Achieving Excellence in Promotion Execution

In the dynamic world of Consumer-Packaged Goods (CPG), 75% of companies grapple with the consistent challenge of having retailer-aligned promotions executed correctly at store level. This means that time and money invested into developing and implementing promotional strategies probably won’t result in in-store execution as you’ve planned and have agreed with the buying team. There is no guarantee that trade spend will generate any ROI or that your consumers will even encounter the promotion in the store at all. Even the best-built plans can be disrupted by a variety of deviations, for example:

• Non-participation by individual stores
• Incomplete execution (lack of displays, POSM etc)
• Late start or early finishing
• OOS of promotion assortment

Each of these factors can undermine the impact of your promotional campaign. But how can you protect yourself from this when the promotion launches in thousands of stores simultaneously? Well, the answer is tied to why promotions sometimes don’t work out as planned and is often linked to the planning process.

One of the core reasons for low promotion ROI or failure is that people within the company don’t always communicate effectively and share information as they should. Trade Marketing Managers and Key Account Managers can implement dozens of promotions simultaneously, and if information doesn’t reach the customer facing sales teams on time or in its entirety there is an information gap, that can lead to a less than optimum promotion performance. Look at the following scenarios:

Further issues can arise with feedback going the other way. Sometimes, Promotion Managers don’t get all the information they need on time, for example, when the promotions go live, how well they’re implemented in-store and if they’re going to plan can take time to feed back in reports. If we could monitor performance while they’re happening, we could make changes and corrections during the ‘live phase’, making our activity work even better and deliver forecasted results.

In most businesses, however, such control and adjustments are placed on sales or rely on manual communication and in-store pro-activity, which is time-consuming, slow and expensive. Surprisingly, a quarter of companies do not undertake any in-flight monitoring at all.

It’s possible to tackle this issue by ensuring communication flows seamlessly within the company and that some tasks are automated like preparation, in-flight monitoring, and post-promotion analysis. To achieve this, SoftServe Business Systems has developed an AI-Driven Ecosystem of digital solutions for sales and promotion management, monitoring, and analytics. Here’s how the communication process works within the ecosystem involving three solutions: Trade Promo Management (TPM), Sales Force Automation (SFA), and Image Recognition (IR).

In the SoftServe Business Systems Ecosystem, TPM works hand in hand with SFA. This means that promotion information can be quickly sent to the field for easy mobile access and that no one misses the briefing. This notifies the field teams about their tasks related to promotion preparation and execution. Plus, it closes the loop in the sales process, sending important information from the field execution points back to the planners.

This connectivity with Retail Execution ensures smooth in-flight monitoring of promotion plans, leading to improved sales execution and achieving team targets. Additionally, it paves the way for communication to flow back to the planners via the tool in real-time, providing data related to in-store execution to the Marketing teams. This, in turn, allows for real-time adjustments to be made, keeping the system flexible and responsive.

This smooth integration isn’t just something we claim – the success stories of our customers support this assertion. Added weight is given to this by an industry-focused organization, Promotion Optimization Institute, which has recognized our solutions as best-in-class for years in a row. In fact, last year, our TPM solution received Best-in-Class Distinctions in two key areas: Field Analytics & Insights and Collaboration – External.

SoftServe Business Systems has been helping CPG businesses fulfill promotion potential, improve Sales and Marketing communication, and provide real-time analytics for more than 20 years. Step by step, over these two decades, we have been building an ecosystem that’s tailored to the unique demands of CPG companies and addressing a wide array of needs with easy-to-use tools.

Speed, agility and data-driven decisions are here to stay, so it’s not just about managing the here and now; it’s about embracing constant change and your business having the tools that evolve with you so that you have access and use the data available to improve performance and decision making. Contact SSBS today and let us show you how an ecosystem approach can fit your unique nature.