Retail media

Albertsons Media Collective announced in June 2024 the launch of Collective TV, which will provide advertisers with the ability to target and measure ad campaigns across streaming, digital video and, eventually, linear TV through a unified platform. 

Albertsons’ retail media arm is working across numerous technology partners, including Google Display & Video 360, The Trade Desk and LiveRamp, to power and monetize Collective TV. 

This latest move by Albertsons aims to address the disjointed process advertisers and brands face when running connected TV campaigns by bringing planning, execution and measurement under one tool. 

Albertsons is rapidly expanding its digital retail media capabilities while keeping standardized metrics — an initiative the grocer is spearheading — as a priority. 

The launch of Collective TV aims to give advertising partners more capabilities when launching video ads across modes of television at a lower production cost and speed to market, according to a press release. 

“With Collective TV, we’re removing the silos between publishers, demand-side platforms, and identity solutions by offering an outcome-driven TV solution that is flexible, scalable and measurable,” Kristi Argyilan, senior vice president of retail media for Albertsons Media Collective, said in a statement. 

Collective TV provides advertisers with three service channels to choose from with offerings from multiple partners including Google Display & Video 360, The Trade Desk, LiveRamp, FreeWheel, iSpot and Clinch.

The Premium Offering Channel, for example, enables brands to create omnichannel video campaigns and gives access to additional connected TV inventory through FreeWheel as well as personalized and localized dynamic content optimization through Clinch. 

The DIY CTV Channel offers advertisers “build-it-yourself” capabilities, giving brands access to The Trade Desk’s connected TV inventory, which includes Albertsons Media Collective’s first-party audience data and measurement capabilities. 

“CTV represents some of the most premium inventory for advertisers,” Ben Sylvan, vice president of data partnerships for The Trade Desk, said in a statement. “Albertsons’ purchase-based data represents an opportunity for media buyers to bring that incredibly valuable data to inform their media buys on the big screen and focus on the most valuable buyers.”

The debut of Collective TV builds on Albertsons’ growing portfolio of retail media capabilities that aim to expand advertisers’ reach to customers. 

Earlier in June 2024, the grocery company announced a partnership with Rokt to broaden its retail media network’s reach of advertising partners and ad capabilities. Brands with products and services not sold online by Albertsons are now able to engage with the grocer’s retail media network and connect with its e-commerce customers through targeted ads.

Ahold Delhaize USA’s in-house retail media network wants to make it easier to work with CPG partners.

AD Retail Media has joined forces with ad sales platform Placements.io to streamline the retail media platform’s sales, advertising and finance operations, according to an announcement in June 2024. 

Bobby Watts, senior vice president of AD Retail Media, said in the statement that the tie-up will update its ad sales workflow and sharpen revenue management.

Ahold Delhaize USA said the partnership will increase operational efficiencies and help expand AD Retail Media's digital network through automated workflows and technology integrations with companies, such as Salesforce, Epsilon Retail Media, Meta and Pinterest. Placements.io will also provide retail-specific research and development and revenue management controls.

Combined, Ahold Delhaize’s U.S. brands, which include Stop & Shop, Food Lion, Giant Food and more, span more than 2,000 stores, process more than 23 million transactions per week, have nearly 24 million active loyalty card users and total more than $51 billion in annual sales, the company said.

In late 2022, Ahold Delhaize USA announced the transition of its retail media business to a fully in-house operation. In fall 2023 Watts stepped into his current role at AD Retail Media — a new position — to oversee the growth of the retail media arm and its revenue and partnerships.

As retail media ramps up in the grocery industry, Ahold Delhaize USA has been leveraging its scale against competitors vying for CPG ad dollars.

“We’re really maximizing that opportunity to partner with our CPGs, allowing them to work with our local brands, but also being able to leverage the full size and scale of Ahold Delhaize,” Ahold Delhaize USA CEO JJ Fleeman said at a conference in 2023. “I think as we look to the future, of course, standardization of measurement is going to be a really important topic for us all.”

Ahold Delhaize grew complementary revenue by 13% in 2023 through its retail media and consumer insights practices, the company said in its 2023 annual report. The company added in the report that it is focusing on building out its ad tech ecosystem and noted that AD Retail Media launched a new service in the U.S. with Citrus Ad and Epsilon to provide one platform for buying media and measurement.

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By Kevel

With most advertisers looking to work with 5-10 retail media networks, and with those networks constantly competing with other channels for spend, retailers must prove clear ROI in order to keep winning media budgets.

