The key to effective supermarket advertising? Balancing shiny toys with nailing the basics
Opinion
Settling into her new role as Asda chief customer officer, Rachel Eyre sets out her priorities for how supermarkets can pack a marketing punch.
Supermarkets: a famously and fiercely competitive sector at the forefront of customers’ everyday lives. Any marketers looking for a quieter life might be tempted to look elsewhere.
To me, it’s that ‘always on’ mentality that makes the sector such a rewarding challenge. From key cultural moments like Ramadan, Christmas and sporting events to the routine of the weekly ‘big shop’, brands that succeed in this sector are those deeply in tune with their customers and the agility to meet customers’ needs in meaningful and timely ways.
Ironically, the key to delivering this fast-paced agility is a grounded, consistent marketing strategy. Purposeful innovation is always welcome, but getting the basics right is the key to building memorable, successful campaigns — ones that make a positive difference to both customers’ lives and supermarkets’ profitable sales and market share.
In my experience, two priorities sit at the top of the agenda when it comes to communicating with customers.
Firstly, reach. It’s all well and good developing a killer campaign, but if an ad appears in a media environment and no one’s there to see it, does it make an impression? For marketers at supermarket brands, the answer is emphatically no. Given the size of their businesses, it’s vital for their brands to be in advertising environments where their millions of customers are spending their everyday lives.
Secondly, effectiveness. With more options than ever in such a fragmented media landscape, it can be tempting to reach for the bells and whistles. However, the work has to work. If all those shiny toys aren’t producing a tangible ROI for the business, no amount of experimentation will deliver a campaign’s key metric — bolstering the top and bottom lines.
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Putting priorities to the test
With so much choice, the medium really does make a difference. What does this look like practically?
As someone who has worked with news brands throughout my career, I’m proud to be chairing this year’s Newsworks Awards, which celebrates outstanding advertising in the medium from the last 12 months. That said, our fragmented media ecosystem means we increasingly have to challenge established truths. News brands are often touted as pillars of supermarkets’ long-term marketing strategies, but do they still cut the mustard? Let’s take those two top priorities and put them under the microscope.
We can tick off reach easily. With 24 million daily readers across all platforms according to the latest PAMCo figures, news brands command an audience that few other mediums can rival. That’s true for young readers, too; Newsworks’ ‘Youth’ research found 72% of 15–29-year-olds read news brand content every month.
This is vital for supermarkets looking to identify themselves with readers’ everyday lives and concerns. Appearing alongside content that shapes their opinions, conversations and outlooks brings brands like Asda into an intimate part of their interactions with the outside world. In the process, they become as much a part of their lives as the day’s headlines.
What about effectiveness? Absolutely — whether it’s sharing supermarkets’ latest deals or harnessing the moments that matter to readers in a timely and relevant way, news brands provide supermarkets with ample opportunity to produce compelling advertising in a quality environment.
Two campaigns stand out to me that not only demonstrate Asda’s long-standing commitment to news brands as an advertising space, but also their effectiveness in converting agility and relatability into effectiveness at the checkout.
The first came during Christmas 2022, when Asda scored a major coup by acquiring the services of Buddy the Elf. Leveraging key placements such as front pages to maximise Buddy’s reach, the campaign injected some well-needed cheer into a festive season significantly affected by the cost-of-living crisis.
It might have raised a smile, but did it raise key KPIs? Yes — the campaign improved value perception and market share at a crucial time, not only in the hotly contested Christmas period but also during harsh economic headwinds.
More recently, Asda used a partnership with The Times to raise receptions of its wine offering among more affluent audiences who might not have considered the brand previously. Harnessing first-party data and smashing impression expectations in the process, the campaign used premium print and digital placements around the news brand’s highly regarded food and drink coverage. It culminated in an interactive ‘Wine Atlas’ map that educated readers on the unique qualities of each wine.
By both educating and driving consumer action, the campaign saw ‘Wine Atlas’ sales grow markedly, not only drawing a sizeable number of new customers but also multiple items in the trolley.
Balancing the fundamentals with innovation
Back to basics means getting the fundamentals right; it doesn’t mean writing off innovation entirely. Combining a well-grounded campaign with the opportunities of new advertising spaces offers advertisers an essential way of growing their reach and harnessing new ways of engaging audiences.
A case in point is Asda’s multiplatform partnership with Mail Metro Media, particularly the joint creation of its Family Matters TikTok channel. By partnering with an established news brand on the platform, it ensures the Asda brand is visible in all the places our customers consume content, all while remaining in a trusted news brand space.
That’s the final piece of the puzzle; brands cannot hope to build relationships with their customers in environments they don’t trust. What makes news brands so valuable is that the trust their readers have in them creates a halo effect around advertising in that environment, whether print or digital. In short, trusted news brands help produce trusted advertising — whatever the platform.
Showcasing brilliant work
Whilst multiplatform news brands can deliver for supermarkets, that’s true for any advertiser looking to benefit from an intimate medium with extensive reach, trusted environments and proven effectiveness.
As such, the Newsworks Awards are a fantastic opportunity to celebrate creative, innovative and effective work from across the supermarket sector and beyond, showing what makes news brands so compelling for advertisers.
That’s why I’m so looking forward to chairing the awards. Look out for the final shortlist announcement on Tuesday 11 November to see if your entry has made the cut.
Rachel Eyre is chief customer officer at Asda.