[ REPORT ] The rise of local marketing in retail 2022

Localistico surveys 500 retailers and 500 consumers to compare industry changes seen over the last year and delve into upcoming challenges and trends that will shape retail in 2022.

Localistico, the Local Marketing & Analytics platform, has recently announced the launch of its annual report “The Rise of Local Marketing in Retail 2022”, which analyses the responses of more than 1000 retailers and consumers in the UK, USA and Spain to show how the retail ecosystem has evolved over the last year. 

This year’s edition provides analysis of the new face of Local Marketing in a Post-Pandemic World and uncovers the main obstacles faced by both retailers and consumers in 2021, plus a “local marketing winning formula” to overcome them. Within the report, you’ll come to understand New Shopping Journeys, learn to react to increasingly Dynamic Demand, and discover how to unlock trends using your own data. 

Some of the most relevant data insights revealed are as follows:

• 22% of retailers claim to not manage their online presence at all and 40% of companies have reported this to be a major pain point, even though 75% of people who use their mobile phone to make a local search end up visiting a store within 24 hours. Even more noteworthy, these numbers remain effectively unchanged from last year, which shows that although retailers admitted in 2021 that it ought to be a main priority for the year, the barriers to effective online presence management are persistently daunting. 

• Consumer patience is running out for those brands that don’t properly deliver. In 2021, 58% of consumers who found incorrect information on the internet said they would not give these brands an intentional second chance. This year, that number has risen to 71%, highlighting that online presence management is not a game in which brands can decide whether to play or not. ​​Customers no longer recognize a distinction between channels during their shopping journeys, so retailers need to mimic this perspective and lean into complete integration.

• Retailers continue to struggle with the same problems as last year. The major pain points currently plaguing retailers include controlling information shared through a variety of different online channels and the inability to extract actionable insights from the spread of channels. Above all else, with a deluge of information, selecting the right metrics at the outset is more challenging than ever, yet necessary to drive success to run a lean and efficient operation. Local marketing teams that employ tools to centralise data collection and analysis simultaneously cut out the middleman and streamline processes.

• Consumer behaviour is undergoing metamorphosis, and the changes come quickly! In 2021, only 20% of consumers claimed that product and service displays were the main priority when searching for information. In the past year, these two aspects saw the highest growth, with 12 points each, showing that the onset of searches and purchases have shaken up SEO keywords and shifted the way people are shopping This forces retailers to deploy full technological integration throughout these new shopping journeys to satisfy consumer demand.

The report also features exclusive interviews with the most respected voices in retail, including insights from Carol Spieckerman, President at Spieckerman Retail and Nicole Leinbach, Retail Minded Founder & Publisher. It also provides exclusive insight into the success stories of globally-recognized brands such as O2 Germany and Spar NL. 

About the data

The data insights revealed in this report are rooted in two surveys that were conducted between January 18th and January 22nd 2022 in the United Kingdom, Spain and the United States. The first survey was sent to 500 retail decision-makers. The second was answered by 500 consumers over the age of 18.

About Localistico

Localistico is a local marketing and analytics platform for brick-and-mortar retailers. Through its intuitive platform, retailers can increase foot traffic to their physical stores and gather better online-to-offline analytics. It enables business owners to control their online presence and manage brand interactions on all digital platforms, from maps to store pages, to launching geo-targeted ad campaigns. Its clients include renowned companies like Inditex Group, Camper, Starbucks or Vodafone.

Download the report here. 

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