The ability for retail media networks (RMNs) to optimize performance is crucial for maximizing revenue and ensuring advertiser satisfaction. RMNs that prioritize attribution, incrementality, and traditional metrics like ROAS are positioning themselves to succeed. Advertisers are increasingly comparing performance across networks and channels, making it essential for retailers to transparently showcase key performance metrics. This guide provides strategies for optimizing your retail media network to rise to the top.

Emphasizing Key Performance Metrics

To stay competitive, retail media networks must focus on the following metrics:

1. Attribution: Accurate attribution models ensure that each touchpoint in the customer journey is correctly credited, helping to understand the true impact of your campaigns.
2. Incrementality: Measuring incrementality helps determine the additional value generated by your advertising efforts, beyond what would have happened without the campaign.
3. Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): This critical metric measures the revenue generated for every dollar spent on advertising, providing a clear indicator of campaign effectiveness.

Optimizing Ad Tech Stacks for Performance

A robust ad tech stack is essential for tracking and optimizing these metrics:

1. Advanced Analytics: Utilize tools that provide detailed insights into attribution, incrementality, and ROAS. These analytics will help you understand what’s working and where improvements are needed.
2. Integration: Ensure your ad tech solutions seamlessly integrate with your e-commerce platform to capture comprehensive data across all channels.
3. Real-Time Bidding (RTB): Implement RTB to dynamically optimize ad placements and budgets based on real-time performance data.

Enhancing Customer Journey with Transparency

Transparency in reporting and customer journey optimization are critical:

1. Clear Metrics: Provide advertisers with clear, transparent reports that highlight attribution, incrementality, and ROAS. This transparency builds trust and helps advertisers make informed decisions.
2. Seamless Experience: Ensure a consistent experience across all touchpoints, from initial engagement to conversion, enhancing the overall customer journey.
3. Personalization: Use data to deliver personalized ad experiences that increase relevance and effectiveness.

Reducing Friction Points in Media Buying

To maximize performance, address key friction points in the media buying journey:

1. Ad Load Speed: Optimize ad load times to prevent delays and enhance user experience.
2. Relevance: Ensure ads are highly relevant to the user’s interests and purchasing intent by leveraging detailed data insights.
3. Frequency Capping: Avoid ad fatigue by capping ad frequency, ensuring users aren’t overwhelmed by too many ads.

Driving Advertiser Engagement

To keep advertisers engaged and satisfied:

1. Customized Solutions: Offer tailored ad solutions that meet the unique needs of each advertiser, demonstrating your ability to deliver value.
2. Performance Reviews: Conduct regular performance reviews with advertisers to discuss results, share insights, and identify opportunities for optimization.
3. Innovative Formats: Introduce new and innovative ad formats that capture attention and drive higher engagement rates.

Implementing ROI Improvements

Enhancing ROI for both retailers and advertisers is a key goal:

1. Advanced Attribution Models: Use sophisticated attribution models to accurately measure the impact of each touchpoint.
2. Incrementality Testing: Regularly test and measure the incremental impact of your campaigns to ensure they are driving additional value.
3. Dynamic Budget Allocation: Optimize budget allocation across channels and campaigns based on real-time performance data to maximize ROI.

Future Trends in Retail Media

Staying ahead of emerging trends is crucial for continuous optimization:

1. Artificial Intelligence (AI): AI will play an increasingly important role in optimizing retail media by providing more precise targeting and real-time adjustments.
2. Augmented Reality (AR): AR ads will enhance user engagement by offering immersive experiences.
3. Voice Commerce: As voice assistants become more prevalent, optimizing ads for voice search and commerce will be essential.
4. Sustainability: Retailers will need to integrate sustainability into their media strategies, promoting eco-friendly products and practices.

Conclusion

Optimizing retail media performance involves a strategic focus on key metrics like attribution, incrementality, and ROAS. By enhancing your ad tech stack, reducing friction points, driving advertiser engagement, and staying ahead of trends, you can position your retail media network for success. Transparent reporting and continuous optimization will ensure that you not only meet but exceed advertiser expectations, securing your place at the top of the competitive retail media landscape.

Sam’s Club’s retail media network announced in July 2024 the launch of display ads in its app’s Scan & Go feature, integrating physical and digital retail media capabilities.  

The display ads will appear on the cart page of the club retailer’s app. The placement for these relevant pop-up ads aims to help shoppers more easily discover products and is a new way for Sam’s Club to measure member shopping behavior and ad performance in-store. 

Sam’s Club’s latest retail media move is the latest industry example of connecting digital retail media capabilities with the in-store experience.

The Walmart-owned club retailer's retail media network, Sam’s Club Member Access Platform (MAP), will display ads on the in-app cart page for members who opt into the service, according to the announcement. The ad then refreshes after each new product scan.

