Seven Leaders on Creating

The Ultimate eCommerce Presence

WITH CHAPTERS BY

The Definitive Guide to The Perfect Page

DESIGN BY CONTENT26

PRODUCED BY

Table of Contents

IRI / Page 34

HELPING FIRMS MEASURE ONLINE PERFORMANCE & OPTIMIZE CROSS-CHANNEL GROWTH

ECOMMERCE CONTENT CREATION

Content26 / Page 4

WELCOME

Page 3

CONCLUSION

Page 38

Webcollage / Page 12

OPTIMIZING WITH ENHANCED CONTENT

Criteo / Page 22

DRIVING TRAFFIC

Salsify / Page 8

TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR PRODUCT EXPERIENCE

Clavis / Page 27

WHAT IS ECOMMERCE ANALYTICS?

Bazaarvoice / Page 18

THE ROLE OF CONSUMER-GENERATED CONTENT IN DRIVING CONSIDERATION & CONVERSION

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Welcome

FROM THE CLAVIS INSIGHT TEAM:

As a global leader in the eCommerce ecosystem for product manufacturers,

we are often asked for best practices and insights into eCommerce optimization.

While eCommerce is decades old, the rapid evolution of online retailer technology

and innovation means manufacturers constantly have new opportunities to win

at the shelf. But how?

The most common questions relate to the product detail page, which makes sense.

In a brick and mortar environment, shoppers have the physical shelf, associates and

product packaging to help them make purchase decisions. At online retailers, the

product detail page requires every product to stand on its own. That means that

manufacturers must work harder to get their products to be found, considered,

and purchased. And while research may happen online, the actual purchase may

take place offline, making the path to purchase more convoluted than ever before.

Of course, measurement and analysis need to underpin all activities, but measurement

and analysis are pointless unless they are linked to actions and initiatives. This is why

Clavis works closely with select partners to ensure that our analytics integrate with

their programs. It’s also the reason that we invited six other industry-leading

technology and service providers to contribute best practices specific to

their areas of expertise and capability.

Together, we’ve created this Definitive Guide to the Perfect Page – an eCommerce

“cookbook,” if you will, filled with recipes that will guide manufacturers on how

to build the Perfect Page, drive traffic to it, and ultimately drive conversion.

Each chapter includes a case study so you can learn how other manufacturers

have solved for some of the same pain points you may be facing today.

We hope you are able to benefit from this collaboration.

If we can help answer any additional questions or provide further detail on how

to build the perfect page, please reach out to Clavis or any of our partners.

We’d love to help you win online.

Sincerely,

THE CLAVIS TEAM

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HOW ECOMMERCE CONTENT SHOULD WORK

The digital shelf is incredibly crowded. Amazon alone offers shoppers an estimated 360 million products.

At content26, we develop eCommerce content and pay-per-click ad campaigns designed to help our clients’ products stand out on Amazon and other retailers. Our approach helps products get discovered in two ways.

ORGANICALLY

Amazon and other retailers have complex search algorithms that determine product relevancy. A product’s brand strength, price,

How do Amazon and other retailers determine which products are most relevant? Behind the scenes, Amazon’s search engine is scanning product page listings for keywords like “mechanical,” “automatic”, and “refillable,” using this content to connect shoppers to relevant product listings.

When you click on a product listing, the content should provide all the information you need to make a purchase decision.

While companies recognize the importance of eCommerce content in fueling eCommerce search and closing the sale, most don’t have the internal resources or retailer expertise to tackle this challenge.

Enter “mechanical pencil” into the Amazon search bar. You’ll end up with a search results page that has over 9,000 products and hundreds of brands.

eCommerce Content Creation

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strategies for companies of all sizes, here are our recommendation for getting started:

Start with the basics. Find the resources (internal or external) to get all of your essential content (product titles, bullets, one-paragraph product descriptions) in order. This means researching retailer guidelines, optimizing keywords, and creating scannable content that helps a shopper make a purchase decision.

Consider advertising. Talk to your Google AdWords team about their approach to eCommerce advertising. Most likely, they aren’t thinking about Amazon or other eCommerce channels. eCommerce advertising is in its infancy, but is expected to grow significantly in the next few years. Amazon has advanced capabilities with its pay-per-click Amazon Marketing Services offering. Running eCommerce advertising campaigns drives more traffic to product pages which helps with discoverability. Insights gained from advertising can also be used to improve product page content,

sales volumes, product availability all play a role in search rank. But brands often forget that keyword-optimized content also plays an important role in signaling to the search engine that the product is relevant. Because of all the factors involved in search, it’s possible to have great content but still not rise to the top of organic search results. That’s where paid search becomes important.

PAID SEARCH

Amazon has continuously innovated in the pay-per-click advertising space with its Amazon Marketing Services offering. This pay-per-click service allows brands to bid on relevant keywords. If they win the bid, their ad gets placed at the top of the search results page. This is especially powerful on Amazon where over 50% of online shoppers start their product searches.

For our Amazon clients, the combined effects of effective product page content and paid search has led to revenue growth, on average, of 7x.

BEST PRACTICES

While brands want their products rank higher on Amazon and other eCommerce sites, many are daunted by the level of retailer knowledge and internal resources needed to make it happen. After more than a decade of creating content and paid search

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Case Study

CONTENT26

Bai Brands

Find help. Industry research shows that 40% of companies outsource eCommerce content management. Why? Many brands don’t have the retailer-specific eCommerce expertise to create effective content. If you sell dozens or hundreds of products on multiple retailers, it might not make financial sense to build an internal content-focused team. When choosing a content partner, look for an agency with brand, eCommerce, and retailer expertise as well as an efficient content creation process.

which will give your products a boost in organic search long after the paid campaign ends.

