Online Location, Location, Location

In retail marketing, location is everything. For years, brands have been relying on end caps to push their products straight into the path of consumers. As the digital marketplace continues to grow, retailers are trying to replicate that product placement experience on their websites.

In the digital world, end cap shelf space usually comes in the form of “featured products” that are shown at the top of retailers’ pages. Such placement has been shown to produce so many clicks and sales that brands and manufacturers are often willing to pay for that prime location.

Now a new shopper marketing program from DiJiPOP is giving retailers the ability to let manufacturers control their own brand marketing initiatives. The company’s proprietary POP technology automates the digital shopper marketing process, allowing brands to insert chosen products and services on relevant retailer pages, all within minutes.

“We integrate all the products that are sold through that dotcom retailer and essentially give them the ability to create shelf space,” says DiJiPOP CEO and founder Ji Kim. “They can create these [digital] product slots and allow manufacturers to start paying for it.”

While many retailers have similar systems in place, most are changed or updated manually. The DiJiPOP solution takes the hassle out of the manual process, seamlessly syncing manufacturers’ catalogs with a retailer’s website so they can create product ads dynamically and allow advertisers to manage, analyze and optimize campaigns in real time.

Allowing manufacturers and brands to check into the system and see analytics, clicks, costs and sales gives them control and a transparent view into their own campaigns. That allows them to measure effectiveness during their campaigns rather than after it.

“It allows retailers, through one system, to go through thousands of ad places and automate the process of merchandising slots on the retail website,” Kim says. Vendors can use the system to push specific products on a retailer’s site.

Early results show promise
Those benefits to vendors, combined with the ease of the DiJiPOP solution, create a system where vendors are eager to get involved and pay for shelf space. Retailers can still maintain control, determine what placements to offer, approve campaigns submitted by brands and measure results — all after doing little more than uploading their product catalogs, setting the parameters and inserting code in their own websites.

According to Kim, early results with several customers are showing notable returns. In one case, shopper marketing drove an 11 percent lift in incremental sales for the advertiser and retailer after implementing the DiJiPOP platform. For retailers that aren’t monetizing their digital shelf space, Kim says DiJiPOP can also build up to 5 percent of gross sales in new revenue with controlled, point-of-purchase placement for brands.

Partnering with brands on the front end can not only capitalize shopper traffic, it can also generate new revenue for e-tailers with the correct placement at the point-of purchase. With more and more consumers taking their shopping process online, Kim says that product placement on retail websites is critical.

“Where [advertising spend] really counts is at the retail websites where consumers actually start and finish their shopping process,” he says. “They’re now starting on retail websites before the search engines.”