In this episode
Matt Eichorn, CEO and co-founder of Freeosk, and Dilini Fernando, who leads marketing at Freeosk, argue that the physical store is the most underinvested high-performing channel in marketing — not because it doesn’t work, but because it was never measured the way digital is. Greg Kihlström talks with them about what they call retail media 3.0: an era in which in-store experiences become media in their own right, tied to shopper identity, closed-loop measurement, and audience signals that feed back into retail media networks. The conversation covers the arc from monetizing the digital shelf to experiential media at scale, how an opt-in kiosk converts an anonymous shopper into a known first-party contact, what a 62.4% tablet conversion rate actually reflects, and why in-store investment holds up as both a defensive and an offensive play in a price-conscious market.
Key takeaways
- Retail media 1.0 monetized the digital shelf and 2.0 extended reach off-property; 3.0 turns physical experiences into measurable media. Fernando frames the first phase as intercepting intent through search and e-commerce, the second as reaching audiences via display, social, and connected TV, and the current phase as making the physical world itself an accountable channel.
- In-store experiences were always media — brands just didn’t call them that. Eichorn points to decades of shelf talkers, danglers, and shippers: an audience, a message, and an intent to change behavior. The category was media all along without the vocabulary or the reporting.
- The reason brands underinvest in store is measurement, not doubt. Eichorn’s read is that the industry gravitates to what is easiest to activate and easiest to measure rather than what matters most, and that in-store lost the budget argument on rigor rather than on results.
- The value exchange is what makes opt-in work. Freeosk’s kiosks sit on the path of purchase rather than at the fourth wall, and a shopper scans a retailer loyalty card, phone number, or email to start the experience — a free sample or savings offer is the consideration that buys the identity.
- Scanning to start makes the in-store experience personalizable from the first second. Because identity arrives before the sample dispenses, the interaction can be targeted the way an on-site or online session would be, rather than treated as an anonymous impression.
- Interactivity, not exposure, is what separates a retail experience that performs. Fernando’s standard is participatory retail: a destination a shopper willingly walks toward, activating taste, smell, and touch, rather than a one-way message a shopper passes.
- Ratings volume is a measurable in-store output, and the magnitude is large. Fernando cites brands moving from roughly 500 ratings to about 3,500 — a 7x lift inside a five-hour window at a Sam’s Club demo cart — with corresponding gains in perceived quality and in sales.
- Experiential and measurement are not opposites, and proof of execution is not measurement. Fernando’s position is that samples distributed and impressions delivered describe activity; the honest question is whether behavior changed at four weeks, and at six months.
- The real-world intent signal is the asset retailers have been throwing away. A shopper standing at a new product for thirty minutes is invisible today; digitizing that moment and passing it to retail media network partners is what makes in-store audiences retargetable off-property.
- Retail’s lesson from TikTok is that discovery rivals intent. Eichorn notes that retailers optimize to get shoppers in and out efficiently, and asks what the store looks like if some of that optimization is spent on curiosity instead.
Chapters
- 0:00 — Cold open and introductions
- 2:57 — From staffed demos to an in-store retail media platform
- 4:24 — Dilini Fernando’s path from brand management to Freeosk
- 5:12 — Retail media 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 defined
- 6:55 — Why brands underinvest in the top discovery channel
- 10:04 — How an opt-in kiosk turns an anonymous shopper into a known contact
- 13:44 — 62.4% tablet conversion: engaging versus distracting
- 16:51 — Translating in-store activity into loyalty and repeat purchase
- 18:51 — Feeding real-world intent signals back into retail media networks
- 19:55 — The case for in-store investment in a price-conscious market
- 23:12 — What retail should steal from TikTok
- 25:14 — One year from now
- 26:00 — How each of them stays agile
What retail media 3.0 actually means
The phases are distinguished by where the media sits relative to the purchase decision. Fernando describes retail media 1.0 as monetizing the digital shelf — search and e-commerce placements that intercept a shopper already forming intent. Retail media 2.0 let advertisers move beyond the retailer’s owned assets to reach those audiences through display, social, and connected TV, but still operated close to the moment of decision. Retail media 3.0, in her framing, moves upstream: it takes physical experience and turns it into media that can be planned, targeted, and measured, with the goal of creating net-new demand rather than redirecting demand that already exists.