Add enhanced content. Studies show adding enhanced (Amazon calls it A+ content) content can increase purchase intent by up to 20% depending on the product. But you need to understand both your brand and your product in order to create effective enhanced content. We normally recommend that brands look at the 20% of products that have the most sales and prioritize those for enhanced content.

CHALLENGE

For newer beverage companies like Bai Brands, Amazon content and advertising are critical for generating product interest and finding new customers.

In 2016, Bai came to content26 to create Amazon product page content and to manage Amazon Marketing Services (AMS) campaigns for over 50 of its products.

Bai, an up-and-coming brand in the health-conscious flavored water and carbonated

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Find out more at www.content26.com

Content26 has produced Amazon marketing content for over 650 consumer brands across a wide range of industries and product lines. Our clients include world-renowned companies such as Philips, Newell Brands, Unilever, Samsung, and SanDisk. Our Amazon knowledge helps our customers reinforce branding and create a rich shopping experience across their main online retail channels.

beverages market, asked content26 to restructure AMS campaigns and modify content to increase their effectiveness. The result has been a dramatic increase in Return On Ad Spend (ROAS).

“Increasingly, if you win on Amazon, you win, period. And this is the world marketers have to wrap their brains around,” John Denny, vice president for digital and eCommerce at Bai Brands recently told The New York Times.

SOLUTION

When content26 took over control of Bai’s marketing campaigns in September of 2016, the first step was to turn off and phase out old, ineffectual campaigns. We created 125new campaigns for the top-selling

drinks, with 17,000 targeted keywords injected, observed, and adapted for usefulness.

Once the campaigns were up and running, content26 used the most effective keywords to improve Bai’s product page content.

RESULTS

Prior to content26 managing AMS, Bai received a 1.8x ROAS. In the first quarter of 2017, with content26 running the AMS campaigns, Bai received a 4.3x ROAS, leading to a 150% increase in AMS revenue.

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HOW IT WORKS

To improve your product search rankings and drive sales growth, your organization needs a repeatable strategy to put optimized product content in front of shoppers. This requires:

• Comprehensive content management, an easy way to centralize and update product attributes and assets for your full catalog.

The product data you need to power that journey can come from anywhere – product teams, creative agencies, third-party sites – and that data needs to be everywhere, optimized for each sales channel so shoppers can discover it and buy it. This means you must have a way to efficiently manage, optimize, and syndicate product content to drive product discoverability and sales.

Today, consumers are in charge of their own shopping journeys. They search, compare, and choose what to buy based on product information. According to Deloitte, 76% of consumers interact with products online long before stepping into a brick-and-mortar store. You need your product to surface throughout the buyer’s journey in a compelling, impactful way.

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Take Control of Your Product Experience

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SALSIFY

and systems develop and transfer product content today before attempting to centralize that data into one place. Choose a system that can help structure your data in a more useful way, regardless of the initial source.

Define your syndication priorities. Who are your most important retail partners? What are your most important sales channels. Take the time to outline the current process you use to get these partners content today.

Define your KPIs. Before you begin, identify the aspects of your business you want to improve. Consider tracking days to market, products launched per year, number of sales channels, item set-up time, brand accuracy or team productivity.

BEST PRACTICES

Prepare your organization. Digital transformation will impact your entire company. Communicate the actions you are taking and the economic opportunities behind those changes. To get support, share the project’s value by celebrating early milestones. Look for ways to improve operations for your entire organization with the technology and processes you adopt.

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• Robust ecosystem connections to leading retailers and other commerce partners to automate your digital supply chain.

• Actionable analytics that provide insight into what’s the best content to use, what keywords will maximize product findability, and how product page content should be optimized for conversion.

Brands face an enormous challenge—present a cohesive, impactful product experience quickly at scale to every prospect. This requires digital transformation within your organization and a technology platform to automate your process. Start with one focused initiative to build that process and then roll out it to your whole company.

FOUR STEPS TO HELP YOU GET STARTED:

Build your strike team. Choose a team who has subject-area expertise, time, and motivation to drive the project:

• An executive sponsor drives digital transformation and communicates project milestones

• A technical power user operates the system you use to automate workflows

• An existing systems expert understands where your product data lives today

• A syndication expert manages the relationships with retail partners

Outline your content sources. Understand which people

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Find out more at www.salsify.com

Salsify’s SaaS-based Product Experience Management platform powers the creation, management, and syndication of product content across the distributed commerce ecosystem. Salsify transforms product experience management from an administrative burden into a driver of new revenue, increased productivity, and market share growth.

content or wider market share. Select a key retail partner to improve item set-up or content refreshes with that group. Incremental changes can yield large results when you are working with your top brands and sales channels.

Democratize product content. A centralized source of product content can enhance more than your eCommerce efforts. Use product data to collaborate better with third-party manufacturers, sales teams, creative agencies, and other partners. Choose a technology that is easy to use and has flexible permission levels. When your team can access the aspects of product content they need from a trustworthy source, there is no end to the internal efficiencies you will discover.

Collaborate with advocates outside your organization. Individual brands cannot achieve full automation in silo. Retailers must provide open APIs that allow brands to share content and get feedback on content performance. Salsify works with leading brands to influence retailers to take an open content approach, and allow for a direct content flow between organizations.

Use your existing data sources (when they are reliable). Your company may already have a PIM, MDM, ERP, or multiple systems housing trustworthy product data. Check where the gaps are in getting content to market. Rather than scrap one existing system for another, choose a tool that can build connections between your existing systems.

