Top line results of the survey of 593 industry professionals (Sept. 29 - Oct. 6, 2010) were discussed in a RetailWire webinar, "Shopper Insights: Actionable or Academic?" on Tuesday. (Click here to download a free Executive Summary of the study results.)
According to the research, 38.7 percent of retailers regularly use shopper insights in their positions while 29.8 percent sometimes do. For manufacturers, 49.7 percent regularly use shopper insights and 28.5 percent report using them sometimes.
"Shopper insights can and should drive an enormous amount of retail activities
in merchandising, buying, aisle and category management," said Roy White,
business development executive with RetailWire and lead author of a
white paper on the study.
Noting how closely aligned retailers and manufacturers were on the value of using shopper insights to improve a variety of retail activities, Mr. White said, "They're really on the same page. That's something that bodes real well for collaboration. And it's a statement that collaboration is an actual fact."
Nadine Hernandez, director, shopper insights worldwide industry marketing, DemandTec, who co-presented the research findings on the webinar, said the study results and her own in the field observations show retailers and manufacturers are putting their money where their mouths are.
"More and more trading partners agree that this (funding shopper insights) is a joint responsibility. In fact, the topic of trade dollars, which has always been sort of a taboo topic, is back on the table," she said. "I think that is largely in part to the tremendous amount of success we've seen with those trading partners that have done a great job in leveraging shopper insights to drive true ROI -- in many cases, much higher ROI than another me-too, ineffective in-store promotion that was planned without any type of shopper insights."