Innovations in Shopper Marketing: Current Insights and Future Research Issues

Shopper marketing refers to the planning and execution of all marketing activities that influence a shopper along, and beyond, the entire path-to-purchase, from the point at which the motivation to shop first emerges through to purchase, consumption, repurchase, and recommendation. The goal of shopper marketing is to enable a win–win–win solution for the shopper–retailer–manufacturer. Shopper marketing has emerged as a key managerial practice among manufacturers and retailers, who are eagerly embracing innovations in the different aspects of shopper marketing. We review current and potential innovations in shopper marketing. We identify the managerial challenges to achieving new win–win–win solutions among shoppers, manufacturers, and retailers in shopper marketing and outline future scenarios and research issues related to these challenges.

► Shopper marketing – activities that influence a shopper along the shopping cycle – aims at enabling a win-win-win solution for the shopper-retailer-manufacturer.
► Emerging innovations in shopper marketing include those on digital marketing activities, multichannel marketing, store atmospherics and design, in-store merchandising, metrics, and organization.
► Major underexplored research issues related to shopping cycle include: new insight generation through non-traditional discoveries, interaction effects of rational, emotional drivers, individual and environmental factors on shopper behavior, collection and linking of data to insights and shopper marketing actions, allocation of shopper marketing budget for different out-of-store and in-store marketing activities, alignment of incentives of the shoppers, retailers and manufacturers, and use of multiple channels to influence shopper decisions.