Digital advertising is growing (+10%) and so is e-commerce (+20%) but what about in-store retailing?

The answer may be complex. Although it is quite easy to monitor the consequential link between web adv and the increase in the online purchases, it is not as easy to identify the relation between digital adv and in-store retail revenues. This is not due to a lack of tools, but to the inability of those who should use such tools. Read it in Italian.

That is to say: in a recent article published by MediaPost it was pointed out that despite the fact that high-tech giants such as Adobe, Salesforce, Oracle, Google and Facebook have been implementing their off-site platforms to be used for creating customers’ profiles and allow marketers to anticipate their online and off-line, very few companies are have been using them.

Consequently, although apparently “digital commerce is killing retailing”, we can wonder whether hundreds brick-and-mortar stores closing down every year have been doing so due to a lack of foresight, common also among advertisers and media agencies.

According to Moody’s, the number of “retailers and apparel businesses”  which claim to be going through serious difficulties has tripled over the past six years , with a relevant increase in their debts.

However, crying over spilt milk is useless. We’d better take another point of view into consideration: if the web is killing the retail sector, it is also providing it with new customers. According to the latest Footfall Attribution Benchmarks report digital marketing campaigns are pushing more and more consumers to make in-store purchases. If used properly, internet can actually reverse the process.

The report also explains how a clever adv campaign, designed by using new tools and keeping an eye on the way, may bring about an increase in the sales by 10-30% for retailers.

Let’s take Harley-Davidson as an example: in New York, its typical “48 Bikes in 48 Hours” digital campaign used to allow their stores to sell 8 motorbikes. By using Albert analysis and predictive learning tools connecting online marketing to off-line behaviours, they have managed to sell 15 (Digital Marketing Has Bigger Impact on In-Store Sales than Ever).

In order to help their advertisers to better understand how digital adv can attract more in-store customers, the personalized radio service named Pandora, has introduced the use of  Attribution by Foursquare, a new tool supplying advertisers with the factual translation  of measurements into the number of in-store visits, the sales increase, the return of investments into advertising, the impressions and the devices reached, in addition to a clear analysis of the audience, classified according to geographical, age, gender, loyalty and tastes criteria. So far the increase in the number of new customers has reached +7.5%.

Innovators always win.

Which tools do you use for your digital campaigns and why? Tweet me @agostinellialdo.

If you liked this post, you may also like: “eCommerce B2B status of arts: growth in Italy but still lots to do”