Got some great press for Adcorp Media Group and Adcorp360 regarding our supermarket MarketVision broadcast programs in the Digital Signage Pulse e-newsletter. This e-newsletter is subscription-based and is read by ‘players’ in the digital industry.

Our MarketVision digital broadcast programs consist of high definition screens placed in hi-traffic areas in the supermarket. We have two broadcast programs in place at this point. Our MarketVision Network consists of a bank of screens (anywhere from 8 to 12 HD screens) placed along the main aisle of the supermarket right at check out. Our MarketVision Kiosk program consists of 4 or 5 kiosks or wall-mounted hi-def screens strategically placed in departments that are heavily trafficked areas. Both programs are capable of running rich, dynamic motion graphics. We create and run content that ranges from national public service announcements to campaigns for national CPG brands, franchises, as well as regional and local businesses.

Check out the article from Digital Signage Pulse e-newsletter for more information on our programs… read article on digitalsignagepulse.com

Or view a copy of this article here

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Advertising media comes in many shapes and sizes – print, video, radio, banner ads, OOH and more. Once you’ve decided who your audience is and what their media consumption habits are, and have decided your media of choice, the next step is creating captivating, engaging content that once exposed to your ad…your audience will read your message!

However, it’s more than just finding the right media for your audience, it’s understanding the media, and where and how your audience is interacting with it to help determine ‘what to say’ and ‘how to say it’.

While the agency account teams and brand managers write and re-write creative briefs, once it gets into the hands of the designer, that’s when the words come to life. Remember though that ad design that works in print may not translate well to video or to out-of-home. Each media vehicle has its own nuance.

Adcorp offers out-of-home, in-store supermarket advertising media programs to our customers, and have been doing so for over 10 years. It’s our ‘thing’, and like the old KFC jingle…’We do OOH right’.

Not only are our out-of-home print and digital in-store programs effective, targeted advertising vehicles, we also have a design team that knows this medium and what works best in terms of effective, engaging design and have worked, successfully (read: patiently) with our customers to help them understand what design techniques work best.

This blog is a first in a series of tips compiled from our strategists and designers to help other designers and clients using this medium to understand the best approach and design aspects for out-of-home advertising.

First, let’s start with Strategy…

Tips For Developing a Great OOH Creative Strategy

More often than not, out-of-home media serves as a branding tool to generate awareness of your brand, and what it stands for.

That said, here’s what you need to know to make your ad effective and engaging.

Think about your business

Identify your strengths and let them shine! Think about your business in a more abstract way. It may help to try to view your business from the point of view of your customers/clients. What is it about your business that makes your clients choose you? What makes you different from the competition in your area? How do you want customers to feel about your business after they view your ad – what’s the ONE THING you’d like them to remember about your business.

Think about the space

OOH advertisements are everywhere, and we engage with more ads out of our home than ever before! Where will your ad be featured? Is it a static print ad or a video/motion graphic? Think about where your ad will be and try to connect to the people passing it. Visit the location where your ad will be featured. How will your target be engaging with your ad.

Focus on a single message

Choose one main point that you would like to convey to your audience and stick to it. Focus on the one thing that makes your business stand out from the competition and shows the end benefit of choosing you, specifically. The benefit of your service may be the same as your competitor so think about the end-end benefit that is unique to you, something that may garner an emotional response (trust, safety, experience) vs. price, customer service, etc. The ad itself is to get them interested in you and to show how you differ. Make the message relevant to them.

Keep it simple – Less is more

It is most effective in this medium to keep the information about your business ‘short and sweet’ and to the point. Try not to be too clever or funny. If it takes too long for your audience to figure out what you are saying, you’ll lose them. Too many messages will only confuse a viewer and may end up ultimately taking away from your message rather than adding to it. It is important to keep it focused on that one central message. Since OOH media typically serves as a branding tool, steer away from elaborate messages and KISS ‘Keep It Simple, Stupid.’

So, embrace the thoughtful artistry of a simple design. OOH is not like standard print advertising which gives the user time to read the ad and digest the message. Typically OOH ads are placed in hi-traffic areas so the simple message repetition is what will build the branding message.

