroger use RMN to improve shoppers’ ad experience appeared first on MarTech.

Ryan Phelan has 25 years experience in email marketing and has written 83 articles for MarTech on that and other topics. He’s the co-founder of RPEOrigin.com, a digital marketing services company with an agnostic approach, and is the chairman emeritus of the Email Experience Council Advisory Board.

Q: How did you get into marketing?

A: I have a funny employment history! I went to college and studied to be a Catholic priest and decided, halfway through the program, that I didn’t want to be a priest. And so then I thought, well, I’m a pretty good DJ. So I worked at a nightclub for six years, being a DJ and running the club. And then I discovered DJing didn’t make any money, and that was during the dot-com boom. 

I got my first internet job with Giftpoint.com, which did gift certificates online. I worked in the affiliate world and I worked in email. And over the years I did a lot with affiliate marketing, and then decided that email is where I wanted to go. It was more fun, more exciting, more new. And that’s where I started my email career, back in 1998. It’s been a heck of a ride! I got a degree in psychology. Most marketers I know don’t have a degree in marketing, they have a degree in something else.

Q: From the DJs I know, it sounds like there’s a psychological component to hosting a party.

A: There is. There are two things I took away from being a nightclub DJ that I still use today that I think are great for marketers. I learned how to read a room. You’re up in the DJ booth putting on music and thinking: What is the crowd going to react to? What is the next song? And you get very attuned to what people are doing and the micro-movements around the room, who’s going up for drinks and so on. You read the entire room and that helps predict the energy level and where you go next. That customer-centric focus is really what I started back in ‘95, entertaining 600 people a night in a nightclub. Taking that into email, I think it’s really about putting the customer first and reading the room.

Q: In email marketing, there’s no single room where everybody is mingling together. Is that why it has to be data-centric?

A: The “room” in email is your reporting, your conversion rate, your online behavior, heat maps, all that kind of stuff. But it’s still this centric approach of reading the room and trying to figure out that everybody is different. 

When I was DJing we had a format, and it was a country nightclub. We developed, really, a science on how to play music in a nightclub. It started with a couple two-steps, a triple-step, which is a little faster-paced, and then another faster song, until you reach this crescendo. And different types of people come onto the dance floor based on what you’re playing. Then you crash it down to another two-step, bring it up again, play another slow song, and then start the whole thing over again. What that does is create a stream on and off the dance floor that is much like segmentation done in marketing. 

In today’s world, most marketers are doing one-to-many messages. They’re not doing any segmentation, it’s the same message to everybody. That’s like me playing the same music over and over again while I’m DJing. But what I’m doing, and what marketers should be doing, is using propensity, using demographic and geographic data, looking at persona-based models, and what you can do to differentiate your message to different archetypes and groups that you identify in the data.

Q: Why do you think email is still such an important marketing channel after all these years?

A: I think there are two upsides for email currently. Number one, we still have a large majority of marketers that still aren’t doing the advanced stuff — segmentation or “reading the room.” There are still companies that are struggling with that. COVID was a great example of how companies finally realized they were underweight in their technology in order to execute email, either in their staff or tech stack. Email came in and saved the day again during COVID. 

The second thing is that with the availability of data, email has the opportunity to continue to grow in sophistication. From identification, to third-party data, to touching outside of email into social media or text or web — email continues to power those full-spectrum experiences. And so the same future I saw for email 25 years ago, I still see today. But it’s predicated on the fact that first we have to get more companies to buy in on the sophistication that email can achieve with data.

Read our Spotlight on contributor Stacey Ackerman here.

The post Ryan Phelan: Spotlight on the expert appeared first on MarTech.

Why we care. D2C brands are only a click away from their competitors making it easy for online shoppers to compare prices and products. To connect with customers, brands must identify and address the very different motivations that drive sales. Messages that land with one cohort will be wasted on other groups.

Seeking lower prices. The majority of online beauty shoppers are looking for bargains, the study found. This applied to younger consumers as well as older generations.

Sixty-seven percent of Gen Z and millennial digital shoppers said that they preferred to wait in order to pay a lower price on beauty products. And they accepted the risk that items would become unavailable.