Choose high-impact syndication projects and brands. When working across a large portfolio, start with a brand that will benefit greatly from better product

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How Dr Pepper Snapple Group elevated its digital brand experience

Company

SALSIFY

update, enhance and review new images, descriptions and other digital assets before putting them into market. Next, Salsify enabled Dr Pepper to share that product content data with all its retail partners using readiness reports to ensure the requirements are met.

RESULTS

In fact, Dr Pepper was one of the first brands to meet the updated product content requirements for Walmart, through a direct connection API with Salsify. “On one retailer alone, we’ve seen triple-digit growth over the last two years in part due to the significant effort we’ve made to optimize our digital shelf,” said Jordan Ste. Marie, Senior Manager of ECommerce Marketing, Dr Pepper Snapple Group.

CHALLENGE

Dr Pepper Snapple Group needed to get control of its digital footprint across a portfolio of more than 50 flavored brands. Its retail partners were funneling data from multiple sources resulting in errors and confusion for consumers looking for consistent descriptions and images online. The brand teams had manual, time-consuming content management processes wherein each retail partner needed different spreadsheets of data to fit different product information.

SOLUTION

Dr Pepper implemented Salsify in June 2015, which enabled the company to centralize its product content and implement a reliable go-to-market workflow. Salsify became the trusted source of content at Dr Pepper, from which internal teams could

Dr Pepper Snapple Group

Case Study

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It’s no easy task. Controlling product stories across retailer sites is a chaotic, time consuming process. Very few manufacturers have the teams or technology in place to manage, update and optimize content across retailer sites with vastly different upload requirements and specifications. In 1999, Webcollage recognized this gap and developed a solution—a technology platform that automates and streamlines the delivery of enhanced product content at scale to an expansive global retailer network.

At the heart of these experiences is high quality product content— it’s the lead driver of sales growth, no matter the category. Success in the crucial “Buy Now” moment hinges on the ability to publish exceptional content that displays quickly, responsively and consistently across browsers, sites and devices.

As the customer journey becomes more complex, online sellers face immense challenges to keep product pages rich and engaging. Shoppers firmly control the path to purchase and don’t just expect, but demand immersive digital experiences everywhere they shop.

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Optimizing with Enhanced ContentCREATE CONSUMER EXPERIENCES THAT DRIVE PURCHASE INTENT

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WEBCOLLAGE

HOW IT WORKS

Content is Still King, But There’s a Catch. Shoppers depend on product information to gain the confidence to buy; it’s the online equivalent of an in-store sales person. A full 71 percent of online buyers rely on product information in the path to purchase*. It all starts with engagement on the product detail page where enhanced content creates the experience and gives the brand a clear, compelling voice—the opportunity to tell a powerful story and connect with consumers on a deeper level.

Its strong influence is clear and measurable: When shoppers are exposed to great content, we’ve seen conversion rate increases ranging from 12 to 36 percent, with results reaffirmed through A/B tests across categories spanning millions of shoppers worldwide.

Here’s the catch: Not all content is created equal. Inconsistent, inaccurate or incomplete content will cost the brand not just sales, but integrity. In a fiercely competitive, shopper-dominated landscape, the caliber of content on the product page is what sets the winners apart.  

EXCELLENCE & VARIETY

Let’s start with quality. We can all agree that a great product page goes far beyond a photo and a “buy now” button. Multiple images and compelling videos are high on the list of consumer demands and play a strong role in the path to purchase. From powerful visuals, to strong feature copy, interactive tours and comparison tables, the story presented on your product page must not only inform and engage, but also earn trust and motivate action.

This means going beyond manufacturer-curated content. Reviews, ratings, UGC and influencer images and videos are not only an authentic way to have customers tell the brand story; they’re now a vital part of the information package that shoppers want to see. Here’s the tricky part: to keep the brand story intact while leveraging this powerful new generation of content requires the ability to control it at scale.

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MOBILE-FRIENDLINESS

Meanwhile, mobile has forever changed the way we shop, putting an entire Internet in the palms of our hands. Small screens have a big influence: an overwhelming 82 percent of shoppers say they research on mobile before making an in-store purchase decision, and 36 percent of consumers check their phones for product information while at the store***. This means that it’s vital to have product information display not just quickly but responsively.

CONSISTENCY & CONTROL

Owning the brand message means managing content so that the brand has its thumbprint on that content, wherever it is, for quick updates, launches, sunsets and everything in between. Consistency across screens, browser formats and retailer sites doesn’t just provide greater control over messaging, it also creates a uniform, satisfying shopping experience.

It’s not just the ingredients on the page, but the way you combine them that can make all the difference. For example, we’ve learned from data that nearly 60 percent of consumers are more likely to interact with a video online if it’s featured next to or part of a block of contextual copy. Furthermore, no cookie-cutter solution exists. There is power and value in using multi variant layouts based on category and target market.

Finally, consider the ever-shrinking shopper attention span. If you’re marketing to millennials—you’re going to have to make your message especially quick, because you’ll hold their interest for about 5 seconds** And while other segments may scan for longer periods of time, smart marketers are finding ways to place their best visual content in the most eye-catching real estate—above the fold, next to the buy button and in product search listings.

WEBCOLLAGE 14

WEBCOLLAGE

BEST PRACTICES

Win with data and technology. Another crucial step is to understand where the engagement happens and why, to identify what content resonates and transforms browsers into buyers. That’s where routine testing, access to good product data and the ability to act on it become imperative. For example, we’ve found through data that while comparison tables can be extremely effective, when a table includes more than 10 products, it has a diminished effect on engagement. Our best practice is to use anywhere from 5-10 products, but in certain categories some of the most effective comparison tables we’ve seen look at just 2-3 products.

