HOW TO

OVERCOME
RETAIL MARKETING
CHALLENGES
USING CROSS-CHANNEL
ATTRIBUTION
 3 INTRODUCTION

4 EMPTY BRICK & MORTAR STORES WITH

BOOMING ONLINE SALES

5 SEO & RETAIL SHOPS

6 PAY ATTENTION TO PAID MEDIA

8 CREATING LOCAL BUZZ

9 UNDERSTANDING & USING THE ANALYTICS

TABLE OF

CONTENTS 10 MAKING THE CASE FOR CROSS-CHANNEL

ATTRIBUTION
INTRODUCTION
The State of Shopping
The convenience of online shopping is one we all succumb to. Knowing this, do brick and
mortar store locations stand a chance?

In short, yes, but there are three common digital retail marketing challenges to overcome
before seeing the boost in foot traffic and sales you’re looking for.

Everyone Loves to Shop

From understanding how digital presence influences in-store sales, creating a stellar
localized SERP ranking, to digging deep into the data to make sense of it all, BFO’s strategic
retail marketing experience is here to help. Hey, we like to shop, too.

3
EMPTY
The Problem
It’s a common challenge retail entities are facing
more and more - They set up beautiful shops with the

BRICK & MORTAR

stock customers asked for, but the shelves remain
untouched, the shop is virtually a ghost town.

STORES WITH
The Result
Low product turnover, which costs more than it
seems in the long run. On the flip side, the online

BOOMING
store is bustling with busy shoppers scouring pages
and pages of items in hopes of making the perfect
purchase. What are retail businesses to do about this

ONLINE SALES
drop in foot traffic?

Enter Cross-channel Attribution

As online retail shops become more sophisticated,
the key is cross-channel attribution. Cross-channel
attribution is the method of analyzing marketing
touch points both online and offline to determine
and optimize conversions.

By understanding what it is, how it works, and why

it can make or break your retail business in the
SECTION years to come, you will have better insight for future

1
marketing strategies. The first part of the cross-
channel attribution journey is taking a look at your
SEO.

4
SEO &
The Problem
With in-store inventory customers want to purchase, shops know there are plenty of
challenges with keeping potential shoppers informed about what’s on the shelves,

RETAIL SHOPS
what’s leaving the floor, and ensuring they stay interested along the way. This can also be
intimidating when addressing your shop’s online inventory.

There are lots of moving pieces, plenty of flux, and it makes creating a consistent SEO
strategy to use across the digital shop a bit scary. You need to deal with changing
inventory, yes, but if you have a specific strategy informed by someone who understands
merchandising, SEO management will become a bit easier.

The Best Strategy

Especially important for enterprise retail, creating an SEO strategy informed by those who
know the typical paths customers take in-store and online can help you know where to
focus your optimization energies rather than look at hundreds of product pages in horror.

For example, if your data and

in-store research show specific
pathways customers walk through
your floor, you can mimic this on
your digital site, optimizing those
pages for better digital visibility
much like you would place those
SECTION items towards the front of the

2
store. This becomes easier when
retail shops work with analytics
experts who can get to know the
store’s merchandising through the
in-store expert.

5
PAY ATTENTION
The Problem
You’ve got your organic results on point, but what about those paid ads you’ve been
running? Are they reaching the right eyes on the other side of the screen?

TO PAID MEDIA Will those shoppers who see the ads simply use the site or will they be encouraged to head
to their nearest brick and mortar location to test out the products for themselves?

Understanding the effects your paid media efforts have on both your digital site success
and your brick and mortar shop’s sales can be difficult, but it’s crucial to get a handle on
for omnichannel sales.

SECTION

6
PAY ATTENTION
Digital Shopping and Physical Sales
A common question we get from retail clients is how to tell if a TV commercial impacts
digital sales, and thereby how does that digital sale or site session increase impact the in-

TO PAID MEDIA
store traffic?

Think of it as a pathway, going back to the SEO segment for a minute. If you understand in-
store merchandising and work with an expert who understands the digital equivalent, you
will begin to see patterns, tracking spikes in digital traffic and hopefully an increase in your
storefront’s shopper count.

Use Your In-Store List

Another example is measuring the impact of in-store lists, or those who might sign up for
a newsletter in-store and then engage with your digital shop. How will you measure this
SECTION
reverse pathway?

3 This is where your CRM and consistent acquisition attribution will be your best friend. By
keeping track of customer acquisition sources and following their journey with your digital
marketing tools, you will be able to see just how well your in-store lists perform digitally.

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CREATING
The SERP Struggle
One of our retail clients’ greatest struggles is knowing what to do to increase local SERP
ranking and visibility. Whether you have one, two, or 600 brick and mortar locations, it can

LOCAL BUZZ
be difficult to get your shop on the map, let alone within the geographic parameters you
think customers are searching from.

Our solution at BFO has been to help clients build a Nationally Local strategy.

What’s a Nationally Local Strategy?

In essence, it means retail businesses
will buy digital media efforts at national
scale efficiency while providing
consumers local experience and results.

Using the latest technology, retailers

purchase media across the country
and then create localized pockets,
so to speak, within this to consolidate
spending and hyper-focus efforts.

The only way this can even marginally

function though is if you clearly
SECTION communicate your goals for local to

4 help the purchasing and setup process

run smoothly and ensure the right
targets are reached.

8
UNDERSTANDING
The Greatest Question of All
It’s great to have these tactics in place, seeing more in-store
sales and increased conversions online, but how do you

AND USING THE

keep up the momentum to grow the business?

It Comes Down to Analytics

ANALYTICS
Team BFO dives deep into the data and over the years
we have helped retail clients identify certain platforms to
help offset some of the most common challenges. These
challenges are as simple as tracking online purchases or
can be as complex as assessing cross-channel attribution
for multiple online shops with hundreds of brick and mortar
locations.

BFO’s expertise is in data analysis fueling our strategies for

retail clients. With access to powerful tools like GA 360, Data
Studio, and others, we have the ability to help accurately
assess cross-channel attribution from all angles. This means
we can help you learn which metrics to track and measure
in-store and online to create plans that increase in-store
foot traffic, localized SERP visibility, and overall revenue
growth.

SECTION Additionally, by working with analytics experts, retailers

5
can have more time to focus on other items that require
attention such as inventory, merchandising strategies, and
ways to delight customers who enter your stores.

9
MAKING THE
Start Seeing More Shoppers!
Much like SEO and paid media efforts, online and in-store success cannot be mutually
exclusive for retail revenue growth.

CASE FOR The effects online optimization can have on in-store purchases are endless, but they can
only come to fruition if you understand how to get there.

CROSS-CHANNEL When you are able to overcome these three common retail digital marketing challenges,
you will see increased in-store purchases, better understand cross-channel attribution, and

ATTRIBUTION
get your store in front of the right shoppers, whether on a screen or in person.

CONCLUSION

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