In the crowded CPG marketplace, it’s a challenge for brands to stand out, create a loyal following, and stay ahead of the competition. You can have an amazing product that blows away the others in the category, but without getting (and keeping) that product in front of shoppers, the brand has little chance of success.

So how can your brand engage with shoppers, understand their internal decision-making processes as well as their attitudes, and build the kind of relationship with them that puts your brand first on their mental checklist? It starts with investing in excellent market research.

“Of course you’d say that,” you might be thinking, “C+R is a market research company.” And you’re right. In fact, our robust shopper journey/path-to-purchase and shopper insights research are points of pride for us. However, we believe that you don’t need to just take our word for it. 

Here, we briefly discuss 5 examples of how CPG brands built and sustained success through market research (and why yours should too).

Case Study 1: Unlocking the Power of Product Display Pages for Enhanced Shopping Experiences

The challenge:
A multinational CPG client needed a comprehensive, research-backed perspective on the impact of product display pages on a major grocery retailer’s website. Their understanding needed to encompass the effects of page variations on shopping experiences and sales across multiple categories.

Our approach:
Addressing the client’s needs meant developing a thorough data picture of shoppers’ interactions with the store’s web pages. To achieve this, we leveraged our diverse research offerings to capture holistic insights, first via a multi-celled monadic shopping exercise, giving the client a deep understanding of the financial implications of each page type. A quantitative survey of shoppers rounded out the research effort, revealing shopping experience, preferences, and potential areas for improvement.

Results:
The research highlighted the critical role of product display pages in shaping shoppers’ purchasing decisions, revealing a preference for adding items from search or product detail pages. Insights into navigation ease, shopping experience attractiveness, and optimal display page design enabled the client to enhance shopper satisfaction and drive better financial outcomes.

Case Study 2: Assessing the Physical and Digital Shopper Journey to Inform Retail Strategies

The challenge:
Our client, a major food company, needed to gain an understanding of the path-to-purchase for the shelf-stable and refrigerated salsa, Mexican sauce, and guacamole categories among Gen Pop and Hispanic shoppers.

Our approach:
To answer the client’s questions around the path-to-purchase, C+R implemented a comprehensive research design, combining several approaches to develop a robust picture of the shopper journey:

• Digital ethnographies helped get to know shoppers in each category, creating an understanding of their behaviors and brand perceptions.
• Shopping missions & shop-alongs provided additional context to the ethnographies, giving the client a deep look into the nuances of each category journey.
• In the final phase, C+R’s head of shopper insights facilitated a journey mapping workshop with key client stakeholders, bringing the shopper journey to life for the client.

Results:
Our multi-faceted research provided the valuable insights our client needed to formulate their strategy and brand planning; specifically, leveraging the work to make long-term strategy adjustments and develop annual brand and shopper plans.

Case Study 3: Unlocking Omnishopper Insights for CPG Solutions

The challenge:
A major CPG company needed an efficient way to access targeted insights fast, but also didn’t quite have a grasp on the specific – and potentially ever-changing – research initiatives that would surface in the coming year.

Our approach:
C+R developed a CommuniPanel, combining community and panel features, to meet a company’s diverse research needs across categories, brands, and retailers. Focused on omnishoppers, it offered a range of methods like surveys, live chats, mobile missions, and eye-tracking to gather agile, cost-effective insights.

The result:
As a result of the CommuniPanel, our client developed strong shopper intuition and retailer partnerships. Learnings were leveraged to further shopper conversion and satisfaction across retailers and improve overall revenue.

Case Study 4: Sustaining the Frozen Food Boom Post-Pandemic

The challenge:
Our client, a large, well-known manufacturer of frozen foods and meal solutions, wanted to update their understanding of the category given the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to tremendous growth in the sector. The challenge was to retain that growth as the pandemic ended and shoppers returned to the new normal.

Our approach:
C+R conducted a three-phase research study to understand frozen food shoppers, combining an online community with in-store missions, remote shop-alongs, and a foundational survey. The study included activities like journaling, pre-homework, and real-time shopping observations to capture detailed insights into shopper behaviors and preferences.

The result:
Our client gained a thorough understanding of the needs, pain points, and desires of their customers along the journey for purchasing frozen foods. The research identified the triggers to begin the journey and identified pre-store, in-store, and post-store feelings and behaviors throughout the shopping journey. The client also received actionable insights so they could immediately utilize the learnings to optimize their marketing and retail strategies.

Case Study 5: Engaging Channel Shoppers for Category Growth

The challenge:
A major food CPG company wanted better shelf representation and brand adoption in convenience stores. The client knew they needed to build rapport to drive adoption of their products in stores, and that marketing pieces would need to be highly focused on solutions that could help store operators.

Our approach:
To accomplish this, C+R created an online community to give the client ready-access to c-store shoppers. Through the community, we utilized a full range of research approaches to capture the most reliable information, including:

• Quantitative surveys
• Quick polls
• Mobile missions
• Photo and video capture
• Shopper-driven forums about topics of interest to the community
• In-depth discussions
• Journaling

The result:
C+R’s findings helped the CPG company build collaborative partnerships with convenience store operators. Results were used to improve conversion, revenue, and customer satisfaction for the retailer while building the CPG manufacturer’s presence in the channel. Our client is now considered a thought-leader and valuable resource within the industry.

As you can see from the five examples above, market research can and does play a large role in success for CPG brands, giving them the knowledge they need to connect with shoppers and build in-roads with retailers.

Click here to find out more about C+R’s tailored market research services for CPG brands.