Meat Conference 2013: Shake Up That Ad

Sherry Frey, vice president of account services, Nielsen Perishables Group

Retailers should be thinking more like food magazines when they are putting together their ads, according to the Nielsen Perishables Group's Shery Frey in her presentation "The Meat Department's Role in Total Store Health" at the Annual Meat Conference. 

“If you think about the ads in the grocery channel, we’ve really designed these ads and our circulars around departments, and we also know there are departments that don’t even drive lift when they’re on ad.”

Frey said that retailers need to redesign those ads to address consumer needs, not just point out different products from departments. 

“I think the food magazines are completely hitting it on the head in terms of the way they’re designing against these behaviors,” Frey said, giving the examples of magazines focusing on healthy dinners, weekend cooking or quick cooking.

Nielsen research found that shoppers don't respond well to fresh product being covered up with price tags and that showing food "closer to the completion point" leads customers to finish that thought. For example, showing an open box of crackers with some crackers coming out is better than just showing the box, Frey explained.

Frey singled out a Hy-Vee hamburger ad with all the condiments and toppings arced across the page — bun, pickles, lettuce, ketchup — as an example of an effective ad.

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