Power shoppers. The study also identified a segment of “power shoppers” — those who spent at least $2,500 on beauty products annually.

Among “power shoppers,” 40% are bargain hunters. They spend more overall, but they resist paying full price on individual items.

Super fans. Against these trends, there is a cohort of “super fans” who are, indeed, willing to pay full price for exclusive or rare items.

Twenty-one percent of shoppers said they’d pay full price if they were one of the first customers to purchase the product. And 25% said they would pay full price if it was a limited-edition product.

These shoppers are receptive to brand events that emphasize the scarcity of a product. However, price-conscious customers would likely be discouraged by such an event.

Dig deeper: What is ecommerce and which trends are shaping its future?

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OpenAI has until April 30 to inform Italian users of “the methods and logic” behind the processing of data and provide a way for them to exercise their existing personal data rights. Longer-term deadlines were also given for age-gating to the app and launching an awareness campaign so Italians know what their rights are.

Why we care. Italy is the first EU nation to take any regulatory action on ChatGPT. In the past most EU restrictions around privacy have come from France and Germany. Spain has also requested the EU’s privacy data protection board to look into ChatGPT’s practices.

As generative AI technology continues to evolve, regulators are taking a hard look at its use of user data across the web, especially when large language models are trained on that data without the consent that GDPR law requires.

Conditions for ChatGPT’s return. OpenAI has until April 30 to inform users in Italy about how data is used in its algorithms to run its AI models. 

OpenAI will also have to provide tools that allow those whose data is used — including users and non-users — to request a correction of data inaccuracies or to have the data removed if a correction isn’t possible.

Age verification. OpenAI has until the end of September to install a robust age verification system that keeps out users under age 13. And they must submit a plan for this system by the end of May.

Additionally, users aged 13 to 18 who don’t have parental permission will also need to be restricted from using the app.

Campaign. As another condition for lifting the ban, OpenAI will need to launch a local awareness campaign on radio, TV and digital to educate Italians about ChatGPT’s processing methods and data usage. The company has until May 15 to launch the campaign.

The post Italy lays out requirements for ChatGPT’s return appeared first on MarTech.

Why we care. CTV is the fastest growing digital ad channel because of its inventory and adtech precision. Brands can fit a campaign into a budget of any size. They can deliver ads to a few hundred consumers in their target demo, or many millions. That’s all due to the wide range of inventory available, from free ad-supported services up to very premium opportunities on ad-supported streamers like Netflix. 

Marketers also have more ways to find their customers on CTV/OTT by partnering with retail media networks.

Dig deeper: CTV added to Kroger’s retail media business

Higher-quality inventory. New platforms and programming continue to be added to CTV/OTT inventory. Consumers now have thousands of viewing options to choose from, many of them free. Additionally, Netflix entered the adtech game last year, offering new ad opportunities alongside their premium films and series.

All of this has spurred DTC advertisers to dip into CTV/OTT. Forty percent of marketers in the study said higher-quality inventory was a reason to increase their budget for the channel. And 38% said measurement capabilities were another good reason.

First-time advertisers. Of those DTC marketers spending more this year than last, 65% are first-time CTV/OTT advertisers.

Where are the dollars coming from? Sixty-one percent say the budget is reallocated from another channel, like social media, search or mobile apps, while 39% said they increased their total media budget in order to allow for their increase in CTV/OTT spending.

Measurement. Another takeaway from the study is that many DTC marketers are demanding improvements to measurement. Less than half (48%) of respondents said they’re satisfied with their current media partner’s incremental measurement. Nearly as many (47%) said they were satisfied with brand lift measurement. Satisfaction with low-funnel attribution was even lower (44%).

DTC marketers see the opportunity in CTV/OTT, even as they seek better ways to measure the channel’s success.

The post DTC marketers planning to up CTV/OTT spend this year appeared first on MarTech.

These opportunities contribute to high satisfaction among those who work in the thriving field. 74% of those surveyed reported being at least somewhat satisfied with their jobs. 

“Given that one-third of our respondents were promoted or got a new job in the past year, relatively high happiness levels seem justified,” said Scott Brinker, VP platform ecosystem at HubSpot and editor at chiefmartec.com. “Overall, great to see martech pros are feeling good about their jobs.”