Why the store is the top discovery channel and still the underfunded one
Fernando points to research from Circana and NielsenIQ establishing in-store as the leading channel for product discovery and the place where incremental and impulse purchases still happen. Eichorn’s explanation for the funding gap is institutional rather than strategic: large organizations move toward what is easy to activate and easy to prove, and in-store historically failed the second test. He is explicit that the spend was always there in categories like snacks, beverage, adult beverage, and candy — it just wasn’t reported as media, and it wasn’t accountable in the way digital taught buyers to expect.
How an anonymous shopper becomes a known contact
The mechanism is an opt-in with something real on the other side of it. Freeosk’s automated kiosks are placed on the path of purchase rather than at the perimeter of the store, and the shopper initiates by scanning a retailer loyalty card or entering the phone number or email tied to that loyalty account. Only then does the experience run — a wrapped sample dispenses, or the shopper browses full-size product on the unit’s shelves. Eichorn describes the resulting record as connectable to sales data on the back end and personalizable on the front end, since identity is established before the offer is delivered.
What a 62.4% conversion rate is measuring
Greg raises the 62.4% conversion figure for interactive tablets against a live-demo baseline, and Fernando’s answer separates table stakes from differentiation. Right message, right place, right time, and good creative are what shoppers already expect. What lifts performance is interactivity plus a value exchange — a reason to trade attention for something. Her Sam’s Club example is a tablet on a live demo cart where members scan a membership card, self-identify, and rate the item. The measurable effects she describes are threefold: better ratings, higher perceived quality, and a volume of ratings that can move roughly 7x in a five-hour window — which she connects directly to shelf-space defense and to how products surface in AI-mediated search.
Holding experiential media to a real measurement standard
Fernando is direct that she has been on the brand side of this argument and has treated experiential and measurement as incompatible. Her correction is that experiential media needs a different standard rather than no standard. Proof of execution — samples distributed, impressions delivered — describes what happened, not what changed. The measurement that matters looks at campaign week, then four weeks, then as far as six months, because discovery does not usually change behavior overnight. The stated objective is a customer over a lifetime, not a larger basket today.
Closing the loop back into digital
Most of the industry’s attention has gone to driving digital traffic into stores. Fernando’s point is that the reverse path is the one that was never instrumented. A shopper watching a screen or standing in front of a new product is a real intent signal that today disappears. Digitizing that signal and passing it to retail media network partners makes in-store audiences addressable afterward — through the RMN’s own inventory, through platform extensions, through personalized on-screen media, and through email tied to what is happening in a shopper’s local store.
The TikTok lesson for retailers
Eichorn’s forward-looking answer is less about new technology than about what retailers choose to optimize for. Retail is engineered for replenishment and assortment: the item is on the shelf, the trip is fast. TikTok demonstrated the opposite proposition — that people buy things they had no intent to buy, at scale, because they stumbled into them and acted immediately. His argument is that discovery can be as powerful as intent, and that stores hold an advantage no platform can match, because they can activate every sense. The open question he leaves is what a store looks like when a portion of its design budget goes toward curiosity rather than throughput.
FAQ
What is retail media 3.0? It’s the phase in which physical, in-store experiences become measurable media rather than unmeasured trade activity. Dilini Fernando defines it against retail media 1.0 (monetizing the digital shelf through search and e-commerce) and 2.0 (reaching retailer audiences through display, social, and connected TV), with 3.0 tying physical experiences to first-party identity and closed-loop measurement.