The new tool allows advertisers to connect with shoppers at the “point of conversion” and provides members with a more convenient shopping and product discovery experience, the press release noted. 

“This new capability reflects our member obsession and commitment to ensuring ads reach the right members at the right time in their shopping journeys,” Diana Marshall, Sam’s Club’s executive vice president and chief growth officer, said in a statement. 

The Scan & Go ad feature will also give Sam’s Club new insights into shopper behavior as well as the effectiveness of ads it pushes out. The ads will provide measurable results to the retailer’s ad and CPG partners, tracking metrics like return on ad spend, click-through rate, incremental sales and conversion rate, according to the press release. 

The new Scan & Go display ads are currently available in all clubs for select members, and Sam’s Club plans to roll it out to all of its in-club shoppers over the next few weeks.

While scan-and-go app features have had a touch-and-go relationship with other grocers, the payment method has been a success in Sam’s Club stores. In March 2024, the retailer shared that it has seen a 50% uptick in Scan & Go adoption over the past three years.

Expanding in-store retail media has been a defining advancement throughout the first half of 2024 as grocers push to bring digital personalization into store aisles. 

Aisle screens, digital kiosks and end-cap displays have grown in popularity over the past six months and, like Sam’s Club’s new Scan & Go ads, they aim to promote product discovery while consumers are actively shopping and serve up new ad placements. Industry experts are also pushing for grocers to continue finding avenues for syncing in-store retail media with app features.

Earlier in 2024, Save A Lot expanded its partnership with Swiftly, allowing its technology partner to update its website and power its first-ever mobile app. The app will give Save A Lot customers the ability to clip and redeem coupons and offers from their phones.

The Save Mart Companies plans to roll out In-Store Connect, an in-store retail media network powered by Quad/Graphics, Inc., according to an April 2024 announcement.

To start, 16 of the grocery company’s stores will have digital screens, kiosks, end caps, shelf screens and vertical banners throughout, allowing CPG partners to showcase promotions, product information and recommendations to shoppers. The program will eventually roll out to all of The Save Mart Companies’ approximately 200 stores. 

This is Save Mart’s latest retail media effort, coming almost a year after the launch of its own retail media network.

The Save Mart Companies’ three banners, Lucky, Save Mart and FoodMaxx, will all house the in-store technology with the initial rollout primarily happening in California’s Central Valley and San Francisco Bay area before rolling out chainwide, according to a spokesperson for The Save Mart Companies. 

Neither The Save Mart Companies nor Quad/Graphics disclosed how long the initial test period would last. “It’s an exciting new way to attract shoppers’ attention with motion and color while still being a relatively easy way for our vendor partners to participate,” the spokesperson added. 

Quad will work closely with the grocer’s vendor partners to create and deliver real-time promotions and product insight as customers shop while also integrating with The Save Mart Companies’ existing in-store platform, according to the announcement. 

“Physical stores continue to account for the vast majority of retail sales, especially for grocers,” Kevin Bridgewater, Quad’s senior vice president of retail initiatives, said in a statement, adding that in-store retail media bridges physical and digital consumer connections. 

The Save Mart Companies launched its retail media network in conjunction with retail technology company Swiftly in May 2023 and said at the time it was also considering adding smart carts and additional in-store video screens. 

Industry experts anticipate in-store retail media taking off throughout 2024 just as retail media networks dominated the industry throughout 2022 and 2023. With in-store shopping back in full swing, more grocers are finding ways to integrate digital media into their stores. 

Wakefern announced in 2023 that it had added nearly 100 sampling kiosks to its stores. In May 2023, Kroger announced it was adding digital smart screens powered by Cooler Screens to 500 of its locations across the U.S.

Meijer announced in March 2024 the addition of closed-loop measurement capabilities for on- and offsite display advertising through its retail media network. 

The expanded capabilities on Meijer Media are powered onsite by Google Advertising Manager and offsite via Google Display & Video 360, which Meijer says offers brand partners improved visibility to in-store and online campaigns on sales. 

Implementing closed-loop measuring capabilities across retail media platforms continues to be a key development for grocers because it provides advertisers with valuable and specific insight into customers’ shopping behavior and the impact of ad campaigns. 

The newly launched closed-loop reporting ability builds on Meijer Media’s current measurement capabilities as well as its digital partnerships. 

Meijer’s brand partners can customize customer messaging and deliver targeted content on- and offsite, in-app or on social media, according to the press release. The network has partnered with a number of third-party digital companies, including Google and Criteo, to power its retail media tools. 

Meijer Media also offers direct transaction data, allowing advertisers to connect with shoppers. Advertisers using the retail media network can also access an expanded set of channels, serving as a one-stop shop for reaching customers through personalized campaigns.

