Grow Your Emerging Brand with Retail Demos

Picture this: you’re an emerging brand, just beginning to integrate your product into various grocery stores. Once your product hits the shelves, the next goal is to start seeing consistent sales. To hit this goal, you shouldn’t just sit back and wait anxiously for consumers to gravitate toward your product. 

While you could allot some of your marketing budget into online ads or coupons, in hopes of driving potential consumers into the store for a purchase, why not directly target shoppers in a way that will get you immediate results and the highest return on investment — through retail demos?

Retail demos and live samplings are a widely-known key to success for many brands looking to raise awareness and create quick sales conversions. Leveraging the proven effectiveness of positive word-of-mouth, experiential interactions build consumer trust and brand loyalty through authentic, educational and interactive experiences.

When consumers are enthusiastically invited to try or hear about a product while they’re already out-and-about shopping or at an event, they immediately let their guard down because they have nothing to lose; the buying power and control is in their hands.

– Building Awareness –

Awareness is immediately achieved as consumers sample your product while actively participating in an authentic discussion with the brand ambassador, whether that is a founder or employee of the brand, or simply a well-trained representative. Instead of a manipulative sales pitch, brand ambassadors share the product details and brand selling points in a genuine, friend-to-a-friend manner, while openly receiving opinions and feedback.

– Stimulating Consideration –

Consideration is simultaneously obtained as the product is readily available to purchase, encouraged by the positive interaction and potentially assisted by giveaways or other points of sale (i.e. coupons, branded one-sheets).

– Creating Sales Conversions –

This all leads to the sale, or the conversion. If this is accomplished, the road to loyalty and advocacy is not far off, as these consumers have in-depth brand knowledge and an accompanying pleasant experience associated with the product to talk about with others.

Beyond merely executing the events and generating sales, field marketing allows for opportunities to gather important data. With the right systems in place, you’ll be able to generate quantifiable metrics and vital consumer feedback, allowing you to evaluate and make critical managerial decisions.

Retail demos during COVID?

While free food samples have been put on hold since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, it is likely just a matter of time before they’re back in most retail grocers, perhaps with new protocols or different forms. 

The state of the pandemic and its regulations are constantly changing and varies from state to state (even from county to county). According to The Miami Herald, Costco announced the eventual return of their beloved samples in May 2020, noting to expect a different process. 

Other stores have slowly begun integrating retail demos again, without the sampling aspect or with socially-distanced safe tastings. Most importantly, brand ambassadors can still display and share about the product with passerbys, achieving brand awareness and making in-store conversions.

If you want to learn more about how Mirus Agency can support your brand with retail demo campaigns, contact us today for a free strategy session! Or if you feel you’d rather go the DIY route with your retail demos, we’ve created a step-by-step program toolkit to help get you started and navigate the field with success.