Why do brands underinvest in in-store media if the store is the top discovery channel? Matt Eichorn attributes it to measurement rather than strategy. The industry gravitates toward channels that are easiest to activate and easiest to prove, and in-store spending — shelf talkers, displays, sampling — was substantial but was never reported or evaluated as media.
How does an in-store kiosk collect first-party data without damaging the shopper experience? Through an opt-in with a value exchange. Freeosk kiosks sit on the path of purchase, and the shopper starts the experience by scanning a retailer loyalty card or entering the phone number or email tied to it. A free sample or savings offer is what the shopper receives in return, and identity is captured before the offer is delivered, which also allows the experience to be personalized.
What results does interactive in-store media produce? Fernando cites a 62.4% conversion rate for interactive tablets against a live-demo baseline, and describes brands moving from roughly 500 ratings to about 3,500 — around a 7x lift in a five-hour window — along with improvements in perceived quality and in sales.
How should in-store experiences be measured beyond samples distributed? Fernando argues for behavior change over proof of execution, evaluated across campaign week, four weeks, and up to six months. Sales lift, new-to-brand, new households, and lifetime value are the outcomes Eichorn names as the ones that unlock further in-store investment.
Can in-store audiences be retargeted in digital channels? Yes. The intent signals collected at the kiosk or tablet are passed to retail media network partners, which allows those shoppers to be reached afterward through the RMN’s inventory, personalized on-screen media, and email tied to a shopper’s local store.
About Matt Eichorn
Visionary entrepreneur Matt Eichorn has been at the forefront of evolving brand and shopper marketing experiences for the better part of 20 years. As the current CEO, President, and Co-Founder of Freeosk, Eichorn has built a one-of-a-kind technology platform to deliver multi-sensory experiences at scale. His foresight to digitize millions of real-world intent signals in-store, as they happen, is unlocking new insights and shaping the landscape of retail media 3.0 for brands, category managers, and retailers alike.Dilini Fernando is the Vice President, Marketing at Chicago-based Freeosk – the only omnichannel discovery platform with in-store automated sampling. Dilini joined Freeosk in October of 2020 to lead integrated marketing programs, including brand, product and partner initiatives. Prior to Freeosk, Dilini spent ten years at MolsonCoors in brand marketing, digital innovation, new product development, and portfolio strategy.Dilini received her BA from Brown University and her MBA from the University of Chicago. She is a previous recipient of Brand Innovators “40 Under 40”.
LinkedIn: Matt Eichorn
About Dilini Fernando
Dilini Fernando is the Vice President, Marketing at Chicago-based Freeosk – the only omnichannel discovery platform with in-store automated sampling. Dilini joined Freeosk in October of 2020 to lead integrated marketing programs, including brand, product and partner initiatives. Prior to Freeosk, Dilini spent ten years at MolsonCoors in brand marketing, digital innovation, new product development, and portfolio strategy.Dilini received her BA from Brown University and her MBA from the University of Chicago. She is a previous recipient of Brand Innovators “40 Under 40”.
LinkedIn: Dilini Fernando
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Transcript
[00:00:58] Greg Kihlström: Hi, this is Greg Kihlström, host of The Agile Brand, and here’s a question for you. With trillions spent on digital ads to capture consumer attention, is the most powerful and effective channel for product discovery the one your brand is overlooking? Agility requires brands to move beyond a digital-only mindset and recognize that the modern customer journey fluidly moves between the online and offline moments. It means building the capabilities to engage and measure impact in the physical world with the same precision we’ve come to expect from digital. Today we’re going to talk about the next evolution of retail media and why the physical store, far from being obsolete, is becoming the next great frontier for data-rich, high-impact customer engagement. We’re gonna explore how brands can bridge the gap between their digital strategies and in-store realities to not only drive discovery but create measurable, full-funnel marketing moments. To help me discuss this topic, I’d like to welcome Matt Eichorn, CEO and co-founder, and Dillany Fernando, CMO of Freosk. Matt and Dill, welcome to the show.
[00:02:48] Matt Eichorn: Happy to be here.