Remember, you only have a few seconds to capture a potential customer’s attention and an engaging, stunning image will capture their attention, and a concise, simple message will register your business name, and the benefit of your service. A clean, simple ad can do all those things at once.

Next in our series of ‘Design Tips for Effective OOH Advertising’ our designers will address the specifics of ad creation.

The post Understanding Strategy and Design Tips for Effective OOH Advertising appeared first on Supermarket Advertising.

Seasonal forecasting is important for businesses in order to know when they must prepare for rises and falls in their sales cycles. No matter the month, it’s necessary to understand seasonality in order to remain competitive throughout the year. Planning for the calendar year is a good way to research and understand what opportunities will allow you to speak to your target audience and build and maintain awareness of your business. Marketing and advertising opportunities typically require lead-time so planning early will allow you to capitalize on them.

Right now, most media businesses are selling for the January advertising season. For example, businesses that experience a great amount of influx in January include pre-schools, camps, gyms, health centers, and personal trainers (due to hopeful resolutions made in the new year)! Don’t forget about tax season! From January to April, financial businesses experience their busiest time of the year. Even the real estate business is starting to heat up with the impending spring selling season. These businesses should be identifying and planning for media opportunities that will appear in January and the first quarter of the year.

Even if your business is not affected by seasonality, make it a point to maintain visibility and engagement with your customer base throughout the year. Be creative about finding ways to stay in touch with them all year round. It’s a great way to turn one-time customers into repeat clients.

Advertising can be your most powerful tool in building brand awareness. And, if your business is affected by seasonality (both negative or positive impact), then it’s imperative to increase that awareness throughout that time. For local businesses, hyper-local and targeted advertising like in-store supermarket advertising is an extremely effective way to get your message (seasonal or not) in front of your local prospects.

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According to the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, OOH advertising is now a $29 billion market in the US and is responsible for approximately 6 percent of the $500 billion global advertising spending, outweighing TV advertising. Its revenue is expected to grow by 3 to 4 percent per year over the next five years to reach $33 billion by 2021 in the US.

As part of its increasing importance in the media mix, OOH market share has increased from 8 percent to 10 percent of traditional media advertising spending, which includes TV, print, radio, among other categories. Given the fragmented viewing habits of consumers and the fact that they are always on the move, it’s no surprise that OOH media is playing a more important role in media plans.

Supermarket advertising is one type of OOH media and refers to out of home media placement in the supermarket arena. Given the hyper-local aspect of this particular media, local and regional business utilize this media often so they can target shoppers in a specific zip code or DMA since those are the prospects most likely to utilize their services. National advertisers, specifically CPG brands, use this media since the advertising is at the store level, right at the point of purchase yet can also be an effective vehicle for generating an immediate purchase or long-term branding.

Forbes states that 70% of purchase decisions are made in-store by consumers; and it makes sense since shoppers spend an average of 41 minutes per visit, and go often, sometimes 2-3 times per week, so supermarket advertising offers not only exposure to the shoppers, but repetition as well, resulting in saturation of its message to the shopper.

Types of Supermarket Advertising

There are several media formats that represent in-store supermarket advertising including print and digital:

Supermarket Advertising Print formats include:

• Shopping Cart Advertising

Placed on either the baby seat or front of the cart, Shopping carts provide continuous advertising throughout the entire duration of a consumer’s shopping trip.

• Welcome Center

The Welcome Center is typically placed at the entrance/exit of the store. The fixture distributes weekly circulars and complimentary cart wipes and offers up to 8 square feet of advertising.

• Market Information Center

Located inside the entrance or exit vestibule of the store, the Market Information Center provides advertisers with large-scale advertising. With up to 16 square feet of space to deliver an advertiser’s message.

• Ad Bench

Ad Benches can be found outside the supermarket entrance, inside the interior vestibule or across from the checkout aisles. Benches are another classic in-store media format as they provide advertisers with the opportunity to deliver their message on a 2’ x 8’ banner.

• Receipt/Register tapes

Register tape advertising places your advertisement on the back of a receipt, typically in the form of a coupon. Customers must receive their receipt after checking out.

