PebblePost was in full force last week at Shoptalk’s annual conference in Las Vegas.
The conference brings together industry leaders and changemakers who are reshaping how consumers discover, shop, and buy. We asked our team on the ground to tell us the most compelling insights attendees shared surrounding industry challenges, what they’re excited about, and what’s top of mind for the remainder of the year.
Brands want to test new channels
Brands are hungry to vet, evaluate, and test new channels and capabilities, including flexibility, measurement, and integrations. There’s growing awareness and interest in Programmatic Direct Mail as one of those new channels.
“There is an appetite for testing new channels,” said our Chief Revenue Officer Eric Presbrey. “Brands are bullish on what intelligent data and PDM can do. Most buy into smart direct mail and like our approach to it.”
Even with the economy changing course in the right direction, factors like rising customer acquisition costs are catalyzing brands to explore other media channels.
“Despite economic headwinds, marketers are still being tasked with finding new solutions to help them convert their target audience in new ways,” said PebblePost Sales Director Dan Stern.
Privacy changes are also part of the impetus for testing new channels. PebblePost Sales Director Michael Hill said that brands he spoke with “are looking to diversify their media mixes and find solutions to help future-proof third-party cookies.”
However, finding the budget for these new channels presents challenges for some brands, with marketers “thinking about rising costs (digital CPMs) the back half of the year in an election cycle, plus Q4,” said PebblePost VP of Sales Daniel Hoffman.
“Brands are still looking to diversify their marketing, especially with the deprecation of cookies quickly approaching,” said PebblePost Sales Director Sydney Russell. “With that said, they mentioned that finding larger budgets to test into new channels has challenged them in the past year.”
Brands see the importance of incrementality
With new channels come new ways to gauge performance. And marketers are increasingly waking up to incrementality as a measurement North Star.
“Incrementality continues to grow in importance,” said Presbrey. “Consolidating measurement is growing in importance.”
Hill said each brand he spoke with mentioned a focus on incrementality in measuring partners and is looking to add new channels to hit goals. “They also each talked about flexibility in testing and learning when it comes to bringing on new channels.”
Brands with long-standing traditional direct mail or catalog programs are also beginning to acknowledge that those programs might be ready for some disruption—especially regarding the results they’re generating.
“They see the value in an offline touchpoint but are struggling to scale the programs based on underwhelming incremental ROI,” said Stern. “The biggest pain points with traditional direct mail are manual and operational inefficiencies, data limitations, and measurement.”
That’s why brands need the right partner to test new channels and measure their efficacy.
“Brands continue to look for vendors and solutions that emphasize the partnership itself,” added Stern. “They want to work with companies investing in their long-term success.”
If you’re looking for new solutions that extend beyond your digital efforts, let us tell you how PDM works in tandem with online marketing channels to engage consumers with an omnichannel approach that turns marketing dollars into revenue. Download our “eBook Programmatic Direct Mail: How a Channel with Offline Roots Fits into Your Digital Marketing Mix” to learn more.