Increased salaries. Survey respondents had a wide range of experience in marketing. Nearly half had more than 10 years of experience and 60% had more than seven years in the profession.

When looking at the average compensation for various levels of experience, the survey found that compensation increased, on average, consistently at each stage after the third year. 

After seven years, the bump in pay was most dramatic, climbing from $118K, on average, for marketers in their sixth and seventh years, up to $154K for those in their eighth and ninth years.

Dig deeper: Marketing technologists earn more on average than marketers

Promotions. More than three-quarters of respondents were promoted in the last two years, either within their organization or as a result of changing jobs. This was true for marketers at all management levels.

At the managers/staff level, more promotions came in the first year. For directors and above, more promotions were awarded after the first year than for lower-level marketers.

Why we care. The vast majority of marketers report that they are at least somewhat satisfied with their jobs, and the data about pay increases and promotions support these sentiments.

The opportunity for advancement in a competitive job market also explains the high churn rate. In this context, switching jobs isn’t a result of job dissatisfaction so much as on way by which employees gain promotions.

Churn accelerated in 2022. More than 70% of respondents said they noticed an increase in churn at their organization in the last year.

Nearly a third said that the increase of churn was significant, as opposed to a moderate increase.

The survey. The survey, conducted jointly by MarTech and chiefmartec.com, was taken by 419 marketers in December 2022 and January 2023; 401 of those provided salary information. Nearly 70% (286) respondents live in North America; 15% (63) live in Western Europe. The report’s conclusions are limited to responses from those individuals only. Others were excluded due to the limited number.

Respondents answered more than 20 questions related to career roles, salary, technology and job satisfaction and challenges/frustrations. They were from all job levels — C-suite to managers and staff.

Download the survey here (no registration required).

The post Frequent promotions and salary increases contribute to thriving martech careers appeared first on MarTech.

“I think we’re entering a very disruptive phase for creativity for designers, illustrators, video producers and writers,” said Paul Roetzer, CEO of Marketing AI Institute, at the recent MarTech Conference. “I think AI came for knowledge work and creative work way faster than we were prepared for as an industry, and I think that 2023 is going to be a very hard year for a lot of people to grasp what is really possible now and what that means to organizations and writers and content teams.” 

Why we care. Advances in generative AI will likely affect content creation across the marketing profession, at brands and agencies alike. This means smaller organizations can in-house tasks they might have previously depended on agencies to execute. However, new generative AI technology will also be helpful to agencies, making content production more efficient and allowing them to better serve their clients.

Creative work at agencies. “In-house and on the agency side, marketers are already leveraging AI to help them do what they’re good at,” said Stephen Marcinuk, co-founder and head of operations for Intelligent Relations, a low-cost tool that uses AI to help companies craft news pitches and carry out other public relations functions.

“For creative content — ads, blocks of text on a website, sales emails, things of that nature — AI is good at getting from zero to something 80-to-90 percent there,” said Marcinuk. “A real pain point for creative marketers is to stare at a blank piece of paper.”

Generative AI chatbots can produce a number of creative options in short order that humans can then choose from, edit and finalize. For instance, it could provide five different versions of copy for a specific ad, or a number of potential headlines for a blog post.

Upskilling. “Some people say AI will just help get rid of the tedium and so creatives can do interesting work,” said Marcinuk. “I think that’s naïve, personally. Some real jobs will be lost in the next two-to-three years. There will need to be upskilling across the marketing industry to learn how to use this technology and do jobs better.”

At agencies, this means having more marketers focused on strategic thinking and client relations management, as well as brand positioning, testing and analytics.

Augmented intelligence. Adding AI to graphics and other creative tools, as Adobe has done with its new Firefly offering, helps people complete work with tools they weren’t trained to use.

“The tool itself has the intelligence to help you,” said Marcinuk. “That’s what you’re seeing with Firefly and different ad tools. You don’t know how to write great ad copy? Well, what do you want to say? It will help you say it in the right way.”

Generative AI models connect users with outside data sets that can bring a higher level of competence to writing and other creative tasks. This way, agencies can pitch new clients quicker without having to research an entirely new industry.