[00:02:48] Dilini Fernando: Hi, thanks for having us.
[00:02:49] Greg Kihlström: Yeah, yeah. Looking forward to diving in here. Before we do, though, why don’t you each, give a little background on yourselves and your roles at Freosk?
[00:02:57] Matt Eichorn: sure. So, my name is Matt Eichorn. I’m the co-founder and, CEO of Freosk. And I spent much, most of my career connecting brands to shoppers. I started at some big agencies in Chicago, Leo Burnett and Draft, and then about 23 years ago I started my own agency and incubated Freosk inside that agency probably about 10 years after starting around this kind of really simple idea, which was if you could reinvent traditional staffed demos and modernize it, how would you do that? So today, many years later, Freosk kind of squarely sits at the intersection of retail media, product discovery, shopper engagement, and we create, each week millions of in-store experiences, and we do it at scale, which is a, I think a big dif- differentiator because of our nationwide network. We’ve got automated kiosks. We’ve got some interactive tablets. and all of this collects a, a, a bunch of rich data, that, that brands can use and use it for measurement, which is incredibly important. So the business has really evolved. it has evolved from primarily kind of a, a sampling business long ago and really now into a in-store retail media platform, all designed around how to connect for brands an- and, and retailers. How do you connect the physical environment through, identity and engagement with the digital ecosystem?
[00:04:24] Dilini Fernando: And I’m Dill. I’m the CMO at Freosk, and I’ve been a lifelong storyteller, so part of my career has been in radio and the other part has been in brand management, which is actually when I discovered Freosk. So on the brand side, seeing this amazing capability to bring shoppers and brands together in a way that could be really meaningful and also measurable.
[00:04:42] Greg Kihlström: Nice. Nice. Love it. Well, yeah, let’s dive in then. And wanna start kind of at the, at the high level here and talk about, you recently did a, a study that talks about the emergence of experiential retail media as kind of the 3.0 era. Let’s y- maybe back up a little bit and s- you know, what, what is 1.0 and, and 2.0 in this retail media, 3.0 kind of, uh-
[00:05:12] Greg Kihlström: … landscape? And, you know, what, what’s the fundamental strategic shift that defines this new phase?
[00:05:17] Dilini Fernando: Yeah. And certainly there’s been lots of models for what phase are we in-
[00:05:20] Greg Kihlström: Yeah
[00:05:20] Dilini Fernando: … but I think fundamentally when we think about where retail media started, it was really monetizing the digital shelf, so think search, e-commerce. It was largely about intercepting intent. I think we all remember the days of those pop-ups. And then as we get into the 2.0 era, that’s when the introduction of retail media really starts to allow advertisers to look beyond the owned assets of the retailer and find those audiences through display, social, connected TV. but I think in many ways we were still operating at that moment of decision, and it’s really about finding them when they’re searching or comparing or they’re already thinking about the purchase. So retail media 3.0, or this phase that we’re currently facing, is really about taking physical experiences, taking the physical world, and turning that into measurable media. I’m sure your listeners, Greg, are familiar with all the research from Circana and NielsenIQ that have shown, you know- People discover in store. It is the most important channel for product discovery. It is a place where incremental and impulse purchases still happen. and that’s really what inspired the conversations and the white paper that we did with Andrew last year, was that there is this ability that, that our platform has to connect trial to shopper engagement, to first-party identity, to closed loop measurement in a way that, you know, isn’t happening, and doing that in a single activation. So I think as we think about this next phase of retail media, it really is about not just influencing through existing buyers and what choice they’re gonna make, but really about creating total net new demand through experiences that, you know, are themselves media.
[00:06:55] Greg Kihlström: And y- you know, you mentioned that the physical store is still the number one channel for, for product discovery. You wouldn’t necessarily know that or think that from reading all the… You know, digital just, I think it just takes up all the oxygen in the room, and now, you know, certainly all the AI-related talk is, is certainly taking up a lot of the, the bandwidth, so to speak. From a strategic standpoint, you know, why, why do you think that so many brands have underinvested… you know, if, if it is so clear that the physical store is the number one channel, you know, why, why are brands underinvesting in the physical stores compared to these massive and, and growing digital ad spends?
