Performance Branding and Retail Media

Over the years, performance marketing and brand building have functioned as two very different areas within brand and agencies objectives. Performance marketing, more numbers and short term sales driven and brand building, a more long-term exercise that is targeted towards a more holistic market share capture.

The same school of thought is generally extended when brands invest in different digital channels and platforms. Retargeting, search, email is usually connected with BOFU (Bottom of the funnel) vs Social, Youtube Videos, Programmatic with TOFU and MOFU.

But with the emergence of more shoppable platforms (Social Media Shops Selling, Google Shopping) and the emergence of retail media (Amazon AMS, Walmart Ads) the opportunity to combine awareness and direct response/sales objectives has emerged.

In a recent study, Facebook termed this practice as Performance Branding.

“Many advertisers today struggle to balance?short-term sales activation?with long-term brand growth. And while both are critical to marketing success, traditionally these strategies have been viewed as distinct. Often, performance marketing/DR and brand teams are in their own silos, with their own budgets and their own distinct – and perhaps conflicting – goals and priorities.” – Facebook on Performance Branding.

The above statement by Facebook is also a true story for a lot of brands looking to juggle their DTCs growth with online retail channels/marketplaces + offline shelf growth. Hence, performance branding as a KPI for eCommerce becomes even more relevant.

Amazon advertising + Retail media spend in general have seen massive growth over the last 2 years. According to eMarketer, there was 50% growth in 2020 on eCommerce Channel Ad Spends.

This in result is going to lead to channel clutter, higher CPAs, CPMs and CPCs on retailer platforms. Right now the retailer KPIs are more aligned towards BOPU, but the overall impact of ad spends could be justified as across the funnel.

A perfect example would be, sponsored products on Amazon which are at the top of the search. These sponsored products don’t only lead to higher chances of conversions but also contributes to the share of search.

-???????As a brand, and as an agency, it’s going to be important to introduce performance branding based KPIs to the retail media and DTC ads in general.

-???????Connection branding KPIs with Performance KPIs is going to be vital to prove retail media campaign success

-???????Merging the gap and reducing the silos between performance and branding teams will only lead to a more realistic understanding of overall media impact

What are some of the branding KPIs you have introduced as part of your eCommerce and Retail Media Spends?