• Shelf Talkers

Shelf display advertisements are found promoting new deals or brands on product shelves.

• Floor Graphics

Displays can be found on the floor of the supermarket.

Separately, in-store Radio Advertising is an option for advertisers to reach shoppers. An in-store Radio Network delivers your message to shoppers through targeted in-store radio programming. Your radio commercial will reach every shopper, everywhere in the store.

Digital and Broadcast Innovations

The latest and most innovative programs in OOH in-store supermarket advertising are the new digital formats. Today’s digital out of home offers new technologies, new formats, and more creative thinking to help advertisers take their message further. The industry has embraced innovation in all parts of the business to keep pace with where advertising and the consumer are headed.

In supermarkets, we see high-definition digital screens are placed in high-traffic areas throughout the supermarket allowing for an advertiser’s message to reach consumers directly at point-of-purchase and often where there is dwell time breaking thru the clutter, and holding people’s attention. Food courts, deli and app areas, entrance/exit and in the checkout/register area are all locations for digital. Here are two of the newest programs…

MarketVision Network network is a bank of screens (anywhere from 8-12 HD screens) placed right at checkout delivering an advertisers message to a captive audience. Branded content featured on the network offers programming that is entertaining and engaging, along with the video advertising on screen.

MarketVision Kiosk digital displays are strategically placed in the deli/app and perimeter departments which are heavily trafficked area where there is dwell time, allowing for maximum exposure and engagement of a brand’s message to the shopper. The innovative, state-of-the-art HD displays attract attention through rich, dynamic motion graphics.

Any combination of OOH supermarket strategies including print display and broadcast products allows an advertiser’s message to follow the path of the shopper for maximum message exposure.

Advertising to supermarket shoppers is an effective tool in any brand’s marketing mix. Multiple campaigns and platforms can combine strategies to create a marketing plan that reaches a wide, yet targeted audience to build brand awareness with a goal to increase sales.

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It’s not about reaching more people, it’s about reaching the right people, and for local businesses, it’s the Power of Local Connections.

The power of your brand relies on your ability to focus and craft a marketing message that will convert prospects into customers.

The need for marketing and media efficiencies in terms of reaching your best prospects at an affordable price is critical for today’s local businesses. Cutting through the competitive clutter so more consumers think of you, FIRST, will help you build your brand and your customer database.

That’s where advertising, specifically local advertising comes in – having people think of you, instead of your competition, and to think of your service more often.

Local, in-store supermarket advertising can do just that. At Adcorp Media Group all of our marketing efforts are centered around the supermarket where your local prospects go. You know your target audience, and we have them! (Unless they don’t have to eat and feed their family!)

More people, spend more time, more often in supermarkets than they do anywhere else and in-store advertising programs are the best solution.

There are three distinct elements to effective advertising: Exposure, Repetition, and Targeting.

Our local, in-store supermarket advertising programs can do these three things more effectively than anything else you can buy, here’s how…

Exposure:

If people don’t see or hear your ad, they can’t respond to it. Not only are consumers going to the grocery store, but they are spending an average of 41 minutes per trip there.

And, according to the Outdoor Media Association, consumers are 2.5x more alert when they are out, than at home consuming media.

Plus, our print and broadcast media are strategically placed so shoppers have no choice but to see them.

Repetition:

If your ad isn’t seen or heard often, then people won’t remember it. Shoppers hit the supermarket almost twice a week and our markets see an average of 25,000 shoppers per week.

Targeting:

Shoppers shop multiple channels however, 85% still almost always shop at a regular/full-service supermarket. In spite of the growth on online/delivery services like PeaPod and FreshDirect, the supermarket is the venue of choice. And, these shoppers are going to local supermarkets, in your local target market area, which makes supermarket advertising a great way to reach your potential customers.

That said, one of the benefits of our in-store supermarket programs is you get to pick the store that makes the most sense for your business.

When these three elements of effective advertising are present and working together, the result is Brand Recognition. And if people think of you first, they are more likely to choose you over the competition.

