From Consumer Insight to Growth: The Future of Retail Media

This blog post is guest authored by Jacques Hagopian, Senior Vice President of North America Brand Operations.

I've spent my career at P&G working at the intersection of brands, consumers and retailers, and if there's one thing I've learned about media, it's this: the most important metric isn't a media metric at all. It's profitable retail sales growth.

In today's retail media landscape, it's easy to get caught up in impressions, clicks, engagement rates and return on ad spend. Those in-process metrics are helpful diagnostics for us to understand performance. But if retail media isn't creating sustainable, profitable growth for both retailers and brands, then we're missing the point. That's the real scorecard.

While the landscape continues to evolve, some components are the same while others are new or different. Brand Building Fundamentals are the same. Growing awareness, creating memory and connecting that memory to purchase is still incredibly important. That’s how brands grow — through Mental & Physical Availability.

What’s changed is that the consumer and retail landscape is constantly shifting. The journey no longer works in a slow, sequential way. It’s a continuous flow of insights, idea creation, execution and retail conversion. Consumer attention is increasingly fragmented. Reaching people today is harder than it was even a few years ago. At the same time, commerce and communication are converging. Every point of reach can now become a point of sale. Add advances in AI and technology, and we have an opportunity to create experiences that are not only more effective, but more useful for consumers.

As we enter this new chapter for retail media, we’re leveraging the best of what P&G does and the best of what our retail partners do, from focusing on consumers to collaborating with partners for meaningful innovation.

Start With the Consumer

The best retail media programs start with a consumer insight. What problem are we solving? What need are we meeting? What experience can we create that adds value?

When we think about the future of retail media at P&G, we start with three things: a rich consumer insight, a compelling idea and the ability to execute that idea across the entire ecosystem. The magic happens when all three work together to deliver a superior brand experience.

Planning matters. In many cases, big ideas and excellence in execution begin 12 to 18 months before consumers ever see them and are borne from listening to customer feedback, considering shopping habits and trends and tapping into evolving patterns our teams work to identify. Retailers and brands are most effective when they align early around the insight, the idea and the end-to-end consumer journey to synchronize demand creation with supply and product availability.

Data Is Only Powerful When It Creates Better Experiences

One of the greatest strengths retailers have is data. But data alone isn't the advantage. How are we going to use it in service to our joint consumers?

I often challenge teams to think beyond traditional targeting. Instead of only asking who bought a product in the last six months, we should also ask who could become a future buyer. How do we identify unmet needs? How do we uncover moments where our brands can genuinely help consumers? How might we relevantly inject our brands in key cultural moments?

When brands can anticipate needs and surprise consumers in meaningful ways, engagement becomes more than a metric. The real opportunity lies in using data to understand people at a deeper level and then serving them with communications, products and experiences that feel relevant.

Innovation Happens Through Partnership

One of my favorite examples began during a simple dinner conversation. In chatting with a retail partner at Albertsons, the discussion sparked a thought about doing something different, leveraging data and insights Albertsons had with the unique storytelling history P&G could bring.

That conversation ultimately led to the creation of Rico's Tacos, a short-form, comedy-drama series developed with supermarket-level ad sales. The series is about a taco vendor and his teenage daughter navigating authenticity, ambition and the future of their family business. With participating brands like Head & Shoulders, Vicks and Bounty, each episode introduces unexpected customers who help turn the humble taco cart into a neighborhood obsession.

This initiative combined shopper insights, engaging content and commerce experiences in ways that went well beyond traditional banner ads or sponsored search. Albertsons had a rich data set of different types of shopper trips and the different “missions” shoppers had. We brought our storytelling expertise to help create “snackable” stories that consumers wanted to engage with. This content was not only entertaining, but deeply relevant, driving traffic and commerce within the Albertsons’ ecosystem.

What made it successful wasn't the technology. It was the willingness to rethink the model. The result was a more engaging consumer experience and a stronger business outcome.

Looking Ahead

Retail media will continue to evolve rapidly. New capabilities, new technologies and new channels will emerge every year. But the fundamentals won't change.

Success will come from understanding consumers better, building stronger partnerships and creating experiences that drive profitable growth for everyone involved.