Even deeper insights into evolving shopper behavior, especially path to purchase and content performance,

are not just nice to have; they’re essential. Big data and predictive analytics are top investment priorities among category managers, with 82 percent saying they are behind on leveraging these metrics****.

Some key performance metrics are based on engagement, along with content views by browser and device types. Others are clearer—the ability to study conversions on the actual product pages where shoppers shop. Armed with data on the content that generates the most shopper interaction

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Webcollage is the leading cloud-based platform for the publishing of rich product content and syndication across retailer sites globally. Built in an environment rich in strategic thinking and innovation, the Webcollage platform serves more than 1,000 of the world’s most demanding brands, providing the tools they need to deliver consistent content that powers online sales conversions and improves the customer experience. The Webcollage global network includes more than 600 top retailers across dozens of countries.

Find out more at www.webcollage.com

* US Department of Commerce Q3 2016 report**comScore 2017***Bazaar Voice 2016****JDA Voice of the Category Manager Survey

provides a golden opportunity to optimize rich product detail pages to engage in a much deeper way, vastly improving the shopper experience.

Stay on top of the latest trends. Since the product story has such a strong influence on the path to purchase, as the shopper journey continues to evolve, it makes sense to invest in a way to incorporate new content trends into product stories to address changing consumer requirements as they arise.

Deploy the best technology. Delivering a great experience, while having the ability to distribute rich content at scale and fine-tune that content regularly depends heavily on having access to the right technology; something that’s engineered to innovate.

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CHALLENGE

To stay competitive in a crowded marketplace, one of our top consumer health and home care brand partners wanted to conduct a test to determine whether a layout that enables shoppers to scan rather than scroll would address shrinking shopper attention spans and result in greater engagement and conversions.

SOLUTION

Webcollage conducted a month-long A/B test at one major retail eCommerce site, between two layouts across three different products, which were selected based on traffic and category.

As a first step, an area was designated at the top of the product page for content placement. The test layouts included a hero image, marketing copy and bulleted product features.

The existing one-column layout A, which required scrolling to view one feature at a time, was tested against a three-column layout B, which enabled shoppers to quickly scan features.

RESULTS

At the conclusion of the test, a clear winner was identified. Layout “B” with its scannable “snack-sized” product photos and information consistently

outperformed layout “A” in both engagement and conversions, with an average conversion rate increase of 65 percent.

Our brand partner was pleased with both the test methodology and results, and plans are underway for more extensive content layout testing.

Optimizing Dynamic Layouts

Case Study

WEBCOLLAGE17

product or service, and comes in several forms, such as ratings & reviews, Q&A, and visual content. Ultimately, CGC is an at-scale conversation with your consumers. The voice of your customer has never played a more important role in shopping than it does today, driving both increased conversion and basket size: in 2016,

FROM GOOD TO FANTASTIC – CGC FOR THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE

One thing is certain: Nothing gets you closer to your shoppers than consumer-generated content (CGC). CGC gives you insight into what your customers are thinking and experiencing with your

Driving shoppers to your product pages is one thing, keeping them engaged on your site is another. Brands and retailers alike are losing shoppers to companies that build the best on-site experience. The crux of delivering a best-in-class shopping experience depends on effective use of consumer-generated content (CGC). Authentic content helps shoppers make the right decision the first time and builds trust in your brand. 

The Role of Consumer-Generated Content in Driving Consideration & Conversion

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IT’S A LOT MORE THAN A PRODUCT REVIEW

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BAZAARVOICE

Our research indicates that five powerful practices deliver the best possible results from a CGC program: 

• Putting Content Collection at the Core

• Actively Listening to Consumers

• Let Customers Illustrate the Story

• Meet Shoppers in the Moments that Matter

• Engage Consumers in a Conversation

A HARD-WORKING CGC PROGRAM

Content collection is at the core. There is no such thing as collecting too much content, and retailers and brands should actively collect a stream of fresh CGC to build trust. Consumers want to know that people are buying and loving your products today, and will seek out customer reviews that are recent and relevant. Ask for, display, and distribute CGC across multiple consumer touchpoints to influence shoppers with content your consumers are already creating.

Active listeners win. There is a massively-scaled customer focus group happening in your CGC. Your consumers are telling you what’s working with your product—and what’s not. Our clients use CGC as an invaluable

Bazaarvoice clients saw an average 106% conversion lift and 116% revenue per visitor lift from those who interacted with CGC.

Consumers rely on CGC to research purchases in virtually every category and everywhere they shop. Whether in-aisle, at home, or on-the-go, both low and high consideration purchases rarely happen without some interaction with product reviews. Brands who provide compelling and trustworthy content win shoppers’ preference, and retailers who provide shoppers with the information to purchase confidently, ultimately win at checkout.

Consumer content is no longer just a basic enhancement to your website. Implementing a CGC program is now a core component of best-in-class customer experience strategy. In a recent survey, our clients reported several key drivers that their CGC programs are expected to influence (in order of impact): online sales, website engagement, SEO, enhanced customer service, product development, reduced returns, and in-store sales. 

Companies who thrive in our network of consumers, brands, and retailers use CGC throughout the entire buying journey, turning browsing shoppers into loyal advocates.

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BAZAARVOICE

The Container Store

For The Container Store, the commitment to customer care is as strong as it was at its inception back in 1978. Today, that commitment extends to the online shopping experience.

online, mobile, and in-store. In research spanning more than three million transactions, we found that shoppers consult online CGC before 45% of offline purchases. Amplify your CGC in email campaigns, website, advertising campaigns, and in retail outlets.

Consumer engagement is a conversation. People are talking to one another—and to you—in your Q&A content, and today’s consumers expect a response. Last year, consumers submitted more than one million product questions on our platform— a 49% YOY increase. Answering questions within 24-48 hours shows your responsiveness to the hundreds—or thousands— of consumers who are listening.

source of feedback to improve customer service, products, and marketing tactics such as messaging and targeting.

