Implications of the Integration of Retail Media

A G Lafley, CEO of P & G said “Media can (and usually should) work together to create a cohesive brand experience.” This is certainly true, and emphasizes the importance of integration across all media, not just retail media when you are creating a brand experience. Lafley then continues:

“Yet all too often, there's not enough communication between the different brand and agency groups responsible for all of the media formats being worked on. We see this in the digital signage world all the time. The agency responsible for putting together an in-store TV promo frequently can't get the necessary content assets -- let alone time with the marketing/creative professionals from the brand itself -- and therefore has to reinvent the wheel. This not only translates into more work when producing the in-store spots, but also creates fragmentation when the in-store media doesn't conform to existing marketing goals and campaign styles”

In digital signage, or in-store screens, the content required is very different from a standard television advertisement. The timings are different and the kind customer participation is different. When you are passing something as you walk your responses and level of interaction cannot be the same ad if you are sitting in a comfortable chair watching television with your family. This leads to the need for specialists in the particular medium to produce the right sort of content. At the same time you need to ensure brand consistency In order that the customer can recognise the brand message without having to work at it. As Lafley points out, consistency implies the sharing of assets. This in turn implies a high level of communication between the teams of specialists for each media.

It begins to sound like we are talking about the creation of an agency that just does retail media. This could solve some of the communication problems as well as enabling asset sharing. At the same time it would give the customer a single point of contact ensuring that the brand message is not given different interpretations each time it is passed to a relevant agency. So far this sounds good, so what are the cons? The major con is that no such agency exists. There is no one out there who does everything across all media to a sufficient standard to be the first choice for all media.

Practically speaking, what is the answer? A first step would be to minimise the number of agencies involved so as to allow as little as possible to fall through the cracks. The second step would be to try to persuade the agencies that display most competence to start taking on additional media and expanding their services. It should be possible to find an agency that specifically handles retail media and then persuade them to expand. They could do this either through bringing the new media in house or by evolving close partnerships with the best in breed of the non-retail media agencies. Putting agreements in place that they will share assets on joint clients as well as specific agreements about how this will take place.

There would be more steps beyond this before we reached the best of all possible worlds, but for the moment it would be good to hear about agencies who are moving in that direction. Failing that, are there any who are offering good reasons, beyond “that isn’t how we work” for why they are not doing this.

Rufus Evison