Again, that’s how ALL advertising works. We just happen to be able to accomplish this for you better than any other local advertising media with our in-store supermarket advertising print and broadcast programs.

The post Supermarket Advertising Effectiveness appeared first on Supermarket Advertising.

Why It’s Important for Local Businesses to Have a Web site.

It’s no secret that most people today use the internet to gather information for everything from buying baby clothes, to finding the doctor to deliver the baby who’ll wear those clothes. Smart marketers and business owners know that having a great Web site can convince a customer to choose your business or service over your competitor. If you don’t have a Web site at all, you can be almost certain you‘re losing business to other companies that do.

Going digital is critical to your business’ future. The good news is that it can also be very affordable. The Internet has leveled the playing field. With a well-designed site, your small or medium size operation can project the image and professionalism of a much larger company. In fact, your Web site is often your first chance to make a good (or bad!) impression.

The new reality for marketing small businesses is for your online presence to drive customers to your offices/store/shop/salon, etc. and vice versa. This is accomplished by creating a memorable Web site and then making it work with your traditional advertising channels while helping your best customers to drive new customers your way through social sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Your site is often the first chance you have at making a good impression on a potential buyer—sort of like a digital salesman.

Here’s some of what a great Web site can do

1. Helps you to compete with any size competitor by driving thousands of new customers to your store or, at the very least, pick up the phone to contact you.
2. Makes your small business’ virtual and interactive: offering e-commerce, plus the ability to be found more easily on internet searches when your customers are in a buying/planning mode.
3. Gives your small business instant access to massive audiences through powerful word-of-mouth sharing, via e-mail, blogs and social sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
4. Allows you to stay in touch with your customer and nurture that relationship by providing news, promotions and useful information through all your marketing channels.

Small businesses can now turn to technology to keep up with the big boys in their industry in an affordable way—with an online presence small businesses reach massive audiences, are made available to potential customers, make an unforgettable first impression, and offer up a powerful mix of marketing tools that will build your business in the years to come.

The post Why It’s Important for Local Businesses to Have a Web Site. appeared first on Supermarket Advertising.

Here are 3 reasons

The Amount of Content on the Web
Think about the massive amount of content on the web and the rate at which that continues to grow over time. Content is being uploaded every second of every day. For example, 72 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute. And that is just one website out of the billions that exist! That’s a lot of content out there. While it certainly may feel like publishing a few blog posts a week is a lot (it’s definitely a lot of work!), in the grand scheme of things it’s really not much at all. You will need to be publishing a few blog posts a week for an extended amount of time in order for them to really gain traction.

The Search Engine Indexing Process
While it seems like everything on the Internet should happen instantaneously, unfortunately it doesn’t work that way. Even though it may only take seconds for a blog post to go live, it doesn’t mean that the search engines are going to find it, index it, and include it in their rankings as soon as it’s published. It can take some time for the new content to be found. This was very apparent when Google made large algorithm updates like Penguin and Panda. Site owners took action ASAP and made vast improvements to their site to make it more “Google-friendly”, but it may have taken months to see an improvement in search presence and traffic because Google wasn’t immediately recognizing that change.

The Website Trust Factor
The domain age of a website plays a large role in conveying trust to the search engines and the search engines are known to favor content that is published on a website that has aged as opposed to on a relatively new site. This isn’t great news for new site owners but it’s one of those SEO factors that is completely out of our control. Over time as a site continually posts quality content and becomes more established, it will see that content gets indexed and shows up in search results more quickly.

source: brickmarketing.com/blog/see-seo-results.htm

Along with our in-store supermarket advertising programs, the Adcorp Agency offers web design and development services. We apply the latest in SEO features in order to improve the search results of the web sites we create. In addition, we recommend and can develop other programs that contribute to organic SEO like blogs, social media and other internet programs that work with your web site.

The post Search Engine Optimization : How Long Does It Take to See Results? appeared first on Supermarket Advertising.

 The short answer is…mostly both.