Customers illustrate the story. Immerse consumers in a visual shopping experience that showcases your brand in action, inspiring them to move from browsing to buying. Across our best-in-class client base, at least 51% of shoppers engaged with visual CGC when it was present, and shoppers who engage with it have larger order sizes. In 2016, revenue per visitor lift for customers who interacted with visual content was 116%, compared with 111% for CGC in general.

Be there in the moments that matter. Reach customers with CGC everywhere they shop:

Case Study

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Find out more at www.bazaarvoice.com

Bazaarvoice helps brands and retailers find and reach consumers, and win them with the content they trust. Each month in the Bazaarvoice Network, more than one-half billion consumers view and share authentic consumer-generated content (CGC), including ratings and reviews as well as curated visual content, across 5,000 brand and retail websites. This visibility into shopper behavior allows Bazaarvoice to capture unique first-party data and insights that fuel our targeted advertising and personalization solutions.

Founded in 2005, Bazaarvoice is headquartered in Austin, Texas with offices across North America and Europe.

RESULTS

In using Ratings & Reviews and PIE, they saw noticeable results across their business:

• 325% increase in review volume

• 21% increase in page views

• 57% increase in order volume

• 27% increase in revenue

“We use consumer content everywhere we can— in marketing emails, in-store graphics and signage, and catalogs,” says Burk.

For a company that puts the voice of the customer front and center, The Container Store has extracted tremendous value from its CGC program.

CHALLENGE

“From the very beginning we’ve used comment cards and read every single one of them. Now we can do that online, and we can also easily share customers’ comments with other shoppers.” says Patrick Burk, Customer Content Manager, The Container Store.

SOLUTION

The Container Store uses Bazaarvoice Conversations Ratings & Reviews to collect CGC and integrate it throughout their business to drive revenue. The Container Store invites customers to review products using a post-interaction email (PIE) to reach customers after purchase.

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a severely limited field of view— made even narrower on mobile phones. With only one-third of shoppers beginning their online journey on search engines, brands need a way to increase visibility and drive product page traffic on the broadest range of online retail environments. Sponsored product listings are the solution to this problem.

Shoppers rely on retailers’ product ranking to surface the best options. Ranking is driven by algorithms, not relationships and slotting fees. These algorithms typically favor long-time best sellers and are difficult to unseat, which makes it difficult for challenger brands as well as brands wanting to drive consideration of new or premium products. Escalating the brand challenge, online stores present

eCommerce challenges brands to defend and grow product consideration in a realm drastically different from the physical store. Online, shoppers view a seemingly endless aisle of products. Retailers offer expansive catalogs and consumers easily shop across sites. Despite massive selection, the vast majority of products purchased online are reached from the first page of listings.

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Driving Traffic

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CRITEO

turn to retail sites more often than search engines for product research. Retail sites are a critical venue for reaching high intent shoppers when they’re making the purchase decision.

Increasing mobile visibility

Ads render across every device in a native format relevant to the shopper.

Improving organic search ranking

Getting onto the first page of search results is crucial. Criteo analysis shows that 85% of products purchased were found on the first page of search results. Paid retail search drives additional clicks and product sales, which can have the ancillary impact of increasing organic search rank.

Solving brand/retailer misalignment

Sponsored Products put brands in control of their digital shelf: they get to set priorities for products promoted and can nimbly adapt strategies to meet market dynamics.

HOW IT WORKS

Sponsored product listings help brands increase product consideration, drive sales and measure effectiveness down to the individual SKU. The concept is the same as paid search on general search engines: paid placement achieves greater visibility in limited and highly valuable real estate, which in turn drives consideration and conversion.

These paid product listings appear in native formats on retailer sites and apps and are relevant to the shopper. Brands bid for placement and pay only on clicks. Effectiveness is measured in attributed sales, allowing ROAS (return on ad spend) to be calculated.

Criteo Sponsored Products offers this paid placement opportunity across a network of the world’s largest retailers, allowing brands to drive product page traffic and increase eCommerce sales on retailers such as Walmart, Target, Best Buy, Tesco, ASDA, Auchan and Toys ‘R Us.

Sponsored Products appear across the retail experience including: category listing pages, search results, product recommendations, home pages and cart pages. Sponsored Products help brands drive traffic to products by:

Reaching high-intent shoppers

Criteo research corroborates other studies showing that shoppers

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CRITEO

share, or growing the category, sponsored product listings can support your marketing objectives. Criteo Sponsored Products offer targeting and bidding controls to tailor campaigns for:

New product launch Dominate shopper entry points and product category searches, and compete for cross-sell placement to introduce your new product to people shopping adjacent categories.

Sustained presence Use an “always on” strategy to achieve and maintain the category shelf dominance of a long time sales leader.

Seasonal drives or promotions Win in-category placement on category listings, search result pages and product pages. Use higher funnel placements (home pages and product category pages) to increase awareness.

KEY CONSIDERATIONS

When building a sponsored product listing strategy, brands should take the following into account:

Relevance of the placement environment: Can you reach shoppers on retailers important for the brand and category?

Digital shelf management: What are your product priorities based on brand objectives, promotional activities and lifecycle?

Organic rank of each product: Do you need to maintain or improve visibility of a product?

Goal-setting: What are the ROAS expectations that are appropriate and what other metrics will indicate success?

BEST PRACTICES BASED ON PRODUCT LIFECYCLE:

Whether launching products, moving customers along the journey, defending

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CRITEO

Facilitate cross-category shopping. Leverage targeting options to achieve placement on product detail pages and shopping cart pages of complementary products to bring shoppers into your category and inspire impulse purchases. Criteo offers a bid multiplier for cross-sell placement for brands pursuing this strategy.