[00:07:39] Matt Eichorn: I know, I think about it, I’m like, is it strategy that, or is it just kind of the inertia of how these gigantic brands operate? ‘Cause I mean, I think in general, I think, our industry gravitates to things that are, easiest to activate, and measurable, and I think it’s not necessarily about what matters most. I mean, I think about, I’ve been doing this a while and, you know, there’s always been investment in store. I mean, think, you think of the categories, you know, some, especially by some huge brands, you think about, snacks and beverage, adult beverage, candy, like they- they’ve been investing in store forever. I don’t think they, they didn’t call it media, but make no mistake, that is media. I mean, it has an audience, it has a message. [laughs] You know, we’re trying to influence behavior. I, you know, back in the day I did a lot of, shelf talkers and danglers and shippers and tons of corrugate. All of that was media, and that was a ton of investment. So, yes, I think certainly, retail media and digital, digital media, has the lion’s share of that spending. But, and I think, I think the real reason is what perhaps has got people tripped up, and, and maybe rightly so, which is the lack of measurement of this. I think intuitively everybody know it works, and I think for us, that was why, really it was one of the, cornerstones of the Freeosk platform was, was measurement. And so we wanted to be able, to provide brands really what they’re looking for and what they got used to, the rigor of digital. There’s nothing wrong with that, and there’s nothing wrong with trying to bring some of that in store. And I, and our in, in-store media platform allows them to do that, ’cause we’re, you know, we’re tied to identity, we’re tied to engagement, and they can measure the things that they like. So whether… Certainly, sales lift, of course, performance, but, you know, things like, new to brand and, new households and, LTV, all of that, is kind of, I think, a, a game changer to get more investment into in store.
[00:09:28] Greg Kihlström: Yeah. Well, ’cause that really is the, the, the Holy Grail, so to speak, is to be able to connect that digital customer profile to an in-store shopper, right? And, and to do that, you know, consistently and, a- and meaningfully. You know, tactically, how does a platform like yours make that connection and, and, you know, turn that anonymous shopper that all, you know, many stores are, are trying to, to, to figure out who’s, who’s shopping in their stores, you know, how does, how does it turn that anonymous shopper into a known contact for, you know, a first-party data strategy?
[00:10:04] Matt Eichorn: Yeah. I mean, I think no matter what, and we’ve always done this, no matter what we’re gonna do, you gotta start with a, a great shopper experience, and it’s gotta be the center, especially ’cause we’re an opt-in, right? And so we’re op- people are, are opting in to providing their information. And so I think there really has to be a value exchange there. And so, early on, we realized a real great way, to, to have a, a shopper engage is potentially offering a free sample, right? A free physical sample in store is a great way. It doesn’t always have to be a sample, it can be savings, it could be other digital types of free samples. But we really start, with the shopper experience at kind of at the core and, and, and what are they gonna wanna do. So from a, maybe tactically for our automated kiosks, so our automated, sampling kiosks are, on the path of purchase, so they’re not on the fourth wall, so they’re part of the shopping experience. a shopper would come upon them, they’d see on our big 32-inch, interactive touchscreen what the brand is offering that week. they would start to scan, the… or they scan to start the experience, so that is either scanning their retailer loyalty card. It could be entering their retailer, the telephone number associated, could be the email associated with the, the retailer loyalty program. and then, after that, the experience starts. So in, maybe in the case of a sample, an individually wrapped sample is dispensed. we have full, shelves with full-size product that they can shop from. And then we’re able to connect, all of that, all that information. So that’s, we compare that to sales data. The nice thing is also because they are scanning to start, also we have an opportunity to personalize that experience from the get-go, much like you would do, sort of, on site or online. and you know, that allows us to, to personalize and, and, and target in that way. And then of course on the end, we have all of these incredible in-store intent signals that the, a retailer RMN can use to build audiences and to kinda continue that conversation, with the shopper, in the sort of digital ad eco- ecosystem.