The AI can also improve language proficiency for non-native speakers. Therefore, it can be a leveler for non-native English speakers who want to break into English-language advertising, Marcinuk said.

In-housing. As generative AI tools evolve, smaller organizations might be able to manage tasks they’d traditionally outsource to agencies.

The Intelligent Relations platform does this by using AI models that generate appropriate news pitches while also finding news organizations and reporters likely to be interested in the pitch. And it offers these tools as a subscription, starting at $95 per month.

Managing your AI. Organizations of all sizes will be forced to take another look at their budget and staffing. While AI capabilities improve, it will be important for marketers at all levels to manage their AI tool much like employees.

“It will still be important to have humans in the loop for approval [of content],” said Marcinuk. “It’s the same as managing a person — communicate the standard and help employees hit the standard. Same with ChatGPT. You’ll have to say ‘no that’s not good enough, make it less verbose.’ You’ll still have to manage your AI for the foreseeable future.”

Dig deeper: New AI-powered product releases

The post Why ChatGPT may be a blessing and a curse for agencies appeared first on MarTech.

Gatorade is currently running ads for its new energy drink Fast Twitch. Kraft Heinz tested ads for multiple brands, including Velveeta. Both campaigns used basketball themes to connect with March Madness fans.

Why we care. Cooler Screens’ technology shows video images of in-stock products to shoppers when they’re deciding what to grab and buy. This makes the screens eye-catching and relevant for serving ads. On the back end, the technology uses “identity-blind” sensors for traffic and behavior data that demonstrates campaign performance.

At a time when many retailers are launching their own retail media networks (RMNs), Cooler Screens cuts across a number of retailers with this new all-at-once offering, giving big brands opportunity to scale, and to do so with a video experience that is more useful and interactive than standard in-store video screens.

Dig deeper: Why we care about retail media networks

In-store network. Cooler Screens’ 10,000 screens across retailers serve ads to nearly 100 million viewers per month.

Using data from the screens, brands can measure sales lift, brand equity and real-time shopper actions — like opening the refrigerator door — to optimize the campaigns.

The Kraft Heinz test campaigns delivered between three and six percentage points in sales lift across their brands.

The post Kraft Heinz and Gatorade tap in-store video screens for March Madness appeared first on MarTech.

“Whether we’re talking about B2B buyers or consumers, customers need you to know who they are, whichever channel or device they’re meeting you on,” said Kim Davis, MarTech’s editorial director. “At the same time, they expect you to respect their privacy. What that means is that as the industry gradually weans itself from cookie-tracking, other ways of understanding customer behavior and the customer journey become paramount.”

Is the industry prepared for this privacy-driven environment? Changes are underway as Google now plans to phase out third-party cookies from Chrome in 2024. Last year, IAB CEO David Cohen called the deprecation of third-party identifiers “the world’s biggest slow-motion train wreck.”

Here are the approaches B2B and B2C marketers can use today as privacy becomes an ever greater priority.

Identity resolution solutions

Identity resolution solutions integrate consumer identifiers across channels and devices in a way that is accurate, scalable and privacy-compliant to create a persistent and addressable individual profile.

“It’s privacy-compliant because the user’s profile is built around an anonymized token, not a name, email address or phone number,” Davis said.

Most identity resolution platforms maintain identity graphs into which they gather data from the full range of channels and devices where the user is active. Identity resolution platforms identify users either deterministically or probabilistically.

“The result should be the ability to segment and target audiences based on interests and behavior,” said Davis. “For most marketing purposes — not all, but most — it’s more valuable to know what the customer is interested in than their name, height, weight, gender and home address. That’s true whether they’re in market for a sophisticated software solution, or just looking for a new pair of sunglasses.”

Dig deeper: What is identity resolution and how are platforms adapting to privacy changes?

Zero-party data

Zero-party data is a kind of first-party data that a user volunteers that relates to their interests, preferences or intent. 

“It could be collected by something as simple as a three-question quiz,” said Davis. “Collection could be gamified.”

For instance, here’s how online temporary tattoo seller Inkbox uses a quiz to gain zero-party data from customers.

“Customers are eager to give up this information and hand it over so that they can get the help they need, get better products and services,” said Tim Parkin, President of Parkin Consulting. “Zero-party data is massive. It’s been here for a while under the radar and we need to expose it now and align our interests with the customer so that we can access this zero-party data.”

