Latest / IAB Europe podcasts / Retail Media Roundtable - Retail Media Flywheel: Driving Growth, Performance, and Customer Value

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Retail Media Roundtable - Retail Media Flywheel: Driving Growth, Performance, and Customer Value · IAB Europe podcasts

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Retail Media Roundtable, the podcast from IVO that dives into the dynamic world of retail and commerce media advertising.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: In this special edition, powered by our partners MirrorClads, we're bringing you fresh insight straight from the heart of the action, recorded live at our Retail Media Impact Summit in Amsterdam.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: So whether you're seeking practical tips, strategic perspectives, or a deeper understanding of this fast-moving space, the Retail Media Roundtable is your go-to for timely and thought-provoking discussions.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: And in these exclusive live episodes, you'll hear directly from the experts and leaders influencing the future of retail and commerce media in Europe.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: So grab a seat at the table and let's dive in.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_03: I'm going to start with introducing myself.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_03: My name is Yara Daher, and I work for the IAB on all things retail media.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm very pleased to be joined by Andreas over here and Tom.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_03: Andreas, you're with Miracle.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_03: Do you want to tell us a little bit about yourself?
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, um, super excited to be here in Amsterdam and uh listen to all these folks.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's kind of like where lots of leaders come together um to shape the future of retail media.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_02: Looking forward to listening to you.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and yeah, I'm heading up like uh the ME uh business uh for Miracle.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_03: Great.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_03: And you're new at the job, right?
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_02: Pretty new, yeah.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: About two months in now.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: Wow, okay, that's exciting.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_03: And Tom, you were just telling me you're a marketplace guru.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_03: Besides being a marketplace guru, can you tell me a little bit about your role at Devon Hams?
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, of course.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so I look after growth solutions for our marketplace community.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so anything that's gonna help them to sell more effectively, whether that's retail media, uh fulfillment, delivery, payments, this sort of thing.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_03: And you have a wide array of experience in marketplace?
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: Bouncing around various marketplaces, Amazon, TikTok, but yeah, uh currently at Debonham's.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_03: Fantastic.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_03: Um so retail media has become an important part of Debenham's marketplace growth.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_03: Can you tell us a little bit about that, uh, about the journey, and how do you expect it to drive additional revenue?
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_03: What does the flywheel, as we like to call it, look like?
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's a great question.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: I I think we've always seen it as a um a key priority.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I guess particularly since replatforming is a miracle ads, it was when we really got a taste for what that could look like.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um and not only was it an income generation uh uh solution, but also we saw great feedback from our brand partners uh in what they were seeing out of the technology.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: So not just were they getting more visibility, they were also driving more sales.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um and for us that's super important because we're always looking to add value for the brand partner community.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um and the income that we do generate off this can also be reinvested back in the on-site experience, whether that's adding value for the partners or for the end customer.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um and that's why we see it as such a critical priority.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_03: So there's multiple revenue streams that you see from a marketplace partner's.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_03: For those of us who are not very familiar with that, could you walk us a little bit through how that works?
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so so from a retail media perspective is the question.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so um we've we've diversified quite a lot since getting started.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's no longer just kind of sponsored products uh as the table stakes.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: We've we've rolled out new ad formats as well, uh, breaking into shoppable ads, display banners, uh, sponsored video.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: We really want to offer the partner community a diversified way of elevating their brands, uh, particularly with some of those upper funnel um ad formats as well.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_03: And getting those ad formats in place is not always linear.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_03: Can you walk us through that journey and what needs to happen internally to be able to achieve that and then what brands ask you in return for it?
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: And particularly with a business that is a hybrid across marketplace and OneP, um, is an ongoing uh discussion and challenge point where um there's a few things that go into it.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, on the one hand, you have the creative side, and uh with the brand partners we have, some will have the ability to do that in-house, some will want to rely on us for a creative studio or or um leverage AI tools.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: So that's kind of the first piece.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: And then beyond that, partnering with Miracle to uh assess how we target the categories that they want to target in a way that engages the customer well.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, those are all super critical points.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: And then lastly, that interplay between those teams and then the internal 1P brand teams, ensuring that all parties feel that they're represented at the table, uh, either 1P advertisers or 3P advertisers.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sure these are really fun conversations.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_03: 1P, 3P, who gets priority, how?
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_03: Can you give us a bit of a caricature of the debate that happens?