[00:13:44] Greg Kihlström: the data shows that, you know, there’s pretty, compelling conversion rate here is 62.4% conversion rate for interactive tablets versus a, a baseline for live demos. You know, when you’re in a store, there’s, there’s a lot of things going on, a lot of potential distractions. How do you keep this engaging versus distracting?
[00:14:07] Dilini Fernando: Yeah, such a great question. You know, I think, there’s a lot of things that are just table stakes, right? Right message, right place, right time, beautifully executed. Great content, relevant. That is what shoppers expect. I think the experiences we see that start to stand out and have the kind of a, a retail impact and brand impact are differentiated because they are interactive. And then as Matt said, there’s a value exchange there. There’s a reason for someone to give you their valuable time in exchange for something. So if you think about just shopping in the real world, it’s, it’s multi-sensory, it’s physical, it’s interactive. That is what, what makes it fun, for lack of a better word. And I think that is part of, you know, the, the ethos of our company is that moments in retail, especially digital, should [00:14:52] Dilini Fernando: be joyful. They can be engaging and not at the, you know, giving up the measurement of it as well. And so everything we’ve been innovating against for the past, you know, 10 years or so has really been keeping that in. So when I think about what really makes something successful, thinking about activating as many senses as possible, so that’s taste, smell, touch. We use physical and digital media. you know, we don’t wanna be a one-way communication platform that maybe a shopper will see or hear. We wanna be that destination that a shopper willingly walks towards. And that, for me, Greg, is, like, the most exciting part of where we are in this retail media journey is, like, that is participatory re- retail. That is participatory media. And I believe that is gonna be an increasingly important format for all of retail. So the tablet example that you mentioned is a really interesting one from, like, marketing and behavioral science, all of it. we have these tablets on a live demo cart at Sam’s Club, and, you know, members stop by. They have something, maybe a hot pizza, something we wouldn’t, you know, typically dispense through the automated sampling. And then they have a chance to give us their information, scan their membership card, self-identify, and rate that item, and they do, time and again. I mean, it is amazing. We see this huge impact in perception, so there’s better ratings, like the quality. They feel better about the brand. We see it in the sales, as you mentioned, so there’s something about, you know, if I rated it well, well, of course, I should go buy it. That would be silly for me not to. but then also just the sheer quantity. And so it’s not uncommon for us to see a brand go from 500 ratings to, like, 3,500. I mean, a 7X in a five-hour window is unheard of. And so at this time where it’s important for brands to protect the shelf space, to stay top of mind with their buyers, but also, like, think about GEO optimization and the AI bots, it’s important to have all of that out there. So, you know, digitizing experiences in a way that provides a value exchange, gets shoppers to stop, it is truly, engaging and interactive, I think is really what’s gonna be beneficial for everyone.
[00:16:51] Greg Kihlström: Yeah. Well, and th- then I think the, the next step beyond that, that conversion and, and getting the, the social proof and the, the, the ratings is, you know, how do you, how do you translate this to longer term, you know, KPIs like loyalty, repeat purchase, even online engagement?