As business owners, everything is personal when it comes to our business. We are 110% vested – our time, our money, our reputation, you name it. After all, we were so passionate about something (a product or a service) that we gave up that cushy salary and risked it all by going out on our own – and all was right with the world. We’d offer a great product and/or service and be recognized for the wonderful work that we were doing. That was until social media and review sites took the liberty of bursting our bubble and then, BOOM. You come across a post on the internet where someone has bashed your company.

While I get the fact that customers are going to complain, and will use social platforms to post their complaints, the issue for me really is which ones are ‘legit’. Sometimes you have no idea who these people are that are posting something about your company.

The question becomes, how do you respond? Do you respond? Should you get into an electronic tete-a-tete? Is it better not to say anything? After all, an ‘attack’ on your company becomes a ‘personal’ attack on us.

Social media can be an empowering channel for customers and gives many of them a voice, often anonymous, that they would not otherwise have. But, for every valid complaint, there are the ‘fake’ complaints – people who have never been our customers posting untrue, crass comments about companies and, in some cases, their employees. What makes it harder is that since they may not be legitimate customers, there is no way to contact them to validate the complaint and resolve the dispute.

Recent studies suggest that online reviewing is a broken system. For example, researchers at Yale, Dartmouth and USC have found evidence that hotel owners post fake reviews to boost their ratings on the site – and might even be posting negative reviews of nearby competitors. What’s disconcerting is that for the consumer who is searching for companies that provide a certain service, these online reviews (valid or not), provide insight on a company and how they do business.

As a result what we, as business owners, need to recognize is that social and digital media should play a unique and increasingly important role in protecting both our reputation, our businesses brand equity, and customer loyalty since today’s socially savvy customers trust online reviews more than any other form of advertising. Therefore, we too need to find ways to use these venues as a means to uphold our reputation.

So what is a business to do? I suggest to (at the very least) create an online reputation management strategy. Ours involved applying for accreditation by the Better Business Bureau. Since we take great pride in how we operate our businesses and treat our customers, having BBB Accreditation is just one more way we can demonstrate to our customers (current and potential) our commitment to customer satisfaction and to our brand promise. (even though we take it personally, it’s always all about the brand!)

The BBB serves as another online review forum for our customers. Complaints registered by a company on the BBB are ‘real’ complaints made by ‘real’ customers. For us, this allows us to respond and resolve the dispute (BBB is available to mediate if we cannot work it out) and both the complaint and resolution is posted on our company page on the BBB web site. It’s all about being transparent.

Not all companies are accepted by the BBB, and those that do must operate with integrity to keep their accreditation, and this makes it more meaningful to potential customers.

For us, becoming accredited and featuring the BBB logo on our web site and other materials gives us the opportunity to showcase our level of commitment to being a company that our customers can trust – thus staying true to our brand promise (and personally, it makes me feel better).

The post Online Reviews… Fact or Fiction? appeared first on Supermarket Advertising.

To date, I’m happy to say that after four or five years of building a ‘team’ we’ve reached the right mix of personalities, work ethic and experience and I want to keep my workforce intact. I did some homework on financial packages, and other ‘benefits’ for retention and keeping turnover low, and thinking about corporate wellness, I felt this would be a great option for my team.

I found that most of the information out there about employee engagement and retention focuses on creating safe, environmentally-friendly work spaces, improving employee health, and implementing strategies that reduce medical costs as well as increase employee morale and on-the-job efficiency. To add to the mix, employers need to find a way to create work environments that are multi-generation-friendly. The best strategy, it seemed, for meeting the bulk of these efforts (and the most fun for my company) points to organizing and offering a Corporate Wellness program. Since my workforce transcends several age groups (I’ve got Boomers and Millenials sitting at my conference table) a wellness program must address the diverse age groups on my ‘roster’.

Many of the large national and international companies we all know like Google and American Express, plus small, local businesses are embracing these corporate wellness programs, working them into the running of their business in the hopes of attracting future employees, keeping turnover low and morale high, and contributing to the wellness of their employees which, in the end, contributes and helps to define a businesses corporate culture. Much of this is due to the fact that it takes a long time to hire, train and retain the right employee mix – so getting it right the first time, keeping employees engaged is worth the time and effort.

Developing a positive corporate culture is so important to me and I believe, in the long run, only benefits the company, my employees and my customers.

