How online marketing can drive offline sales

Most retailers and suppliers realize just how much digital has changed the retail landscape. The challenge going forward is leveraging that digital influence into brick and mortar sales.

According to IRI, an estimated half of CPG market growth is occurring online. Still, despite day-of delivery options and consumers being able to get essentially anything they’ve ever dreamed of online, the fact remains that 95 percent of CPG purchases are still made in brick-and-mortar outlets. While CPG purchases are likely to remain predominantly offline in the near future, digital is influencing 77 percent of retail decisions, even in the largely offline CPG world.

While consumers frequently shop for CPG items in a store, they also spend a lot of time
online researching products, often on social media, where their impressions of brands
form easily. The time consumers spend online provides valuable opportunities to
engage and influence even those actions they take offline. These are impressions that
can ultimately drive loyalty in addition to catalyzing online and offline sales.

A new IRI report, "Influence Offline CPG Purchase Behavior with Digital Media," explores how data, technology and analytic horsepower have evolved and come together to give CPG manufacturers and retailers the insights they need to change the game. Deterministic data — actual purchase data from FSP databases — can now be integrated with demographic and modeled solutions to paint an incredibly accurate picture of imminent buyers — even offline CPG buyers. This knowledge allows marketers to develop programs that will deliver the right message to the right shoppers at the right time and in the right location.

Download the IRI report HERE.