Understanding and influencing the shopper's in-store decision process has become critical for winning at retail. It involves mapping the in-store "path to purchase" and capturing why and how each "moment of truth" battle is won or lost.

Secondary displays represent perhaps the most effective way to gain visibility along the path of targeted shoppers - significantly impacting performance of a brand as well as category. Despite the fact that both manufacturers and retailers have a substantial financial stake in secondary displays such as end caps, due to a lack of a scalable means for measuring performance, secondary merchandising strategies are largely based on ad hoc rules with incomplete feedback on true impact or return on investment (ROI). Contrast that with marketing practices that are now standard in Internet retailing - thanks to the availability of click-through, page-view and other usage statistics.

The industry needs measurement tools that provide direct visibility into the shopper-decision process and enable shopper-centered metrics for improving every retail touch-point. Traditional research methods such as observation and survey methods are subjective, expensive, and under-sampled; therefore, they are not scalable. There is an urgent need for automation in the process of gathering rich shopper data to have a scalable measurement solution for optimizing retail.

A recent technology breakthrough has led to the development of an in-store measurement platform that fills the need for automatically capturing shopper behavior data...

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To reach the digital consumer, marketers must adjust their expectations, or risk losing the sale - even if they are dangling an attractive discount.

The behavior of these shoppers is something traditional marketers haven't seen before, and they need to learn more. Some shoppers are new digital couponers, while others still rely mainly on paper coupons. The motivations that drive all of them are shifting.

"We feel very strongly that we have to uncover what is driving shoppers to behave the way that they do, and do it in such a way that we can scale that conversation and determine what programs and touch points are going to be most influential for them so you can grow your category and your brand," says Devora Rogers, senior director, retail marketing insights at Inmar, based in Winston-Salem, N.C. She spoke during a recent webinar.

Based on research that asked more than 1,000 shoppers who used a coupon in a three-month span, Inmar concluded that the three key trends that describe "new couponers" are: Entitled, Enabled and Engaged. Here is a look at each...

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The Food Marketing Enterprise at St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia has joined the Shopper Technology Institute (STI) as its exclusive collegiate alliance partner.

The Food Marketing Enterprise consists of undergraduate and graduate studies, a cooperative education program with industry, research on critical issues, community outreach for the poor and hungry, and food industry summits.

In recent years, the annual summits have focused on such topics as social media, e-commerce, and digital technology for profitable meals.

"It's significant to have such an outstanding university is the newest alliance partner of the institute," said John Karolefski, executive director of STI. "The relationship will be mutually beneficial as we look forward to working with the faculty."