CONSUMER MARKETING INNOVATIONS
innovation and e-commerce becoming fundamental areas of focus for companies, with a few focal points over the coming years:
1. Digital transformation has been accelerated through necessity Players that adapt the quickest, with truly useful value propositions answering emerging behaviours, will be the ones that persist, as opposed to brands entering the D2C space with no reason to be there.
2. Changing route-to-market models and driving experimentation According to a 2020 McKinsey study, 96% of businesses changed their go-to-market model after the pandemic hit, with the overwhelming majority turning to multiple forms of digital engagement with customers.
Hand-in-hand with this will go an increased prioritisation of gaining fully opted-in first-party data. Brands will be working harder than ever to gain direct knowledge of and access to customers – especially as the cookie crumbles into extinction. One great example is Adidas, which developed a D2C model in 2017, when it introduced the Adidas app, offering an experience tailored to users’ preferences and behaviours. This was then extended into Creators Club – a membership programme aiming to drive better engagement with customers, providing exclusive rewards and access to products, experiences and services in exchange for advocacy and time invested in the brand. These proved to be great developments, ahead of their time, supporting accelerated revenue growth and increase brand awareness during the pandemic. Creators Club became the core online channel for Adidas in the last 12 months, delivering 60% of its online sales and driving brand engagement to new levels. For the same reasons, we are likely to see an acceleration in how retailers digitise their physical stores. Particularly at the luxury end, they will become theatres for exploration and interaction. Look at Burberry’s new store in Shenzhen, China. The 5,800-square-foot store is split up into 10 rooms for customers to explore and interact with, in person or through social media. Through a dedicated WeChat mini program, developed through an exclusive partnership with Tencent, shoppers will be able
to earn social currency as they explore the store, which they can use to access exclusive content and personalised experiences. Each customer is given a digital animal character that evolves as they engage with in-store experiences. And this is set to continue. Many brands and retailers are starting to take more seriously the growth potential of the channel. Data will allow us to better understand what, where and how consumers engage with products. In this context it is key to create outstanding experiences through e-commerce and social commerce to unlock new growth opportunities.
3. Need for new offerings Food distributors that traditionally supplied restaurants set up digital direct-to-consumer channels as the crisis decimated their core restaurant sales. Similarly, the entertainment industry generated new content (for example, sports retrospectives) to fill the void in programming created by the suspension in sports leagues.
Across the entertainment sector as a whole, the pandemic has given streaming services huge impetus. The timing of the Disney+ launch was particularly fortunate. Soon after launch, the company said it aimed to have as many as 50 million subscribers by 2025. As we’ve all come to learn, Disney announced it surpassed that goal in its first eight months, releasing the staggering news that over 55 million subscribers had already signed up to the service.
4. Rapid change in customer behaviour For years the videoconferencing market enjoyed steady growth by focusing on corporate customers. This market typically required expensive deployments, often involving the physical installation of specialised equipment and training. Now Zoom, with its simple set-up, has become the household way of working, staying in touch with friends, exercising, learning and so on. This new behaviour is likely to seep into other areas of life. Many retailers are pushing hard on live-streaming. China leads the way: live-streaming e-commerce was expected to grow to $129bn last year, according to iMedia. Focusing on direct-to-consumer channel
brands can further improve the customer experience, based on deep customer behaviour understanding. By using behavioural science,
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