Let’s say you’re at a party. You have something to tell your friend, who is all the way across the room. Several of the people at the party already know about the thing you’re wanting to communicate, and the rest of them don’t have any interest in that particular piece of information. Would you shout the information at top volume across the room so your friend (and everyone else) can hear it? Probably not. You would probably walk over to your friend, so you could deliver the information to them directly. Now, when you’re standing next to your friend, it’s very unlikely that you would turn away from them and tell your information to the stranger standing beside them. Communication with a specific person is the whole reason you went over there! A brand’s ability to reach and activate their target audience at a category level is very similar to this scenario.
Wide Nets and Missed Targets
Because most brands don’t have access to granular data about category-specific activation triggers, it’s difficult to know how and where to best reach their target audience. Inside of categories and subsegments, shopper activation operates on both emotional and rational motivators. Because of this dualistic motivation, strategies that work well for one subsegment may not be as effective in another. Instead of being able to target exactly the right shopper with exactly the right information (in exactly the right place) brands inadvertently end up shouting across the whole party to reach their intended audience, or mistargeting and specifically addressing the wrong person. This invariably leads to missed opportunities.
We developed our Shopper Activation Framework as a roadmap to grow brands. In a recent study using our framework, we drilled down into category-level activation to uncover specific triggers, drivers, and motivations within a large representative US market. What did we find?
Certain subsegments were majorly underdeveloped with impulse buyers. Other subsegments were over-indexed relative to the total category. We were able to identify the ideal targets, clarify what appealed to them when shopping, and pinpoint which categories and channels would benefit from the most focus. From this information, we were able to develop the roadmap to encompass packaging, in-store signage, planogram, and merchandising to increase activation along all points of the path to purchase.
Growth is about understanding opportunity, and traditional market research methods fall short when considering the complexity of shoppers’ emotional and rational drivers. Our Shopper Activation Framework overcomes these shortcomings to provide pinpoint and nuanced shopper insights across the total US landscape to reveal opportunities and drive sales.
Contact us today for a complimentary SAF overview of your category.
