Unpacking the Digital Shelf

From her perch as Director of Omni-channel Marketing at Nestle USA, Gloria DeCoste leads a small but mighty team managing over 300 channels in the daily battle to win the digital shelf. Gloria joins the podcast to describe the mindset, process, and intense cross-functional collaboration required to get baby SKUs to market and make ‘em fly with a focus on everything that her and her team does is in service of delivering great consumer experiences

Walmart.com has become an attractive marketplace channel for brands to consider. The trap that many brands fall into, however, is to simply "copy and paste" their Amazon product content and advertising strategy. But Walmart's platform is different in several fundamental ways, such as how products are ranked in organic search. This podcast is an audio version of a recent DSI webinar featuring Kiri Masters, Head of Retail Marketplace Strategy at Acadia and Tom Spaven, VP of Marketing at Good Wipes sharing their Walmart playbook for success and how your brand can utilize Walmart better in your digital shelf strategy.

Guest John Carroll, with deep experience in CPG from executive roles at P&G and Coca Cola, and now in his role as President of Digital Commerce and Analytic Services at Acosta Group, has spent decades watching trends, interpreting data and leading the way in consumer innovations and back office processes and planning. He joins the podcast to distill that experience in CPG Boardrooms to give his perspective and advice on planning and executing for incremental growth and controlling costs in the uncertainty of the upcoming year.

AI’s impact on e-commerce continues to grow with many brands using test-and-learn approaches with AI in their content creation, testing, syndication, and digital shelf optimization practices. Those who aren’t taking advantage of AI-based tactics risk falling behind the competition, but they’re surrounded by questions about how to get started with AI and what the new era of content creation will look like. In this audio rebroadcast of a recent Digital Shelf Institute webinar hosted by Lauren Livak Gilbert, learn how fellow digital leaders like Todd Hassenfelt from Colgate and Pam Perino from Ghirardelli approached the same questions. Eli Orkin, VP of Marketing at Vizit, also joins to map out how AI-fueled data can drive measurable performance improvements on the digital shelf.

How would you like your retail media or in-store shopper marketing campaigns to result in 40% better spending per household and 50% increased share of category? Results like that, it turns out, can happen when you make both those strategies come together into an integrated shopping experience for the consumer. Paul Brenner, SVP, Retail Media and Partnerships at Vibenomics and Nate Pinkston, Head of Growth at Microsoft Retail Media stopped by the podcast to bring to life the strategy, execution, and measurements of truly integrated, agile, measurable in-store and retail media campaigns.

From his time aboard submarines in the US Navy to decades of work in retail, at Sam’s Club, Albertson’s and now Rite Aid, Kenji Gjovig has spent a lot of time leading in highly pressurized circumstances. It is clear that for brands and retailers to achieve top line and bottom line growth in these uncertain economic era, the ability to collaborate at scale is an indispensable skill. Kenji joined the podcast to share decades of experience driving collaborative transformation in resource-constrained times.

More efficiency and more growth - the often conflicting pressures of business today seem unrelenting, especially on the digital shelf. Mike Monroe, Managing Director at Deloitte Digital spends countless hours in C Suites and with teams at brands defining the strategies, processes, tech stacks, and experience innovations that lay the foundation for a more profitable future. The ingredients to scale a content supply chain to both continually optimize for performance today while investing in an AI-fueled future of true personalization and operational transformation. And according to Mike, what’s at stake is that your brand will either win big, or lose big. Mike joined the podcast to provide a journey map to that future.

When the new class of GLP1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy came onto the market, grocery stocks took a big hit, in anticipation that people on these drugs would snack less and pull down unit sales. An overreaction to be sure, but John Carroll, President Digital Commerce and Analytic Services at Acosta Group, has spent time in CPG boardrooms discussing what the future impact and opportunities of a commercialized version of this drug might look like, and shared this point of view. Rob Gonzalez has a low opinion of humanity’s ability to let anything stand between them and their Twinkies, and this pre-thanksgiving Ozempic Hot Take podcast episode is the result.

Ross Walker, Retailer Marketplaces Paid Media Team Lead at Acadia, discusses the benefits of Amazon Marketing Cloud, including targeted audience advertising, customer behavior insights, and actionable audiences. He emphasizes the importance of effectively utilizing and interpreting AMC data, balancing customer acquisition and value, and leveraging AI for future strategy.

Every quarter, the ecommerce education consultancy Allume Group consolidates the output of expert conversations, annual reports, and the latest data to create their Ecommerce Insider Quarterly report, or EIQ. It’s chock a block full of the most current insights into the present and future of ecommerce. Andrea Leigh, Founder & CEO of Allume Group rejoins the podcast for her takeaways from their Q3 research.