• by Ali Amarsy , Op-Ed Contributor, August 29, 2022

Value. This is the hot topic of the season — at conference main stages, in one-on-one conversations and even across phone screens. The news of the Federal Reserve's actions to combat inflation reminded us of the challenging months ahead. 

Heading into the second half of the year is the time to discuss the ways we can create and enhance value for consumers. As we move into a harsher economic reality, brands will tackle greater scrutiny from shoppers when it comes to making purchase decisions, even on major shopping occasions, such as back to school and holidays.

The conversation around value comes in three forms: the marketer's mission – value creation; the consumer's angle – the search for value; and our job as market makers – value exchange.

Brands’ Quest for Value Creation

Creating value is key to consumer interest — making sure not to be perceived as just a transactional brand, knowing that people will be faced with more difficult consumption decisions soon. Both manufacturers and marketplaces need to think about the consumer as one person, whether online or offline, in order to offer an omnichannel experience.

Through this mindset, the friction of re-identification and preference setting is taken out of the ‘costs’ associated with a commerce experience. Marketers today can focus on snackable, smaller opportunities to provide value — be it through relevant promotion or reduction of friction through added services or convenience. Making smaller things simpler will be the name of the game.

Commerce leads face an uphill battle in Q3 and Q4 as economic circumstances tighten and the year comes to a close, all the while being compared side-by-side with an explosive 2021. The winning formula will be to pick the right tactics to create value, powered by a strong brand and reframed KPI to support long-term consumer relationships and profitability. 

Consumer Search for Value

Consumers are looking for value now more than ever, and retailers are ramping up their efforts by promoting their own store brands to meet such expectations. This also means competing with big-name brands to capture sales. The advantage major manufacturers have is their name. Brands must flex their credibility and functional benefits to drive clear differentiation. This is a time to talk up unique R&D by investing in full-funnel brand efforts to ensure the traffic you generate leads to a sale of your brand rather than the off-brand version of your product.

A great starting point here is to connect deeply with communities.

Thanks to great advances in social commerce tech stacks, the shift from demographic to attitudinal groups is accelerated. We can tap into existing conversations and even hand off a portion of marketing to trusted creators who are able to bring a compelling proposition to their own micro markets. Each consumer can then receive a message through a credible and aspirational source, increasing perceived value.

Finding True Value Exchange 

Once brands re-work their omnichannel experiences to have less friction and include more snackable moments that generate value, and consumers are shown more value through brand-specific benefits and creator narratives, the goal is to broker the right exchanges.

The broad theme here is to turn marketing dollars spent into data. Either we are creating shopping occasions where we build relationships and learning preferences, or we are driving purchases that generate a data set of their own. The end goal is to build loyal, trusted relationships, which involves redefining what value means within an organization.

Owning the consumer, crafting for omnichannel experience and thinking long term is the key to successfully moving forward. The aim should be to experiment within the marketplace and measure each activity on value created and exchanged, with consistent assessment and adaptation.