Consumers And Retailers Share Different Views On Marketing

Consumers and retailers broadly differ in their opinions when it comes to the successfulness of brands’ marketing initiatives. This suggests that brands must ramp up their marketing efforts to ensure they are targeting people with the right message.

I read recently results from a study among 2,190 consumers and 100 retailers in the UK from business analytics firm SAS and researcher Conlumino. Results showed that nearly seven in ten (69%) of retailers are certain that their marketing campaigns are effective, and a similar percentage believe they have encouraged customers to make a purchase. Consumers, however, don’t seem to share retailers’ excitement about campaigns; only 37% of them said marketing material would increase the likelihood of making a purchase with a particular retailer. The rest of the sample agreed that retailers’ marketing activities had zero effect or even a harmful effect on their attitude towards brands.

Three in ten of the polled retailers feel that their marketing efforts could be more effective. According to the research, a possible solution to making marketing more successful is getting to know customers better. More than 70% of retailers agree that a deeper knowledge of customers would have a positive impact on their marketing activity.

Both consumers and retailers, however, consider that relationship is key to making a customer more likely to buy a product. According to 81.6% of consumers, having an emotional connection with a brand is a huge incentive to make a purchase.

Generally, 38.8% of consumers would be happy to receive marketing materials from a retailer, which is actually a higher percentage that many would expect. E-mail is considered the most preferred channel for communication with brands, followed by post. Surprisingly, social media and text emerge as methods that are broadly unacceptable for interaction, as they are considered channels too personal for communication.