Brand Equity and the Cost of Point-of-Sale Marketing Obsolescence

The half-life of Point-of-Sale (POS) marketing materials continues to decline. In fact, the marketing value of POS materials, such as signs, displays, coupons and free-samples, has never been shorter or more difficult to manage than it is today. Plain and simple:  POS marketing materials become obsolete rapidly — in some cases very rapidly.

As we’ve learned, marketers in the US are spending over 20 billion dollars per year designing, producing, storing and shipping POS marketing materials. How well this portion of the overall marketing budget is tracked and managed will materially impact the effectiveness and the efficiency of POS marketing dollars in creating and raising value - Value expressed in terms of increased sales and profits, improved Brand Equity^*and a sustained competitive advantage.

Admittedly there are costs that must be considered to determine the best POS material refresh rate. These costs include the actual dollar cost of developing, producing and placing POS vs. the opportunity cost of allowing your marketing message to become outdated or stale.

Accurate POS Content Is Important

Most manufacturers, wholesale distributors and retailers agree that the timeliness of POS marketing content has enormous value at the “point-of-purchase.” Unfortunately, when not tracked and managed, POS materials for your brands or products may contain dated or inaccurate content.

How does this happen? There may be many reasons for out-of-date POS: Ordering, producing or picking errors; graphics delivery delays; or simple carelessness; probably account for the majority of the causes.

But the more likely reason is that those who order, develop and produce the POS are doing so without the necessary tools required to track, measure and manage POS materials in a timely manner - From order entry, to production, to placement, to post campaign analysis.

If you believe that delivering the most current content to shoppers will help build your brand’s equity and achieve your sales and profitability objectives, then you must begin to apply greater discipline to the POS Marketing campaign process. Adopting a POS Marketing methodology and employing systems to help with the process will streamline this portion of the marketing-mix.

It has been shown that adopting POS marketing management systems can lower costs, speed time-to-market for POS materials, and insure accurate POS content. All of these benefits can directly contribute to increasing sales and improving profitability.

Now is the Time

We recognize that the economic environment of the past several years may have not been favorable to the adoption of new systems and technology, like POS Marketing management systems. However, now with the hopes of a US recovery gaining traction, many consumer goods manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers are looking for technology solutions that will drive costs down, increase top line growth and provide a correlation between POS marketing campaigns and sales.

In other words, systems that collect and track POS data have value in themselves but create even more value in helping companies achieve their core business objectives. Today there is ample opportunity for those marketers who are willing to invest in POS Marketing management systems. By aligning their technology goals with their business goals there can be a A ‘Win-Win’ situation for everyone.

To learn more about the features and benefits of a POS Marketing Management System click this button:

    

*Brand Equity is marketing term used describe the value (equated to sales or some other financial metric) of having a well-known brand name. This is based on the idea that the owner of a well-known brand name can generate more money from products with that brand name than from products with a lesser-known brand name, as shoppers perceive that products with well-known brand names are better than products with lesser brand names.