[00:17:10] Dilini Fernando: Yeah. Coming from the brand side, I will say I’ve been guilty of this, where experiential and measurement aren’t friends. Like, they can’t live in the same sentence, but they actually can. And I think we’re getting to this place where we can hold experiences to a different kind of measurement standard that typically hasn’t been there, and I think it’s important for, for brands to, to do that. It’s not just on proof of execution, a million samples got in hands or X amount of impressions, but really, how did that start to change behavior? So I think understandably, largely, you know, for historically, some of these, experiences haven’t been quantified, and again, that’s what we get really excited about as we tie experiences to identity. but I, I… Maybe this is a good chance to take, you know, talk about experiential marketing and what we’re maybe talking about as well is just experiential media. And I think experiential media is happening at scale. It’s multi-sensory. It’s really bringing the best of what happens in a physical world with the rigor that is expected by brands in a digital space. And so for that reason, sometimes the metrics, can feel like- not messy, but they’re, they’re, they’re varied, quite frankly, and it really is important to understand the objectives of the brand. There is upper funnel performance that happens, as well as what maybe lower funnel trade marketing would expect. But it doesn’t happen overnight. Discovery doesn’t s- suddenly change behavior. Sometimes we certainly see that in campaign week. But one of the things that we really unlocked with, with Andrew was that as you look at campaign week, four weeks, sometimes six months even, you’re starting to see the real behavior change, and that is why we’re all in this. Marketing and media should be changing behavior, not just in the moment, not just building today’s basket, but really creating a customer for lifetime.
[00:18:51] Greg Kihlström: Yeah. Yeah. Well, and then how does this, or how has this been used so far to extend beyond that, that in, in-store as well, you know? So can you use insights to do retargeting, you know, connect with them on other channels? You know, how do you, how do you then… A, a lot of, a lot of focus has been put on driving from digital to in-store, but how do you maybe do the, the inverse of that?
[00:19:18] Dilini Fernando: That’s exactly it, that we’re able to digitize a moment that is otherwise completely lost for retailers. Somebody could be watching your TV stands, or they could be standing at a new product for 30 minutes, and nobody knows that they were there. So we are taking that real world intent signal and feeding it back through our partnerships with RMN. So it’s giving brands an opportunity to have richer audience retargeting, not only through the RMN’s offerings, but also through our extensions with them, even through our platform. So that looks like personalized media on screen, or, or emails that are, that are telling you what is happening in your local store.
[00:19:55] Greg Kihlström: Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, just taking a, maybe a s- a step, a step back as well, I mean, certainly there’s a lot of challenges facing retailers. There’s also a lot of challenges facing consumers. You know, there’s certainly a lot of price consciousness and uncertainty, you know, in, in a lot of different areas. H- how do you make the case for investing in the in-store experience as either, either a defensive or even an offensive strategy for retailers that are, you know, they’re fighting for loyalty, pre- pretty hard and trying to drive sales in a, you know, continuously challenging environment?
[00:20:35] Dilini Fernando: Yeah. I could take that. I, I think, you know, in some ways we’ve seen this play out a little bit, Greg, as with the pandemic. So when there are times of uncertainty, it’s harder for shoppers to make, risky decisions, and so they’re really selective about where they’re shopping and what they’re buying. And that’s a time when retailers really have to think differently about what are you offering, your product mix and, and the selections and things, but then also how are you offering it? And so for me, I think of that as the time when discovery is most important, whether you’re the category leader or the underdog. you wanna continue to help drive shoppers towards great choices. And so retailers that continue to invest in meaningful in-store experiences, giving their shoppers a reason to come: in, giving them a safe space, and a, a chance to discover on their own terms, and that is where they’re gonna spend their time and their money. so in that way, maybe it’s a defensive strategy. It’s building loyalty, trust. It’s sort of like what’s expected. But I also think it could be, an offensive strategy in the sense that it’s you’re, as a retailer, starting to establish a place and a, and a reputation for being, where the innovation can happen and, and helping drive new demand for innovation, which obviously is what brands want to help win back share. So I think historically we’ve seen, you know, the research that companies that continue to invest in, in those, those times can emerge stronger. And so the, the store is the most valuable asset a retailer [chuckles] has. That is your captive audience. You have a relationship with them. So investing in those experiences, regardless of economic climate, regardless of what’s happening with pricing or whatnot, I think is, is important, again, to build a basket today, continue that shopper loyalty for tomorrow.
