Building a retail digital footprint in 2021

Director, content marketing

Retail giants like Walmart, Target, and Walgreens understand the value of first-party audience data, which is why these and so many other retailers have launched their own retail media networks. By leveraging their customers’ digital footprints — like transactional data, offline and online behavior, and intent data — not only have retailers found ways to serve their customers better, but they’ve also unlocked revenue. By identifying and growing their customer’s retail digital footprint, which is hinged mainly on first-party data, these companies have redefined what it means to be a successful retailer, especially as we move closer to a cookieless, privacy-centric future.

Your business doesn’t need to be a retail behemoth to capitalize on the digital footprints of its customers, either. Companies of all sizes can combine their strong consumer relationships and first-party audience data to unlock revenue via media opportunities. And there are tremendous opportunities to be had. In 2020, Amazon made $15.7 billion in ad revenue, a figure projected to total $20 billion by the end of 2021. That’s a lot of dough — and you can get a piece of it too.

The impact of COVID-19 on eCommerce

The pandemic caused a boom in eCommerce, with people relying heavily on online shopping to secure items they needed while in quarantine. This forced businesses to adapt or succumb to retail’s version of natural selection, giving way to approaches like By Online Pick Up In-store (BOPIS) growing their retail digital footprint.

Now, with the world slowly opening back up, brands and retailers are focusing on how they can continue retaining digital-first relationships they secured during the pandemic and further their overall consumer relationships.

Instacart and LiveIntent: A Digiday webinar

SVP of product marketing and GTM strategy, Jessica Muñoz, and Instacart’s director of product ads, Vadim Tsemekhman, sat down to talk about building the retail digital footprint in 2021 in a Digiday webinar. The two gave valuable tips retailers can use to profit from digital assets and examples of how successful retailers, like Fanatics and Groupon, are doing that today. Some of those tips include:

  • Uncovering valuable shopper insights
  • Creating targeting that drives sales
  • Closing the loop with sales

Check out the entire webinar, produced in partnership with Digiday and LiveIntent, for the full scoop on how you can start building your retail digital footprint to secure success today and in a cookieless future.