In the connected retail environment developing in the UK the trend for social, location based and mobile forms of exchange are on the increase. Fuelled by growth in smartphones and data networks the integration of the digital world with the in store shopping experience is on the rise. Two thirds of smartphone users in the US say they use them while in store, with 9% using them for coupon redemption. The latter point highlights that it’s not only technological shifts driving the behaviour; economic conditions are also leading shoppers to make smarter decisions using whatever platform they have at their disposal.

I’ve seen recently that shopper marketing departments are growing and the focus of many is to understand how digital integration can support and enhance the shopper experience. It’s a noble quest and one I’m sure will pay dividends in the future. If shopper marketing planning fails to recognise that a great deal of shoppers research and planning is affected digitally and via social media, even for in-store purchases, then they could be missing out.

Key to understanding the role of integrated media for brands in the shopping environment is as follows:

• Forget AIDA – what does the journey now look like and where can/does digital play a role?

• Get SoLoMo – Bring shoppers the right content, media or offers at the right time using their smartphones as the intermediary.

• There is no single answer – research how the role of digital integration can function most effectively in your category and for your shoppers.

At the Value Engineers our Digital Strategy Team can help with all three.

Last Wednesday, The Value Engineers were delighted to be asked to contribute to ITV1′s Daybreak show.

Lou Ellerton appeared on the show at the ungodly hour of 6:40am to talk about Tesco’s trials and tribulations with its Fresh ‘N’ Easy brand in the US, Philip Green’s decision to sell a 25% stake in Top Shop to a US investor, and the opportunities that a Royal baby might create for British brands. It’s an eclectic selection of topics, we agree!

If you’d like to see for yourself how Lou got on, the show is available here on ITV Player until Wednesday morning (12th December). Her comments start at 00:37, just after the ad break.

We’re delighted to introduce two new faces to the Value Engineers team – Nicola Davies and Martha McPherson, who both join us as Marketing Analysts.

Martha McPherson joins us having graduated from St Catherine’s College, Oxford with a degree in English Language and Literature. Whilst at Oxford she got stuck into theatre marketing and reviewing, as well as a brief stint of acting as a beetle in an obscure Lorca play. In the holidays she escaped the world of English to take part in a cultural immersion course in China, which led to a severe case of the travel bug, and to an intense two-month internship in social media marketing in Bangalore. In her spare time Martha enjoys exploring cities, improving her front crawl and reading lots of books.

Nicola Davies graduated from Robinson College, Cambridge this year with a degree in Theology and Religious Studies. During her time at Cambridge, she was on the committee for the college May Ball and took great pleasure in attending a wide variety of amateur dramatics and guest-speaker debates. Nicola has previous experience in the pharmaceutical industry during a 2-month marketing internship at GlaxoSmithKline, where she worked on two brands, which involved using several forms of direct marketing and frequent communication with the sales team. From this, she recognised her interest in creative approaches to branding, which she found The Value Engineers offers in abundance. In her spare time, Nicola enjoys travelling, attending comedy shows and sampling the latest eateries in London.

A big welcome to both Nicola and Martha from all the team at The Value Engineers. We’re sure you’ll see them around our offices or posting on our blog very soon!

As someone who used to do their main shopping in Tesco and used other supermarkets for top-ups, but who has now switched to another brand for my main shop and relegated Tesco to one of my other top-up options, I feel well placed to give both a professional and personal view on why they have gone off the boil in the UK.

Tesco at their best for me epitomised what a good brand should have – a central core but a multiplicity of initiatives, innovations, ideas and actions; their recognition  that for many people the supermarket is a necessary chore and that anything and everything, however small, you can do to make it better for me, the shopper, is welcome.

For years they did this – improving their stores, improving the car-parks and introducing family and toddler spaces, improving the quality of their products, allowing me to give something back to my local community with “computers for schools”, helping with queueing whenever they could by opening other tills, giving me premium and value options, introducing a loyalty card which gave me back something I could actually spend on what matters to me – every little helped and all those “littles” added up to a lot. It made Tesco leader of the pack and the constant innovation help keep them there

In recent times, however, while they have seemed to have one central core, it is a new core and they appear to have focused on it to the exclusion of just about everything else – to paraphrase Tony Blair it appears the three most important things for Tesco are value, value and value.

Now times are tough are and budgets are tight (even for those of us working in marketing) but Tesco seemed to have forgotten that whilst really important, price isn’t the only factor that affects where we choose to shop; otherwise why hadn’t we been shopping in Aldi or Lidl?

Other supermarket brands had been following Tesco where they led, but now in many ways it is the other supermarket brands that have been taking the lead in initiatives and innovations… whilst still being concerned with price too. For example, Waitrose may have introduced their Essentials range but have also focused on local producers, and have re-gained the lead in recipe suggestions and inspirations using Delia and Heston to good effect.

Tesco has announced its £1 billion plan to re-establish growth, and I wish them well, but from what they have said it sounds a little too much like they are planning to play catch up -not planning to re-establish themselves as leaders.

Every marketing case study on Starbucks lauds the success of the brand in creating the concept of the ‘third place’ – the coffee shop as safe, desirable destination that isn’t work or home. Whilst ‘extra-shot, skinny latte with caramel syrup’ personalised coffee consumption was an important part of the offer, the brand was always at pains to point out that it was so much more than just a coffee business.

All that changed, of course, when the brand entered the grocery and convenience channels with pre-mixed chilled latte and cappuccino products, and then again with the launch of the ‘premium’ instant Via product. Today Starbucks have announced that they will be taking on Nespresso with their own single cup coffee maker, the Verismo. So, do these coffee-based product leave the Starbucks brand compromised and confused or can it credibly be both a product brand and an experience brand?

In the new world of complex user-constructed brands we would argue that Starbucks’ integrity is still intact. The core of the brand’s positioning will always be focussed on the full coffee shop experience and the notion of the third place, but beneath that umbrella it is perfectly credible for the brand to offer a range of product (and service) propositions, targeting different users or occasions, as long as these still maintain a clear and tangible link back to the core positioning. The role of future brand building activity should always be about reinforcing the core Starbucks experience, but for as long as that remains attractive and relevant, the brand can comfortably offer a range of appropriate propositions underneath it, allowing their diverse consumers to access the brand in different ways at different times.

For us this is an example of preserving the core whilst stimulating change. A brand remaining true to its core philosophy whilst recognising the need to develop and manage the multiplicity of its offer.

I’m sure Starbucks will be delighted to hear that we agree with their brand strategy(!) …but it looks like Wall St agrees already as shares in Starbucks’ main American competitor, Green Mountain, fell 20% on the news.