Among the main trends affecting the world of digital advertising, the retail media phenomenon is certainly the most interesting one: over 128.2 billion dollars of investments are expected by 2024 and the possibility of becoming the third largest channel globally. (Data provided by Warc, updated to October 2023)
No different from the global context is the situation in the old continent: according to data released by Adjiin Italia, it is estimated, in Europe, that the share of retail media advertising will reach an average growth rate of more than 37% by 2027, from 8.9% of the total digital advertising in 2023, compared to a market that will instead grow at around 6.6%
The Italian reference picture is also interesting, where, to date, retail media advertising accounts for about 9% of the investments in digital campaigns.
With the now radicalised growth of the eCommerce sector, the much anticipated deprecation of third-party cookies, and the consequent need to find new opportunities for cross-domain audience profiling, retail media is looking like an opportunity for advertisers that should not be missed due to the large amount of data and audience information that retailers have at their disposal.
But let’s take a closer look into what retail media advertising is.
Advertising and retailing: two worlds no longer so distant
The term “retail media advertising” defines a new advertising model that allows brands and companies to promote products or services within the retailer’s channels or by using information and data on customers in their possession.
This advertising model in itself does not include any innovative assets, on the contrary it aims to systematise those already known: ecommerce channels, programme advertising activities, digital out of home (DOOH), spaces on virtual shop windows and in-store totems, but above all data and information on the retailer’s users and customers, become the pivotal elements.
The real novelty lies in the possibility of exploiting strategies but above all technological solutions that allow these assets to be maximised through virtuous integration.
Prize competitions, fidelity cards, point collection: at every stage of the customer journey, there is a multitude of data and information that users and customers release on the brand’s digital and non-digital properties.
Personal details, but above all information relating to purchasing behaviour and habits, interests, tastes, passions: all this data, on the one hand, that of the retailer, represents a real strategic resource, not only with a view to personalising the customer experience.
This is where the other big advantage of this model comes into play, that of the advertisers.
While the retailer has the possibility to monetise data and space within its properties, the advertiser is presented with the opportunity to exploit this data and space for even more effective and high-performance campaigns.
Retail media allows precisely this, and it is precisely because of this undoubted ability to represent a winning model for advertisers and retailers that it can be considered, in its own right, the third wave of the advertising market after the advent of search engine marketing and social media advertising.
Retail media advertising: which types?
IAB Italy, in its white paper dedicated to retail media (White Paper | Retail Media, May 2024), identifies three different types of retail media.
On-Site Retail Media
This typology includes campaigns that exploit the retailer’s digital properties and in particular the web channel. We refer in particular to email and SMS marketing, banner space in the retailer’s shop.
Off-Site Retail Media
In contrast to the previous category, all advertising campaigns activated on channels outside the retailer’s own channels such as CTV, social networks, and programme platforms are included here.
The other important typology concerns Retail Data, i.e. the possibility of exploiting the data held by retailers for business analysis, but, above all, to create targeted target audiences for more high-performance and measurable campaigns.
Technology and retail media: a winning combination
As we can easily guess in a retail media advertising strategy, the contribution of a high-performance technological solution plays a crucial role because, not only does it allow a centralised management of data on users and the related personalisation activities also in the ADS scope, but it also becomes fundamental for a correct management of data in privacy-compliant mode.
From CRM to marketing automation platforms, which allow retailers to manage customer relations, to more articulated solutions such as Customer Data Platforms, which allow the value of first-party data to be fully exploited for advanced profiling strategies and personalisation activities: the technological solutions that can be used are truly numerous on both the retailer and advertiser sides.
At this specific juncture, we recall the importance of data and audience management solutions, such as DMPs and their technological evolutions, which allow greater integration with CTV, walled gardens and solutions for data collaboration activities, up to platforms designed for specific ad management.
We close this brief excursus on technological solutions by recalling data clean rooms, designed precisely to facilitate data collaboration in safe, secure and privacy-compliant environments.
Retail media with Blendee: the advantage of an end-to-end solution
Shifting the focus to the main technological solutions involved in a retail media project, the multiplicity of functionalities that can be deployed to contribute to the effectiveness of one’s strategy clearly emerges.
Blendee’s Marketing Operating System allows for many of the aforementioned functionalities in a single platform, a single end-to-end solution capable of presiding over the entire user’s customer journey.
An evolution of more traditional adtech and martech platforms, Blendee integrates the functionalities of a modern Customer Data Platform with those of a high-performance Audience Platform and an Ad Server.
Data collection and normalisation at the level of unified customer view, advanced profiling, audience enrichment and extension, but that’s not all: Blendee’s Marketing Operating System enables personalisation activities, marketing strategies and data-driven advertising, optimising investments and performance.
Thanks to a unique technology stack, Blendee’s madtech overlayer is a unique modular solution offering advertising and marketing engines and apps, which are indispensable for media retail strategies.
The entry of retailers into the world of advertising, whether this takes place at the stage of offering advertising space, rather than choosing target audiences or measuring performance, represents an interesting opportunity for brands and advertisers who, faced with the deprecation of third-party cookies, are called upon to confront new paradigms.
First-party data, as we can see, assume a truly strategic role on both sides of the coin, and become the enabling factor for personalising the customer experience in its broadest sense.
