It’s no new revelation that today’s consumers are ad-blind and leading brands are looking for alternatives to get in front of their consumers. Studies show that 86% of consumers are ad blind, and only 8% of users will recall a company, product, or service after viewing an ad. Paid ads on social media are seeing a decline in effectiveness in today’s climate, and strategies that solely rely on these advertisements aren’t paying off for CPG brands.
With 92% of consumers stating they prefer referrals from people in their lives over any advertising source, it’s a no-brainer to include word-of-mouth as a component of your strategy. This especially holds true for grocery and convenience brands. People love sharing and recommending their favorite grocery store to family and friends – where they’re saving money, buying fresh produce, or enjoying convenient curbside pickup. Consumers are extremely loyal to their primary grocery store, too. Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, allegiance to consumers’ primary grocer has increased as they limit store visits. According to one source, “While shoppers do spread their food dollars around, they still spend about 75% of their food dollars at their primary store – whether in store or online.”
With this loyalty comes advocacy that spreads through social networks. People want to shop where their friends and family have had positive experiences buying quality foods at a price point that works for them. While paid media can be helpful in generating broad awareness, consumers want to hear from each other before you’ll earn their grocery dollars. This post dives into the underutilized opportunities grocery brands have to leverage word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing to overcome the shortcomings of a paid-only strategy.
The oversaturation of paid advertisements, especially on social media, and why they don’t always resonate –
- Consumers consciously and subconsciously filter out digital advertisements. From various ad-blockers to the “Promotions” tab in gmail, brands hit many roadblocks to getting in front of consumers with digital touchpoints.
- Paid advertisements on social media aren’t too effective either. A study by Havas Media found that ad blindness has infiltrated Facebook, reducing clickthrough rates on digital ad campaigns.
- Influencers are oversaturated, too. The world of #sponsored “word-of-mouth” is pay-to-play, and it’s difficult for consumers to know when an influencer’s promotion is real and genuine.
So how can we flip the switch? Here are some ways that you can be a larger part of your consumers journey and join the conversation around the table –
- Join the conversation where it’s happening. Most of the talk about your brand doesn’t happen on your site or your channels, but in the feeds of your best customers; they’re talking about grocery stores on coupon communities, food blogs, recipe shares, and local community pages. By joining these conversations, you can learn from your customers while helping inform and shape the discussion and impact how your brand spreads.
- Flood your social channels with positive brand love and drown out any negative noise. Unfortunately, grocery stores are prone to posts from angry shoppers on social media about a bad experience in your stores. Word-of-mouth programs are meant to cancel out this negativity by inspiring your customers to share brand love and advocacy.
- Share and interact with UGC that your customers post to show your gratitude and increase excitement. Grocery hauls, recipes, and moments around the table lend themselves to great content on social media. Grocery stores have a unique opportunity to be there at the beginning of the journey and continue to be part of the conversation until family meals hit the table. Do you follow bloggers and see how much they love posting grocery hauls? Why not inspire your everyday consumers to share this content, too.
- Find a more structured approach to advocacy and word-of-mouth. Build an Insiders community and engage your best fans to share your brand with their own true network of friends and family. Encourage fans to create content on your behalf. This Insiders community is yours to curate. Create a shoppers’ club, ask for feedback about in-store and online shopping experiences, inspire UGC, and promote sharing by asking for recipe ideas.
- If building an Insiders community feels like a big jump from where you are now, start by inviting your customers to create more user-generated content around your brand. Not only do these generate immediate organic reach, but you can repurpose that content in your paid advertisements so your ads look and feel more authentic. One study showed that Facebook and Instagram ads that utilize user-generated photos saw a 5x higher return on spend and 50% increase in click rates.
With grocery brands, your consumers are already talking about you amongst themselves. With a more solid WOM strategy, you can guide those organic conversations on social media to help grow your business.
The reason that paid advertising doesn’t always work on its own is why WOM does – trust in the source. It goes back to recommendations, stories, and content from people we trust in our real lives. How are you inspiring advocacy and WOM from your customers? There are incredible opportunities for advocacy with grocery brands where trusted peer-to-peer recommendations are an essential form of marketing. If you’re considering tech partners to help you power a customer insiders program, reach out to erin@crowdly.com to learn more about Crowdly’s all-in-one platform and how we’re driving advocacy at scale for grocery brands like Giant Eagle and Home Chef.
Sources:
1 https://miappi.com/paid-ads-benefit-user-generated-content/
2 https://www.annexcloud.com/blog/the-ultimate-list-of-user-generated-content-statistics/
3https://www.omnivirt.com/blog/prevent-banner-blindness/#:~:text=Banner%20Blindness%20Statistics&text=Roughly%20only%208%25%20of%20users,consumers%20suffer%20from%20banner%20blindness
4https://morganmyers.com/2020/07/24/evolution-of-the-2020-shopper-grocery-shopping-behavior/#:~:text=Changes%20in%20volume%20and%20spend%20on%20groceries&text=Pre%2Dpandemic%20trends%20showed%20that,stocked%20up%20and%20panic%20purchased.