Data clean rooms

Data clean rooms (DCRs) use privacy-enhancing technology that allows data owners, including brands and publishers, to share first-party data in a privacy-compliant way. They resolve the data to a profile while keeping that profile anonymized.

This emerging technology requires a certain level of data maturity, so not all organizations can take the leap into DCRs. Those that do typically already have a CDP or DMP in place to manage customer data. Additionally, brands using a DCR might look to a consultancy to assist in the implementation, and that costs more.

Dig deeper: How data clean rooms might help keep the internet open

B2B community building

B2B marketers use communities to give like-minded individuals the platform to communicate with experts in their field. This gives buyers the incentive to volunteer information in order to stay connected.

“B2B marketers have gotten pretty smart at trying to figure out how to have people give their information so that they can voluntarily communicate with individuals and companies that they feel they want to do business with,” said Cyndi Greenglass, President of Livingston Strategies, a B2B marketing consultancy. “Some of the ways that companies have gotten past the [privacy] challenge is by creating their own portals, their own communities and environments where individuals are offering up information so that they can stay connected despite what’s happening in this environment.”

Marketers must serve high-quality content into their portal for the community to thrive. Businesspeople bring high standards to their B2B interactions because they are used to best-of-breed buying experiences when they act as consumers making personal buying decisions.

“Community is more important than it’s ever been,” Greenglass said. “We’ve seen that consumers — whether they are B2B purchasers or individuals — we bring our human behavior into the workplace when we do business every day.”

“I’m a strong believer in customer proximity, that whoever is closest to the customer wins,” said Parkin. “If you’re not talking to your customers, you’re not learning about who they are and what they want, how they think and how they act. Community allows you to do that. It’s your experiment lab where you can see people interact with each other and you can get face-to-face with customers.”

The post Identifying B2B and B2C consumers in a privacy-driven environment: The MarTech Conference keynote appeared first on MarTech.

The first CAPSULE screens will likely be rolling out later this year at high-end luxury stores.

Why we care. Marketers are finding new ways to use screens in-store to help shoppers find what they want and alert them to discounts. They are also using hybrid events (a mix of in-store and virtual participation in a single event) to increase the wow factor for shoppers who choose to shop in-person instead of online.

The new CAPSULE technology is aimed at wider B2C adoption in this vein. Since 2014, ARHT has been supporting holographic presentations at live events and for internal use in mostly B2B use cases.

Shopping with holograms. Touchscreens in-store allow shoppers to select videos about specific products. The recorded demonstrations show a lifesize presenter with the product. Customers can also use the touchscreen to zoom in on the featured products.

“CAPSULE is the newest addition for the retail sector,” said Gorana Seeley, ARHT’s vice president, global retail. “Retailers have had a tough time bringing shoppers back into stores [after pandemic lockdowns].This technology bridges the online-offline gap for those customers. It gives them a reason to come back into stores. A hologram can’t be experienced on a phone or laptop.”

Connecting to digital experience. Marketers can connect the hologram in-store display to the customer’s digital experience. For instance, they can display a QR code on CAPSULE that takes the shopper to a promotion or an app.

“We can link to anything a customer would like,” said Seeley. “A QR code could take the customer to a coupon if they purchase a product that day. If not in-store, they can buy online.”

By connecting the in-store hologram experience to the digital experience, marketers can measure the ROI impact of the display.

The CAPSULE comes in one standard size. Marketers can fit the technology into their budgets by choosing either to purchase or lease the units, and by how many units they use.

Live demos. The CAPSULE also produces live holograms, just like previous ARHT technology.

Dig deeper: How event marketers can use hologram technology for live and hybrid experiences

This means that stores can host celebrity appearances and other live demonstrations via hologram. The hologram is produced in a “capture” studio in one location and then can be transmitted to multiple locations elsewhere.

This technology makes it possible for live product demonstrations for luxury products at the customer’s request. A high-end retailer could have CAPSULE units in multiple locations, and host live product demonstrations that are captured from a single location.

The technology can also be used by manufacturers to show hologram product demonstrations to retail buyers.

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