Follow These CPG Marketing Trends to Connect With Customers

TL;DR:

• Direct to consumer (DTC) models are trending because they give brands complete control over how products are presented to the consumer.
• Consumers prefer personalized shopping experiences, which means CPG brands can enhance profitability and brand loyalty through personalization.
• Data is king in the CPG industry, as data-driven marketing is crucial for building brand awareness and keeping customers engaged.
• With the number of eco-conscious consumers on the rise, sustainability messaging is an important trend that can attract customers searching for environmentally friendly products.
• As the world becomes more interconnected, growing numbers of consumers want a seamless omnichannel experience from websites and social media to in-store shopping.
• As REN Skincare illustrates with the product finder they created via Jebbit, you can leverage interactive digital experiences to gather data and optimize customer journeys so that you can stay on top of CPG marketing trends.

The consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry is constantly evolving. These days, between the explosive growth of e-commerce, shifting customer needs, and industry-wide digital transformation, it seems like that evolution is happening faster than ever. 

As the landscape changes, savvy CPG brands are rethinking their approaches to marketing — and that is leading to the rise of several CPG marketing trends that are reshaping the way brands connect with customers.

If you’re looking for insights, stay tuned. We’re going to explore some of the most prominent CPG marketing trends today, why those trends are happening, and how you can get in on them with help from Jebbit. 

5 CPG Marketing Trends to Watch

E-commerce has taken the CPG industry by storm — and that means CPG brands are shifting marketing strategies to adapt to changing business models and evolving consumer behavior. So what are the CPG marketing trends that savvy brands are following? Read below for some of the top trends that we’ve seen emerge in recent years.

1. The Trend: Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) Models

These days, it’s easier than ever before for CPG brands to adopt DTC models via e-commerce. It’s one of the largest effects of digital transformation. 

Once upon a time, if you wanted to sell apparel, personal care items, household goods, or virtually any other type of CPG product, partnerships with brick-and-mortar retailers were an absolute necessity. Apart from advertising and the occasional catalog, it was the only way to get your products out in front of consumers.

Now that e-commerce is booming, retailers can easily promote and sell consumer goods across digital channels — and effectively bypass traditional retail channels.

Why It’s Trending

DTC models mean brands have complete control over the customer experience. That gives brands the ability to collect data at every touchpoint along the customer journey, then use that data to create truly amazing customer experiences.

Think about it this way: When you’re selling via a partner that operates a chain of brick-and-mortar stores, you have little control over where your products are placed within that store, how they are displayed, or even how the store promotes them. On top of that, you’ll gain virtually no insights into which shoppers are coming into the stores to browse and purchase your products.

DTC models change all of this. They give the brand total control over every aspect of product display and placement. Each time customers interact with the brand, the brand can collect data that it can use to optimize marketing, improve website functionality, or even develop new products that align with customers' interests.

2. The Trend: Personalized Customer Experiences

For today’s customers, personalized experiences are incredibly important. In fact, one survey asked 1,000 consumers about this topic and found that 81% of customers prefer companies that offer personalized experiences.

But what, exactly, does personalization mean? Here are some examples:

• Personalized product recommendations on store and product pages
• Blogs or newsletters with content personalized to customer interests
• Marketing emails featuring personalized product recommendations
• Quizzes and product finders designed to offer recommendations tailored to customer needs

To achieve this kind of customization at the enterprise level, both data analytics and digital transformation are required. Whenever customers interact with a brand, this represents an opportunity for the brand to collect data points that can inform future personalization efforts. 

Enterprises with tens of thousands or millions of potential customers can collect millions of data points per day — and that’s why digital transformation is an absolute must. To make sense of all of this data, brands are relying on customer data platforms (CDPs), artificial intelligence, and automation to create in-depth customer profiles. With these profiles, they can provide personalized customer service or serve up relevant content along with the perfect product recommendations.

Why It’s Trending

For customers, personalized experiences are better experiences. Personalized product recommendations save shoppers time by helping them find the right products in just a few clicks — no need to spend hours browsing and comparing selections from among a sea of options. Offering products relevant to an individual’s interests also helps to deepen customer engagement, and because it makes customers feel valued, it can build loyalty too.

3. The Trend: Data-Driven Marketing

Staying on the cutting edge of CPG marketing trends means harnessing the power of data-driven marketing. Over the past couple of decades, digital transformation and the shift to e-commerce has enabled CPG companies to access more customer data than ever before. 

Brands engaged in data-driven marketing can use that data to get an in-depth understanding of the many segments that make up their target audience. This level of understanding allows for marketers to gain insights into a diverse set of customer needs and preferences — and then optimize marketing campaigns with messaging that speaks to these needs. 

Why It’s Trending

Data-driven marketing is trending in large part because for marketing messaging to work, it needs to be relevant to customer needs and interests. Without data to inform your marketing efforts, you run the risk of bombarding potential customers with irrelevant content, product recommendations, and advertisements. 

One survey from the U.K. illustrated that 70% of people found digital advertising annoying — and 72% said that bad advertising experiences had a negative impact on the way they perceived a brand. Using data to keep marketing messaging relevant helps brands engage customers rather than annoy them.