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's it, I mean, it's definitely a balancing act.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we we need to ensure that we are prioritizing all sides and making sure that we are not shooting ourselves in the foot ultimately.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I think Miracle's been a great part in doing that.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the analysis on what converts well, where it converts well, um, making sure all parties feel represented in that they can come to the table and advertise as well.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: So um when we initially rolled out ads with a previous uh um provider, it was largely just a 3P um business.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas now we've we've extended out into 1P such that the large brands that were buying wholesale uh can also participate and therefore they they feel that it's uh uh fair.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_03: So that's interesting.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_03: You started with marketplace first, 3P is marketplace, just in case that's not clear.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_03: You started with marketplace first, and then you rolled it out to the brands who actually sell the 1P brands.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_03: Why did you go that direction?
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_03: I feel like most start the other way around.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's it's an interesting question.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: I think largely on account of the fact that the the share of marketplace is so big at the moment.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: So um what we found is that a lot of the brands on Marketplace were already doing retail media on other platforms.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Most of them are selling on 10, 15 other channels already, and retail media is table stakes on a lot of those.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: So they're used to it.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: So the sell was a bit easier in terms of like bringing them on board for the journey.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um with 1P advertisers, um, there was a bit more education to be done on advertising on a site where we're buying from them wholesale.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but we've we've taken them along for the journey and now we're seeing some great results.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_03: Fantastic.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_03: And Andreas, you at Miracle are in a unique position because you really thread that balance between 1P and 3P as a technology.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_03: Can you walk us through what makes that unique at Miracle and how you're able to deliver on that promise?
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, totally.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, uh the point that or the question that you just asked about like how do you moderate that?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_02: Like, how do you guarantee like a good shopping experience at the same time, like how you monetize your surfaces, I think is at the core of like this this question and what do we want to answer?
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_02: So essentially, I think for any type of like technology decision, if companies decide partnering with us, I think like one recommendation I would have like look for like how can you remove friction in that journey, right?
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_02: Like bring in a technology partner uh that can help you like uh launch your retail media without like the next three months kind of like engineering project.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um get started quick and learn.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_02: And uh to the question of like what should be like an ads monetized surface, what should not be an ads monetized surface?
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I think we have like uh tools that allow you to have like that debate.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: You want to have that as a KPI first uh discussion and not as a debate.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: You don't want to have like people kind of like sit in a room and just like argue about it.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_02: You want to have like a really rational way of like going about it, and so use the tools that are available.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_02: And so like that's one of the things that I love that like we can we can partner with with companies in that way.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_02: I think um what else do I see kind of is really uh important?
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: I think ultimately also removing not only like internally all that friction, right?
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh but also like externally.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_02: How do you get to bring in all the sellers, all the brands without any kind of like friction that you could introduce?
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_02: I mean it's okay to have like managed service, but have like managed service sit on top of like a self-serve, right?
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_02: Have your folks sell rather than like manage stuff, and so with that, uh we believe in like self-service plus uh enable your teams to sell to uh to marketplace sellers, to large brands uh and uh make campaign creation as simple as possible, right?
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_02: We live in this wonderful world uh where uh the latest technology allows us to optimize for outcomes in the best possible way.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_02: We have cutting-edge technology that allows us to do that, and we want to give that at the hands of our partners.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_02: And then I think um finally is like you know, having like really strong relevancy.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, you go to Amazon and you see a sponsor product ad that feels like it is your choice.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_02: It feels like that's something that you feel totally comfortable buying.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, not every marketplace and not every retailer across Europe actually manage that really manages that really well currently.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, choose technology, choose a partner that allows you to have like strong relevancy, where you get like ads in front of your shoppers that feel natural, where the shopping doesn't uh degrade, and where you can make sure that like you you test for that too, that like the shop experience is excellent, but you also like ramp up your monetization.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_03: So, three things, if I heard you correctly.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_03: The first one is yield management or ensuring that you know where to place an ad and where to go organic.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_03: And I'd love to dig into that one a little bit more.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_03: So give me a second.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_03: The second one you said was ensuring um you have self-service, you can have managed service on top, but self-service should be table stake.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_03: Totally.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_03: And the third one is relevance, right?
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_03: And completely agree.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_03: Without those three things, you couldn't deliver.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_03: But the first one I think is particularly interesting because everybody's taking a slightly different take on how to measure the trade-off between organic and paid.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_03: Can you walk us a little bit through that logic?
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_03: And maybe you went through that exercise if you could tell us how you thought about it.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: No, I I think we we we had to zoom out and look at the bigger picture on this rather than just looking at it from a retail media lens, uh, particularly with our own brands and and wholesale bought-in brands.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there is obviously the consideration around ads income, um, but also what is the trade-off on having a sponsored product in that slot versus not?
