Food trade and sales promotion - today
Marketing trends at the POS 2011
It's 2011 and what is considered to be one of the most important shopping trends? The discount stamp! For those in the know, that comes as no particular surprise: coupons have been making a comeback for several years, while other classics are less and less in demand. The marketing experts at UGW have compiled the latest trends in POS marketing in food retail (www.ugw.de).
The tried and tested in a new guise: discount stamp 2.0
In general, sales promotion, which is strongly linked to sales, is becoming increasingly important. The seemingly astounding "comeback of the discount market" has a diverse character, some with a modern face: special coupons, the redemption of which is linked to a minimum purchase amount for selected items, or coupons that reach the buyer via e-mail newsletter to be used for the next purchase - keyword discount stamp 2.0.
With this discount concept, branded companies can offer their coupon campaigns nationally or address precisely defined target groups. "In the future, mobile coupon campaigns will also be integrated into this strategic objective, which is associated with cost advantages," summarizes Gernot Lingelbach, Managing Director of UGW Communication GmbH, Wiesbaden. This means that special target group clusters can be reached more cost-effectively and more precisely than with classic spreading materials.
Class instead of mass - POS campaigns with added value are worth more
The days of promotional campaign packages with a standard display, top sign and special price at the POS are not over for good, but the trade is more interested in unusual, creative ideas. After all, the placement location, special offer and the presentation of the goods must "catch up" with the "Shopper 2011" even faster, clearer and more convincingly than before.
Creativity and individuality are also required for another marketing classic, namely personnel support by promoters. Retail continues to rely on this relatively expensive way of boosting sales, because an elaborately presented brand offers the opportunity to profile oneself together. For this, however, the retail trade demands well-trained, reliable and eloquent promotion staff as well as concepts individually tailored to the product in order not to provoke boredom or even annoyance in the shopper.
Loyalty without regrets – boom for loyalty points
Maintaining customers is more efficient than acquiring new ones. Trade managers therefore expect the importance of customer loyalty programs to continue to increase in the coming years. Online activities such as involvement in social media networks and e-mail newsletter campaigns are increasingly in focus here.
Traditional instruments such as customer magazines, customer cards or loyalty programs will continue to be the focus in stationary food retail and will even gain in importance. However, in the long term, it will not be possible to activate shoppers with inflationary loyalty point programs for towels, glasses or crockery. "Practice shows that there are more creative ways to inspire customers with content," says Lingelbach. Loyalty campaigns by Tegut (rainforest collection campaign) or Globus (tank discount analogous to purchase voucher amount) can be cited as examples of this.
VIP – Very Important Partner: Trend towards more individual POS campaigns
The retail giants keep getting bigger – and more powerful. A trend that follows from this are marketing activities at the point of sale, which are developed individually for a trading company by the branded goods industry. Retail increasingly demands such individual promotions in order to set oneself apart from the competition and to distinguish oneself from customers. The importance of such campaigns will continue to increase in the years to come.
However, smaller branded goods companies often lack the necessary budget for a completely individual appearance with all their relevant trading partners. Therefore, a thematic umbrella for national campaigns is designed, under which the individual partners are offered specifically tailored POS materials.
The Rise of Private Label
As part of the increasing professionalization and profiling of their own retail brands, the retailer's own brands are gaining in importance. All price categories from the premium segment to inexpensive goods are already covered with private labels in the classic food trade - and the trend is rising. In some product group segments, the private labels already have the largest market shares and leave the products of the industry far behind.
Opportunities are offered to the industry above all through intensive brand management and the clear knowledge advantage in the field of consumer research. "It is becoming even more essential for branded goods companies to develop innovative and coherent product concepts that have an emotional or technological edge in terms of consumer acceptance," says Lingelbach. After all, retailers want to continue to benefit from a strong branded product.
From the surface to the internet: Opportunity or risk?
And e-commerce? Is cut-throat competition expected here? Although there are signs of a trend towards parallelism between online and offline trade, neither purely online retailers nor full-range suppliers offering new online services are spreading fear. So far, there have been no major losses in regional business and German food retailers fear, if at all, that this will be in the long term at worst.
Become active yourself and market groceries online? Some retailers see this as an additional marketing opportunity, for example for special offers. However, the focus will continue to be on the core business of food retailing.
THE POS MARKETING TRENDS 2011 (source: www.ugw.de)
- Discount stamp 2.0 ► Trend towards digital couponing
- Creative or crea-deep? ► Trend towards POS campaigns with added value and more value
- VIP - Very Important Partner ► Trend towards more individual POS campaigns
- Loyalty without regrets ► Trend towards retail customer loyalty programs
- Trade. Makes. Brand. ► Trend towards promotion of private labels
- Online without fear ► Trend towards parallelism between online and offline trade
Source: Wiesbaden [ ugw ]
