Managing product assortments at the shelf is an important task for every consumer goods company. Assortment planning remains a critical component in retail execution. It is the key to satisfying shoppers and maximizing volume.

It is imperative to have the proper assortment at that point of interruption between the product and the consumer. However, so many assortment tools and processes fail to account for and incorporate a critical element - the consumer.

"A robust analytical approach creates in-store product assortments based on actual consumer behavior. It goes beyond traditional practices, providing consumer-driven analysis to help manufacturers and retailers make assortment decisions with greater accuracy and confidence," says Greg Orth, a director with Henry Rak Consulting Partners (HRCP).

He lists three reasons to use a consumer-driven approach to manage product assortments...

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Mobile shopper marketing is creating a buzz nowadays.  It is becoming a key element in the digital space via online (sampling, websites, search engines), in-store (kiosks, digital signage), and word of mouth (social networks). Moreover, it will become the fourth lane in multi-channel marketing, along with store, catalog and web.

However, mobile shopper marketing is a fragmented and opportunistic space today, according to the results of a survey by GfK Interscope. Although there are hundreds of new apps launched per day, there lacks best practices to leverage digital/mobile in sore. The readiness of trading partners for digital/mobile revolution is lacking with some 41% of them devoting less than 1% of the marketing budget to this area. Only 40% of organizations have a dedicated digital/mobile team, according to the firm's latest Futurescope survey...