The Rise of Shopper Marketing Spurs Measurement Research Efforts

October 1st, 2007 Nurlan Urazbaev

The world’s biggest media research firm, Nielsen Co., announced pilot results of the In-Store Prism initiative – or ‘essentially a ratings system for in-store media and marketing that measures reach and frequency similar to TV,’ reports Advertising Age late on Sunday night. The Pioneering Research for an In-Store Metric (PRISM) is a consortium that comprises, among others, the biggest retailer (Wal-Mart), the biggest advertiser (P&G) and the biggest media-buying agency in the world (Starcom MediaVest Group).

“Shopper marketing is a new medium as important as the internet, mobile or gaming,” declared Starcom MediaVest Group North America CEO Renetta McCann at the announcement of pilot results, “It’s a brand-new ballgame, and we’re all in.”

The Rise of Shopper Marketing

Source: Deloitte/GMA draft study

According to Peter Hoyt, executive director of the In-Store Marketing Institute, until recently ‘media agencies weren’t in the game at all,’ but now they are following the media companies: ‘the parents of the four leading broadcast networks have a stake in some facet of in-store media’ says Ad Age. Five media agencies have already joined the consortium behind the Prism effort, said George Wishart, global managing director of Nielsen In-Store.

Nielsen CEO David Calhoun compare Nielsen In-Store’s emerging metric to his company’s TV and Internet rating. “It will allow in-store to rightfully take a seat at the marketing table and be considered in an analytical manner consistent with all good marketing and media planning,” he is quoted in the Ad Age article. “What you can measure, you can manage.”

That’s certainly a major achievement for Nielsen. They were the first to recognize the need to have a stake in the powerful medium of the future (in-store marketing) and led the process of initiating measurements.

Yet, I have some naive questions, and may be someone could enlighten me:

1. TV ratings are better than nothing but they are very far from being a reliable metric (experts and TV advertisers themselves say). Over 100 years after it was said, many advertisers are still repeating that only 50% of their advertising works but they have no idea which half it is. Ratings refer mostly to programs, not the commercials (which are increasingly zapped or ignored). Besides, TV sets are usually far from the products advertised on them. By contrast, when it comes to in-store, all ads are near the products, so why not just track sales uplift or ad-triggered actions, the way Internet does it? If I am not mistaken, the main metrics for online advertising are number of click-throughs, click-through rates, cost-per-click, cost-per-sale (for e-commerce), and not the ratings. Online impressions are measured free of charge. I can see how Internet ratings can be useful for wooing first-time advertisers, but ratings are not enough to retain them. The web has gone much further than that in proving its effectiveness, and that is the reason why it’s growing so fast. So my naive question is: are ratings the best the sophisticated measurement industry can do for in-store marketing?

2. Audience studies give you an indispensable insight, but they are also quite expensive. I wonder how much a Prism study would cost and how many advertisers or retailers (or digital signage networks) would be able to afford it?

Brandweek’s Mike Beirne gives an example of a sceptical view: “While proponents contend that an in-store metric could give POP players a seat at the marketing table, not all are convinced. “I see a lot of upside . . . but I still think decisions are going to be price-driven compared with other forms of marketing,” said Alan Foshay, director of business development at Rapid Displays, Brunswick, Maine. “No one questions spending $3 million for a 30-second spot but tell a client they should spend $3 million on in-store, that seems like a lot of money.”"

I would add: the decisions are going to be price-driven at first, and ROI-driven after the first campaigns show (or do not show) results at the cash register.

Entry Filed under: Digital Signage ROI, The Big Picture, Uncategorized