4. The Trend: Sustainability Messaging

Sustainability messaging is one of today’s biggest CPG marketing trends. Among consumers, there is a growing demand for eco-friendly brands that put their sustainability practices on display. In the consumer packaged goods industry, it’s not enough to simply woo customers with messaging in support of eco-friendly practices. Consumers are seeking out brands that can lead by example.

For brands, this means that transparency is key. You can win over eco-conscious consumers with messaging and practices that include:

• Information on product sourcing that enables consumers to choose ethically sourced products
• Details about ingredients or materials so that customers can make informed purchasing decisions
• Eco-friendly packaging that can biodegrade or be recycled so that it doesn’t end up in a landfill
• Minimalist packaging, which reduces the overall waste generated by CPG brands

Why It’s Trending

Modern consumers have become increasingly concerned with the impact they have on the environment. One of the biggest ways for people to minimize their environmental impact is to make wise purchasing decisions — and that means consumer preferences are shifting in favor of CPG brands who are transparent with their sustainable practices and messaging.

5. The Trend: Omnichannel Strategies

E-commerce itself is a trend that has grown rapidly over the past couple of decades — and it’s one that has also adapted and evolved to better suit shifting consumer demands. That’s why omnichannel strategies are one of the top trends in e-commerce today.

Omnichannel strategies seek to create a seamless experience between e-commerce and in-store shopping. For example, a typical omnichannel customer journey may start with the customer spotting a new CPG product on social media — then clicking over to the brand’s e-commerce site to learn more about it. Having decided they want this product, the customer uses the brand’s site to find it in-store nearby, so they head out to make the in-store purchase and enjoy the product the same day.

Why It’s Trending

These days, everything is becoming much more interconnected. With that, customers expect a seamless transition between online and in-store experiences. Omnichannel strategies make it easier for customers to identify products they want, then make a same-day purchase at a nearby store — no need to pay for shipping or wait for the item to arrive. Amenities like curbside pickup can be major time-savers, enabling shoppers to choose products online, then swing by after work to pick them up.

How Jebbit Can Help You Stay Abreast of CPG Marketing Trends

Looking for ways to meet consumer needs while staying on top of CPG industry trends? Jebbit can help with that. Our platform allows you to create interactive experiences that you can add to digital marketing campaigns. With these experiences, you can accomplish so much, including: 

• Gather first-party data.
• Optimize customer journeys.
• Create personalized marketing campaigns.
• Build brand loyalty. 

We’ll show you how.

How REN Skincare Leveraged Jebbit

Let’s start with an example of a brand who successfully leveraged Jebbit to pursue their own CPG marketing goals. REN Skincare came to Jebbit with two main concerns in mind: 

1. They wanted to increase online conversions
2. They wanted to gather data that allowed them to get a deeper understanding of their customers. 

Thus, they used the Jebbit Experience Builder to create a product match quiz. Users can interact with this quiz by answering a few quick questions — and it simplifies the shopping process by recommending products aligned with individual consumer needs.

This product finder was quite successful. Eighty percent of users who saw the quiz engaged with it. Up to 75% of website visitors who started the experience went on to complete it — and 49% of those users clicked through to shop their recommendations. Along the way, REN gathered information about customer needs and preferences. Plus, 28% of users submitted lead information too.

What You Can Learn From This Example

REN’s product finder quiz makes it easy to see how CPG brands can create their own interactive digital experiences to pursue a variety of goals. Let’s break it down so that you can see how this example could apply to your brand.

Collecting and Leveraging First-Party Data

Each time customers interact with a Jebbit experience, you get the opportunity to gain insights into that particular customer’s needs. Add this first-party data to customer profiles, and then use them to forecast the types of product recommendations that customer may enjoy in the future.

For example, in REN’s product finder, one question asked about skin types. Customers who clicked the “dry skin” answer will likely prefer future personalized recommendations for products designed for dry skin as opposed to oily skin.

Optimizing Customer Journeys

The data that you collect via Jebbit experiences can also help you to optimize the customer journey. You can use this information to dive deep on personalization, for example, so that you can use dynamic content, marketing emails, and other channels to serve up personalized recommendations. 

Jebbit experiences can also optimize the customer journey by:

• Providing fun, insightful content that engages customers while building brand loyalty
• Using product finders to eliminate the tedious research process that customers need to do, thus creating a smoother, more enjoyable path between discovery and purchase decisions
• Providing the insights needed to create personalized digital marketing campaigns across channels so that you can target narrower audience segments with highly relevant content

Stay on Top of CPG Marketing Trends With Jebbit’s Help

DTC models, personalized experiences, data-driven marketing, and sustainability messaging number among some of the top CPG marketing trends out there. On top of that, as e-commerce grows and digital transformation progresses, customers are expecting seamless experiences between shopping online and in-store, which means that omnichannel strategies are crucial.

Whether you need to build engagement among customers or gather the kind of first-party data that will help you power a successful CPG marketing strategy, you can reap a lot of benefits by creating interactive digital experiences with Jebbit. Streamline the shopping experience with a product finder, engage customers with fun quizzes and games, or offer insightful content through lookbooks and other types of interactive experiences. 

Whatever goals you may have for your brand’s CPG marketing strategy, we can help. To learn more, schedule a strategy call with a Jebbit Experience Expert today.