[00:22:16] Greg Kihlström: Yeah. Yeah. Well, and you know, I, I always w- when I work with organizations, I, I always, recommend that they think about their customers as, you know, they’re, they’re not just on a single channel, right? I mean, we’re all consumers, right? We, we don’t necessarily think about I’m gonna use my mobile device for this thing and my laptop for another and I’m gonna go in, into a store for another. So that, you know, that blurring of the lines between physical and digital, like w- we’re already living that, you know, when we’re not working, [chuckles] generally speaking, sometimes when we are. But as we look out, you know, a few years from now and, and things continue to, to blur, from, you know, from, from several perspectives, you know, what, what do you see, what kind of technologies or, or other areas do you see playing a bigger role in this, this retail media landscape?
[00:23:12] Matt Eichorn: I’ll, I’ll, I will tell you, what I would love to see, and that is, retailers learn from platforms like TikTok. And I think, one thing that TikTok taught everybody, certainly the retail industry, is that, you know, discovery can be just as powerful, as intent. So you think really historically what retailers get right time and time again, which is sort of the replenishment side and the assortment side. Like, we wanna go in a store, we want that item on the shelf, and we wanna get in and out as quickly as, as we can. TikTok, I think, showed honestly the exact opposite, which is the power of, you know, actually having consumers discover things that they were not interested in. They had no intent, that was not on their list, which is again, in, in, you know, every single day, I mean, the numbers are staggering about the millions of shoppers that literally, purchase something ’cause they happened to stumble upon it, right? And they chose to, you know, they were made aware of it, they were curious about it, and they acted immediately. So I mean, I think there are huge lessons for retail, here. And again, I think- What retail does really well, you know, it’s designed to get us in and get us out, and they’re optimized for that, and that is, that is probably their winning strategy. however, you know, what would it look like if they could optimize a little bit more for discovery? as, as Dill said, all of the, things that retail can do that these platforms can’t is activate all of our senses. So, and again, I don’t know if it’s as much about sort of new technologies, but that we’re gonna kinda see. But, I f- I think it’s about what we’re, will these new technologies and all these connections enable us to do in terms of just experiences that, again, are about, like, curiosity and discovery, and again, all the things I think make shopping fun and have retailers lean really hard into that, and kinda steal that excitement that TikTok has generated. I think that’s just waiting for retailers. at least that g- that’s what gets us, us excited.
[00:25:14] Greg Kihlström: Nice, nice. Love it. Well, Matt and Dillony, thanks so much for joining today. We’ve got two last questions for each of you before we wrap up here. Maybe related to the, the future, the future outlook. we’ll s- we’ll start there. If we were having this interview one year from today, what is one thing that we would definitely be talking about?
[00:25:33] Dilini Fernando: I hope we’re talking about how media planning is looking different. We’re just talking about as media. [laughs] Not all these different silos, which we’re still in the messy middle. I think that’s gonna happen. And then I think, we’re gonna be talking about physical and digital coming together in ways that are really meaningful along the shopper journey.
[00:25:50] Matt Eichorn: Yeah, I agree. I think it’s just ins- this is in-stores moment, and I, and I think, I, I just think we’ve… It’s been talked about a ton, and I think it’s gon- it’s gonna just continue to grow.
[00:26:00] Greg Kihlström: Yeah. Love it. And last question for both of you. What do you do to stay agile in your role, and how do you find a way to do it consistently?
[00:26:08] Dilini Fernando: The first thing that came to mind, I, [laughs] well, I, I think I’ve, I… A couple years ago, I started doing improv as a way to just keep my brain agile in that way and thinking, “Yes, and…” And I think as, as team leads, that’s something that’s been really important, is to keep your mind open and keep yourself open to experiences and, and where great ideas can come from anywhere.
[00:26:28] Matt Eichorn: Yeah. I would, I would say that just the idea of, to me, being agile is, is, not, pretending to, that you don’t have all the answers. And so I think just that idea of, it’s a little bit about curiosity, but it’s also, it’s like, I think, the minute you think you have it all figured out is the opposite of being agile. [laughs] So just sort of being open, open to not knowing, I think, which is hard.