Measure beyond sales attribution. Consider success metrics other than sales attribution and ROAS, based on your marketing objective. When launching new products or other cases where maximum reach is pursued, for example, achieving scale and effective CPMs are important performance measures. Criteo is able to report “share of category” for both consideration and sales so that brands can understand their success relative to their competitors across the network.

Test and learn. The most successful brands using Sponsored Products continuously test placements and products and optimize accordingly.

Inventory management Bolster demand for specific SKUs, selling out of season or distressed inventory.

OVERALL BEST PRACTICES:

Run Sponsored Products for a broad range of your catalog. Do not make the mistake of only supporting top sellers or a limited set of highest priority products. Including a wide variety of your products in campaigns allows automated targeting to put your most relevant products in front of shoppers. Criteo’s system enables brands to emphasize high priority SKUs with higher bids, which allows other products to be served when they present a significantly higher conversion opportunity.

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Company

Case StudyMicrosoft Xbox

Find out more at www.criteo.com Contact: cbs-salesoperations@criteo.com

Criteo (NASDAQ: CRTO), the leader in commerce marketing, is building the highest performing and open Commerce Marketing Ecosystem to drive profits and sales for retailers and brands. 2,700 Criteo team members partner with 16,000 custom ers and thousands of publishers across the globe to deliver performance at scale by connecting shoppers to the things they need and love. Designed for commerce, Criteo Commerce Marketing Ecosystem sees over $550 billion in annual commerce sales data.

SOLUTION

Microsoft used a combination of search and product detail page placements to reach those in market for a gaming system as well as homepages and other broad reach placements to drive awareness and attract shoppers outside the category.

RESULTS

1200% ROAS. Using a controlled experiment, a 15.7% lift in incremental purchasers was clearly measured.

CHALLENGE

Lock in pre-Christmas sales in advance of the hyper competitive Black Friday rush. There is lengthy consideration for the purchase of this “big gift” for a household and Microsoft needed to increase product penetration within overall holiday shopping, and secure gaming platform upgrade opportunities with Microsoft Xbox customers.

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There is no shortage of data for eCommerce managers—in fact, it can quickly become overwhelming. The challenge is sourcing the right data, analyzing it to understand what it’s telling you, and using it to prioritize, shift or even know where to start.

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framework, a powerful extension of the familiar Marketing 4Ps (Product, Place, Price and Promotion) that has been adapted to reflect the nuances of eCommerce, thus providing manufacturers with the clarity of how to organize and prioritize eCommerce analytics and actions that will drive eCommerce success.  

THE 6PS ECOMMERCE INTELLIGENCE™ FRAMEWORK

At Clavis, we’re passionate about making it as easy as possible for manufacturers to access and understand the insights and analytics needed to maximize digital shelf performance. That’s why we created the 6Ps eCommerce Intelligence™

What is eCommerce Analytics?

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CLAVIS INSIGHT

your own supply chain or is the retailer not carrying enough inventory? Use the data with retailers and partners to drive change. Watch for anchor events such as holidays and retailer promotions and forecast accordingly. Monitoring availability daily, multiple times per day, and at the retailer location level, may all be necessary for a thorough analysis and optimization of your supply chain.

PLACEMENT Retailer distribution, categorization and retailer hierarchy

Many product manufacturers will have an open distribution model, as opposed to an authorized distribution model, but prioritizing retailers is an important exercise. Focus on retailers whose model most closely aligns with your own, and who represents the best strategic partner or partners.

A deep understanding of the retailer’s website hierarchy will help to optimize placement so each item appears in multiple related categories, making it easier to find.

Monitor your own and competitive product placements, understanding the overall location count and menu rank of your products, so that you can optimize your efforts to increase consideration through menu browsing.

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HOW IT WORKS

Manufacturers can directly influence and optimize the first 5 Ps: Product, Placement, Price, Promotion, and Perfect Page, which represent the key levers available to drive business growth online. The results and impact of your efforts are measured with the 6th P: Performance.

BEST PRACTICES IN OPTIMIZING THE 6 PS

PRODUCT Assortment and availability to purchase

What sells offline rarely matches to what sells online, particularly at pure play parcel delivery retailers like Amazon. To optimize assortment, first identify your own as well as competitors’ best sellers online. Examine 3rd party listings on marketplace sites as well. Variety packs, eCommerce-only SKUs, and ready-to-ship (also known as Ships in Own Container or SIOC) should all be considerations.

Next, identify pervasive out of stock issues and root cause the issue—is it

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CLAVIS INSIGHT

retailers are moving first, and which ones are following.

PROMOTION Media, merchandising, and traffic

To stand out at the digital shelf, test and learn your retailer partner’s various media, merchandising and promotional opportunities. Paid Search placements are often the most effective for items that aren’t appearing on page 1 for organic search. Carefully measure the sales lift and ROI, while monitoring your competitors to see what activity is impactful for them. Your brand’s ‘owned’ properties, such as website, social, and digital advertising all can contribute to driving traffic via Add to Cart solutions.

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PRICE Cost of goods and competitive price monitoring

One of the most important aspects to pricing optimization is regularly conducting competitive analyses. Competitor price tracking of individual products can help you maximize your placement on the digital shelf. But comparing prices at the category and even the brand level is needed to understand the competitive landscape at a higher level. Focus first on your priotiy SKUs at key retailers and review price fluctuations over time. Where retailer margin is an issue, work with retailers to understand what’s driving the issue and ways you may be able to work with them to resolve it. And where dynamic price changes are an issue, monitor price changes multiple times per day to see which

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CLAVIS INSIGHT

syndication services, or your own CRM tools to drive review counts. For items with poor ratings, work with your customer service team to reach out to consumers who left negative reviews and then follow up with your internal teams to identify the core issue, be it packaging or product quality. Similarly, where retailers offer Questions & Answers, work with your customer service team to answer these questions. And in both cases, analyze what shoppers are saying and what keywords they are using to inform content optimization.

