Every year Canadian marketers spend hundreds of millions on point of purchase display campaigns and while some are great successes, others turn out to be disappointments. Those disappointing campaigns might have resulted from spending too much on overly creative, complicated fixed displays along with too much spent on trade incentives to get them in place.

Other campaigns lacked the creative to catch the attention of shoppers nor contained the proper call to action to get them to purchase. Some were just the wrong product in the wrong place. And at times, the POP displays themselves are the problem. Failure at POP can lead to a lack of confidence from retailers and distributors and you may have to deal with all the returned product. So, your retail POP absolutely has to be successful.

And the most common problem, is that displays might not have even been setup or are in really rough shape.

Display is Kept Together with Packaging Tape – Displays have to be Constructed well to last

Some POP Displays don’t do Much for Sales or Branding

It’s not enough to be good at POP marketing anymore. You must be very good when you’re going head to head with well executed campaigns from national brands. Very often a small or new brand can only hope the large companies are incompetent and leave an opportunity for them to shine on the shelves. If your POP design is done cost-effectively and you have a winning creative that retailers like, you may find it easier to get established in stores such as Walmart, Shoppers Drug Mart, Costco, Canadian Tire, Sobeys, Great Canadian Superstore, the Bay, or Zellers.

Have you had tough luck on your first campaign and now you’re gun shy about doing a second campaign? It’s probably worth it to have a POP advertising company review your campaign and point out what went wrong. An objective third party investigation and viewpoint is worth the time. POP display is too important to product manufacturers and new brands, so a good consultation is worth the effort.

Keys to a Successful POP Campaign

• Study your shopper’s real needs – the customer’s “pain” to be soothed
• Study your shopper’s attitudes toward competitive products
• Study competitor’s products
• Review and clarify the details of your unique value proposition
• Review retailer’s requirements and specifications
• Brainstorm packaging types and sizes
• Create creative that responds to customer’s needs with a matching unique value proposition
• Find high quality effective packaging design and production
• Find high quality, cost effective copacking and distribution

POPAI has done extensive research into shopper behaviour with video and eye tracking studies along with questioning shoppers in stores, for their ground breaking research survey. They discovered that certain displays such as end caps and standing displays performed well. They discovered that remote displays also did well. The main finding is that up to 70% of shoppers were affected by retail advertising and made their purchase decisions in the store.

Choosing cardboard: The use of cardboard displays is growing rapidly due to how cost- effective they are and the ease of fulfillment. They can be updated frequently with fresh creative and they ship in their packaging.

The ready for retail category of displays simplifies transport of products and for setup for retailers. There’s no need for restocking ready for retail displays. Once the product is sold, the store clerk can simply bring out another package which is opened with simple removal of a perforated top.

What do you think the weakness of today’s POP packaging is? What displays have really caught your eye and drew you into pick up products in your hands?  What prevents you from getting creative with cardboard displays?

If you’d like someone to review your packaging, POP displays and your POP strategy, send us an email.

What creative and structure and store positioning makes the best POP displays?  Is Digital Printing for POP right for you? What’s driving in store shopping decisions right now?