After much research, I decided to implement a general fitness program offered by Born Ready Fitness*, run by Mike Gulyas. As a result of team discussions and surveys, we found that a combination of a boot camp/hi intensity workout, coupled with a Yoga/Pilates program, 2x per week, satisfied everyone’s fitness needs and fitness level, offering the benefit of mental and physical well-being.

While there may be scientific evidence indicating the positive ‘return’ for worksite wellness programs, what I’m seeing are happy, energetic employees with an enhanced sense of well-being, self-image, and greater camaraderie (on and off the Yoga mat!). All of this ‘wellness’ is contributing to their health, and a corporate culture that I want my employees to embrace, help me to further define, and most important, one in which they feel ‘loved’. My employees (and yours, don’t forget) are my greatest asset, and contributing to their health and well-being, making health social and engaging, and part of our corporate culture, is an investment that offers the greatest return, and well worth it in the long run.

A company that sweats together, stays together.

I couldn’t be happier. Namaste.

*Born Ready Fitness is a total wellness company whose goal is simple, to improve the quality of your life (emotional and physical) through fitness, nutrition and massage. All you need to do is to commit to a permanent life change – we’ll help you do the rest. Go to BornReadyFitness.com for more information about their Corporate Wellness Program.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acoslD7lGtc

First….I have to say it… “Different” is being used as an adverb when it is actually an adjective and should have an “ly” at the end to be grammatically correct. Thanks for being patient. I had to get that off my chest.

Despite the intentional faux pas, Steve Jobs used this phrase to redefine the Apple brand, and to differentiate his company from his competitors by sharpening his focus on what made Apple Apple (at this point in tech history, it definitely wasn’t their balance sheet). The slogan came to encompass everything about Apple…their corporate culture, their dedication to creating insanely good products, their focus on creating the customer experience. It not only described the company, but drove its employees to live up to its’ message. The goal of “standing out” from the competition was eventually won as evidenced by the fact that they have become one of the most valuable companies on the planet and have competed and bested every other tech company on every level except one…price.

And they still won.

Their strategy makes a bold statement about the importance of branding and how it can influence customer perception and behavior, and give business owners an advantage when competing for market share.

The American Marketing Association (AMA) defines a brand as a “name, term, sign, symbol or design, or a combination of them intended to identify the goods and services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of other sellers.”

Therefore, it makes sense to understand that good branding is not just about getting your target market to choose you over the competition, but it is about getting your customers, potential or otherwise, to see you as the only one that provides a benefit or solution to their problem. Great branding, on the other hand, is so much more, and this is where Apple made the leap with ‘Think Different.’ and continues to do so. It’s more about building brand value, equity and brand personality by creating and leveraging those intangibles that a brand should deliver (emotional and psychological benefits).

Think about this for a moment: if you had a choice of a free laptop computer, and your choice was between a brand new top of the line Apple Macbook Pro and a brand new top of the line Dell, Lenovo, IBM, Microsoft, etc etc, which would you choose? Since price is not an issue, in all likelihood, it would be the Apple Macbook Pro, no? Well, why is that?

The prevailing wisdom is that Apple products are generally perceived to be the best product (i.e., the computer most suited to solving your computing problem), the most valuable, AND the most expensive. But the Apple brand is really an ‘experience’. Equity has been built into the Apple brand given its ability to successfully deliver unique benefits on a practical, emotional and psychological level.

Yet, despite declining PC sales around the globe (mostly because of Apple creating the iPad), PC computer sales are still robust. I’m sure you’d agree that this didn’t happen by accident.

Building unique brand equity is unbelievably important for owners of any size business as there will always be competition for market share at every level and the battle for customers is daily and ongoing, more so in industries with parody products and claims and no perceived differences by consumers.

The moral of the story is that it’s important to take the time to identify and to define those things that make your company unique and to start the process of developing a brand, building value and equity overtime. It should be the foundation of all of your marketing communication and represents the sum total of your promises to your customers. A clearly defined brand, carefully crafted, will shape the perception of your company, and the experiences your customers have with it.

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