In the first quarter of fiscal year 2024, Meijer Media partner activations increased by more than 53% and campaign volume increased by 76% compared to the previous quarter. The grocer credits its platform’s new solutions to this growth, per the announcement. 

“Meijer Media has grown tremendously over the past year, delivering in-depth measurement and advanced customer insights that are difficult to uncover from more traditional advertising platforms,” Jeff Leitch, director of Meijer Media & category marketing at Meijer, said in a statement. “Our closed-loop reporting and data on real purchase behaviors gives our partner brands a deeper understanding of their customers.”

Connecting with shoppers is vital for advertisers, and more grocers are implementing closed-loop measuring tools to meet this need. 

In September 2023, Giant Eagle introduced closed-loop reporting capabilities to its retail media platform Leap. The tool allows brands to attribute in-store and online sales to specific points in the customer’s shopping trip.

Wakefern Food Corp. announced in March 2024 the launch of its retail media network, Wakefern Media Exchange, powered by Inmar Intelligence. 

The network aims to offer advertisers an easy management platform with cross-channel optimization and self-service campaign management. 

As retail media continues to grow at a rapid pace, retailers and third-party digital media partners are finding ways to streamline platforms and offer more CPG insights as well as simpler avenues to connect with shoppers.

Wakefern Media Exchange offers planning, activation and measurement controls for in-store marketing as well as on- and offsite media buying for advertisers, the retailer-owned cooperative announced via email. 

The newly launched network offers two buying models, managed service and self-service, for advertisers to use. The self-service option, powered by Inmar, offers features like “Smart Mode” and creative templates for a “simplified campaign setup and launch,” according to the announcement. 

Inmar is also bringing its self-service Offer Media tool to Wakefern’s retail media platform. The feature works within the platform’s user interface and helps users launch offsite media campaigns in minutes, driving awareness of digital coupons, per the announcement. The user interface also simplifies the campaign-building process and minimizes the need for media buying expertise by tapping offer details and auto-generating campaign creative. 

The platform’s capabilities offer advertisers the opportunity to showcase products and targeted messaging to Wakefern shoppers, the press release noted. 

Along with advertising tools, Wakefern Media Exchange also has automated reporting features that use key performance indicators to offer brands comprehensive insights on campaign performance. 

Inmar has been powering digital coupons and offsite media solutions with Wakefern for years, Inmar Chief Executive Officer Spencer Baird said in a statement. Currently, Inmar supplies 25 grocers with retail solutions and more than 40,000 retail locations utilize the company’s technology. 

As retail media becomes more dominant throughout the industry, grocers continue to bolster their platforms to offer brand partners personalization tools, real-time analytics and easier ways to connect with shoppers. 

In January 2024, Albertsons expanded its retail media arm in a partnership with commerce media company Criteo. Albertsons Media Collective began utilizing two of Criteo’s platforms as “self-service solutions” that enable the grocery company to connect its advertisers with customers as well as monetize online assets.

Northeast Grocery Inc. (NGI) is launching an omnichannel retail media network in partnership with Inmar Intelligence, according to a July 2024 announcement. 

The network, called Northeast Grocery Shopper Link, will provide off- and onsite media across NGI’s nearly 300-store footprint. 

Partnerships with third-party technology companies are becoming essential for regional grocers in the retail media industry as they offer streamlined platforms, more CPG insights and simpler ways to connect with shoppers.

The parent company of Price Chopper/Market 32 and Tops Friendly Markets is launching a digitally focused retail media network by expanding its decade-long partnership with Inmar. 

Northeast Grocery Shopper Link will provide the grocer’s advertising partners with “comprehensive and automatic cross-channel reporting and real-time campaign performance,” according to the press release, as well as increased scale and customization tools for advertising and media activations.  

The network will tap into Inmar’s Managed Service and Self-Service buying models, which include a tool that allows advertisers to launch offsite media campaigns and simplifies the campaign-building process by using an interface that pulls from offer details and auto-generates campaign creative. These campaigns will drive awareness of digital coupons, per the announcement. 

As the partnership expands NGI’s digital media presence, advertisers will be able to customize campaigns across each of the grocery company’s retail banners.

Throughout its partnership with NGI, Inmar helped the grocery company launch numerous digital coupons and media offerings, like Tops Shopper Link in 2021. 

In June 2023, Northeast Grocery expanded its partnership with Instacart to include new retail media features, including sponsored search, banner ads and more personalized recommendations to online shoppers.

Inmar’s work with NGI is not the technology company’s first time partnering with a grocer to assist in the launch of a retail media platform. In March 2024, Wakefern Food Corp. announced the debut of its retail media network Wakefern Media Exchange, powered by Inmar.