PERFORMANCE

Search rank, share of search, Point of Sale (POS or ePOS, and category share)

Search is often the best proxy for business performance because retailer search algorithms take into account the shopper response to the other 5Ps detailed above. However, because the search algorithm itself is beyond the reach of manufacturers, it is best considered a Performance metric.

To optimize search results, identify category and brand keywords that shoppers use to search for your products; often these are available directly from the retailer or via 3rd party research providers. Establish

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PERFECT PAGE Product detail page content, shopper generated content

Product detail page content deserves a disproportionate amount of your attention as content will directly impact search rank, clicks and conversion. The majority of the product detail page is comprised of the content you provide to the retailer, and by the content shoppers can leave on page in the form of Ratings & Reviews, and Questions & Answers, where available.

Prioritize product titles and primary images. Make sure that key category search terms are present in the product title—e.g. Shampoo, Chocolate and ensure your primary image is current and optimized for mobile. Then, understand if all of your products have secondary images, video, additional descriptions, presence of a minimum number of bullet points, and that all copy is devoid of typos or stray characters. Below the fold content will also aid in search and product consideration. Once you’ve established a baseline, monitor quarter over quarter to track improvement and constantly raise the bar to continuously improve the quality of your content.

For user generated content, first identify products which have low review counts and poor ratings. Leverage retailer programs, reviews

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CLAVIS INSIGHT

To protect confidentiality, the following case study is an aggregation of multiple customers’ actual business results.

CHALLENGE

A global CPG/FMCG company made a C-level commitment to rapidly build an eCommerce capability to pursue greater than fair share of eCommerce growth. They deployed a global capabilities center of excellence to work with local markets, supporting them with content,

The ROI of eCommerce Analytics

and informative vs. prior year.

Finally, where category share is available, it may be useful as a benchmark vs competitors to determine if you are driving category growth. However, keep in mind traditional share is based on a set shelf whereas the online shelf is dynamic and ‘endless.’ As a result, category share should rarely be your primary performance metric.

search rank and Page 1 Share of Search goals; constantly raise the bar as you achieve these goals. It may be useful to compare your traditional offline category shares to your share of Page 1, by brand.

Where POS (also referred to as ePOS) is available, set revenue goals and track against them; often you will experience hyper growth in the early days of an eCommerce program so tracking vs prior period can be more relevant

Case Study

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Company

CLAVIS INSIGHT

The ROI of eCommerce Analytics

RESULTS

The global COE quickly established a baseline of metrics so they could measure the impact they were having across the 6Ps. They applied best practices in each area and supported local teams to take action and make improvements in each area. As a result, measurable improvements were made in every area of the 6Ps, including dominating page 1 search for their Top 20% of SKUs at key retailers, and achieving their revenue growth objectives.

assets, capabilities and funding to succeed online. To measure their progress, they needed a global eCommerce analytics solution who could be a strategic partner to help them as they built the team and capabilities.

SOLUTION

Clavis Insight was deployed into their Top 10 global markets, including a Global KPI Dashboard for the COE team, and an API to populate the internal Business Intelligence tool they were building to accommodate data from multiple sources, including Clavis. A Clavis Global Program Manager ensured a smooth deployment while local teams were trained by Clavis eCommerce consultants on how to both use and apply the data and insights generated by the Clavis solution. The deployment was executed on schedule with accurate data flowing according to the agreed upon timeline.

Case Study

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Find out more at www.clavisinsight.com

Clavis Insight is the global leader in online channel analytics for product manufacturers, and the principal innovator at the forefront of the eCommerce analytics revolution. Global manufacturers use our daily and real-time eCommerce analytics to drive sales in their categories online, optimize content for brand equity enhancement, protection and product information compliance, and to deliver consistent, unified reporting on brand presence and omni-channel performance.

They were able to prove 8.0 ROI on their Clavis investment by measuring the online revenue impact of taking action against the insights generated by the Clavis solution. An in-store

attribution study further proved the revenue lift from in-store conversions, as a result of online shopper interactions.

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competing online. Additionally, shoppers’ evolving path to purchase online is likely to become more rigid, with only certain sites considered for purchases. Manufacturers and retailers who want to grow in this channel need to understand the many different aspects of “e-tail” and how to succeed.

BEST PRACTICES

Investing in consumer and market insights that identify where, why, when and by whom products are purchased online informs strategic decision-making and leads to stronger sales growth.

THE MARKET TODAY

eCommerce is the fastest-growing channel in CPG, outpacing brick and mortar in several categories, and offering an attractive way to gain new growth in a stagnant market. Although eCommerce accounts for 1 – 2 percent of total CPG sales in the United States today, it has been growing by an average of 15 percent annually since 2010 and is projected to double sales in the next two to three years.

Offline sales are certain to shrink, so companies are at risk of losing market share if they are not effectively

With IRI, companies can more easily and accurately study category and brand performance, monitor key online indicators and make real-time adjustments to protect their brands and grow their sales.

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Helping Firms Measure Online Performance and Optimize Cross- Channel Growth

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IRI

Illuminating the online path to purchase, measuring conversions and lost opportunities, tracking and comparing online and offline results, and building strategies to engage and activate shoppers by leveraging insights into key shopper segments is vital for any multichannel business intelligence toolset.