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and this is where relevancy also comes into the question.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: If we are going to put a sponsored product there because it generates ad income, but it's not relevant, yes, okay, it might generate ads income, but does that exceed the income we would have generated by actually just selling a relevant product?
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so we took this all the way back down to a pure profitability standpoint and worked with our finance teams and Miracle to really assess like where are the right places to be advertising?
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: Does the relevancy in those particular places stack up versus what we need it to?
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not always a black and white conversation.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: In some categories, it will be better than others.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: And that can come down to advertiser density in the given category.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: So in areas where we maybe need more advertisers or or have some work to do to bring on the right base, maybe that's somewhere where you would step back until you have that level of density.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_03: So were you making decisions at the category level?
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_03: You were.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_03: And is that easy to manage within Miracle?
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: It it yeah.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: So we've done a bit of development work with Miracle uh in partnership to have that nuance.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: So we have three core categories: fashion, home, and beauty.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, in those categories, we have good density, but the mix between 1P and 3P can vary.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: So the ability to be able to vary the level of inventory by category for us was critical in balancing that internal conversation.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_02: I think uh I mean the what what you just described, uh, I think is like at the at the core of like how to build out a real strong retail media business.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's also not like you do that once and implement, it is actually a journey that you go about.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_02: And I think like it's also a journey of like launching marketplace and then monetizing is also like a journey.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_02: So I think what we see as we as we partner, ultimately, as you bring in marketplace partners, sellers uh that are that are on your website, you essentially broaden your your your the number of products that you sell, your assortment gets larger, you have like additional sellers there.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that uh enables like your shoppers, the folks who trust you that come that come to your site, they they will like shop more, they will browse more, they will search more.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_02: Uh you get like much richer data from their behavior because they go through like all of your assortment.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: And the the the key thing is like with the technology that we that we built, like all this richer data that you have now available, you can use like for much better targeting.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_02: You have like a truly personalized experience for every shopper because you you can use their navigate, you can use their browse, you can use their search, and you have like really rich data that you can leverage suddenly and like have a really personalized, uh highly relevant ad for that specific shopper.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_02: And so like it takes like a journey to go through this.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_02: Now, as you have like a personalized ad that you that you can show there, um sellers also get really high return on investment.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: And these are typically companies that don't get um they don't have like come don't come with large brands often, they often look for visibility, they want to grow, like it that's that's like the whole game.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_02: So you give them something that they really, really, really want, and then you remove all the friction for them to buy like ads.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and so that becomes like a profitable thing.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_02: Do you want to like do you wanna like buy more ads?
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: And uh you can like decide do you want to make more uh inventory available?
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_02: And you kind of like continue that journey and you can ramp up your retail media business in that way.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_02: I and I think like it's a it's a flywheel that uh we feel proud of like working together on, and uh it's it's it's an exciting journey.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's also fun for the team to work through it.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's not easy, right?
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's uh it's like there is you know, it's like it's tough on the teams to kind of like take these decisions, but you can take rational decisions on it, like go after the numbers and like go through the journey together.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_02: It's really fun.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: Agree.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean it's it's a constantly moving picture, particularly as you evolve uh and as you bring on more advertisers and more campaigns and open up more inventory.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: But I think it's uh I agree, it's a it's a fun discussion to have, uh, particularly when the output of all of this is that you're adding value for the partners, as Andreas mentions, like they are seeing incremental sales and and and profitably.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: And for a lot of the brands on on site, they are um they're looking to grow awareness.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, that there's a real mix from from SMB to large enterprise.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and particularly in that SMB tier, a lot of them are looking to grow that brand awareness.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: So to be able to do that where we've democratized the digital real estate that we have is is really powerful for them.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_03: Democratized the digital real estate that you have.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_03: Um feels like a pretty good place to leave this conversation.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_03: Is there any parting words you want to have with the audience today?
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think, yeah, I mean, what I would advise brands is is to engage with us on this uh this lever.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: I think people are seeing really good results.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and yeah, we're really excited about the opportunity that it presents for them as as they expand.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_03: Andreas, do you have anything?
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_02: I look forward to seeing both of you on stage today.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_02: I can't wait for it.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, I can't wait.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_03: It's gonna be really fun.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_03: Um, thank you both for joining us.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_03: You're our first session of the morning, so we're all fresh and ready.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and yes, hopefully we'll see you soon.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks very much.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.