Understanding total sales and shares at the category and brand level, combined with the ability to track these metrics over time, is vital for any organization looking to participate in the online CPG growth acceleration. Because consumers’ adoption of online shopping is occurring rapidly, companies that can proactively develop an eCommerce strategy and quickly maximize new insights can gain much better traction in this channel. This helps protect their overall market share and, in some cases, grow sales in certain categories as consumers continue to shift more purchases online.

HOW IT WORKS

IRI offers an unparalleled view of the market, including the combination of longitudinal shopper data from the IRI Consumer Network™, online purchase data from our digital partner panels, and IRI’s trusted brick-and mortar point-of-sale data.

The IRI eCommerce Reporting Suite is the most complete set of insights in the marketplace and includes several

specific insights modules. Companies get visibility into CPG online opportunities and existing sales through eMarket Insights (Market Measurement and Tracking), IRI Path-to-Purchase Insights illuminating conversion effectiveness and lost opportunities, as well as IRI Omni-Channel Insights focused on online/offline shopper interactions and identifying shopper dynamics, segmentation and demographics.

ADVANCED CAPABILITIES

For clients with more advanced requirements, IRI offers E-Market Insights-Private Cloud. This client-specific solution builds on the syndicated foundation, integrates client-supplied data and can be customized to meet the client’s needs. Private Cloud customization provides several benefits. It is a secure way to integrate, harmonize and visualize IRI and client data access on IRI’s Liquid Data® platform. Full harmonization across dimensions such as time, geography, product and measures eliminates time-consuming, error-prone and often ineffective manual data consolidation. Additionally, clients can create and track new metrics based on custom projections such as retailer-level views, custom product hierarchies and digital shelf causal factors (e.g., pricing, assortment, search rank, reviews) enabled by IRI’s partnership with Clavis Insight.

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IRI

CHALLENGE

A large CPG manufacturer wanted to propel eCommerce growth by understanding the performance of its own and competitive brands, as well as how its customers were interacting with its categories in the newly emerging online space.

SOLUTION

IRI’s eCommerce Reporting Suite and analytic expertise provided valuable insights into the evolving marketplace and associated shopper behavior.

a true omni-channel market view that is specifically designed to meet their business needs.

Clients already subscribing to IRI’s Market Advantage™ (MULO market tracking) and IRI E-Market Insights can bring in additional eCommerce data (e.g., their own shipment data, their own online sales data from retailers) as well as digital shelf data to create

Case Study

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IRI is a leading provider of big data, predictive analytics and forward-looking insights that help CPG, OTC health care organizations, retailers, financial services and media companies grow their businesses. With the largest repository of purchase, media, social, causal and loyalty data, all integrated on an on-demand, cloud-based technology platform, IRI is empowering the personalization revolution, helping to guide its more than 5,000 clients around the world in their quests to remain relentlessly relevant, capture market share, connect with consumers, collaborate with key constituents and deliver market-leading growth.

Find out more at www.iriworldwide.com

RESULTS

The client is expecting to experience up to 150 percent in eCommerce sales growth due to the insights, opportunities and recommendations generated by IRI.

The manufacturer was able to gauge performance against their peers, set achievable growth goals for eCommerce sales and create a growth roadmap, which included:

• List of competitors to monitor and insights into competitor eCommerce performance

• Prioritization of e-retailers and domains presenting the biggest marketing opportunity

• Understanding of customer perceptions regarding the eCommerce channel and future purchase intents

• Recommendations on how to create a comprehensive strategy for online and in-store sales growth

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Conclusion

Understanding the details behind your brand’s daily online performance helps to identify the actions you need to take to optimize your presence, performance, and sales in key online retail channels.

Ongoing analysis, including sales analytics, consumer engagement and representation, are vital to drive sales growth, support brand awareness, and protect brand equity. By following the insightful tips in this book, the Perfect Page is in reach to drive traffic, increase clicks, and turn consideration into conversion so you can beat the competition and win the shelf.

If you would like further guidance in your eCommerce journey, please reach out to us or our partners, or visit www.clavisinsight.com and follow along with our Insights resources—delivering new and fresh tips to you weekly.

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The Partners

CONTENT26 www.content26.com

Content26 has produced Amazon marketing content for over 650 consumer brands across a wide range of industries and product lines.

SALSIFY www.salsify.com

Salsify's SaaS-based Product Content Management platform powers the creation, management, and syndication of product content across the distributed commerce ecosystem. .

WEBCOLLAGE www.webcollage.com

Webcollage is the leading cloud-based content management platform for managing rich product information, and syndication across retail sites globally.

BAZAARVOICE www.bazaarvoice.com

Bazaarvoice helps brands and retailers find and reach consumers, and win them with the content they trust.

CRITEO www.criteo.com

Criteo, the leader in commerce marketing, is building the highest performing and open commerce marketing ecosystem to drive profits and sales for retailers and brands.

CLAVIS www.clavisinsight.com

Clavis Insight is the global leader in online channel analytics for product manufacturers, and the principal innovator at the forefront of the eCommerce analytics revolution.

IRI www.iriworldwide.com

IRI is a leading provider of big data, predictive analytics and forward-looking insights that help CPG, OTC health care organizations, retailers, financial services and media companies grow their businesses.

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LEARN MORE ABOUT HOW WE WORK TOGETHER ATwww.clavisinsight.com/insights/definitive-guide-perfect-page-ebook

DREAM WORK MAKES THE TEAM WORK. We had a vision for this eBook and want to thank everyone for making it a reality over the last six months. A special thanks to all of our partners for their time and contributions, as well as a special nod to Content26, who provided the design and layout.

THE CLAVIS TEAM