Keeping shoppers engaged takes more than clever campaigns; it requires constant reinvention. In a recent Path to Purchase Institute webinar, experts from Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream and Spark Foundry discussed how staying fresh, setting clear objectives, and moving quickly can help brands build lasting connections in a fickle marketplace.

Keeping it fresh: When it comes to creative execution, brands need to keep shoppers engaged.

“You have to date your shopper all the time,” said Matt Rader, senior category manager for omnicommerce at Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream. “The loyalty aspect is much less strong. And so if you’re not keeping things fresh, then [consumers] will look elsewhere.”

That approach drives Dreyer’s year-round creative strategy.

“Our philosophy is that ice cream is a 365-day-a-year category,” said Rader. “But consumers aren’t necessarily thinking of us [year-round]. So how do we interject ourselves into that conversation organically so we can win?”

• He described a tiered approach to creative moments, categorizing them as marathons, jogs, or sprints that range from long-running seasonal tentpoles like fall football to short, 48-hour “appointment viewing” events like the Oscars or the Kentucky Derby.
• “You have to connect to passion points in an organic way that allows [consumers] to be open to thinking about ice cream when they might not have been,” said Rader.

While these big moments capture attention, brands must also focus on the smaller details, like the product detail page.

“It’s not as flashy, it doesn’t change as much, but that’s home base,” said Jared Scott, vice president, commerce, at Spark Foundry. “That’s the moment where they decide, yes or no, am I gonna date this brand?”

Measuring what matters: Creative innovation must be grounded in measurable outcomes.

“We want to measure the front end,” said Scott. “Are we driving incremental traffic and interest? In an ideal scenario, we’d like to tie sales metrics back to that [and identify] what role media [is] playing in the purchase journey.”

It all comes back to having a clear objective from the start, according to Rader.

“A problem that is well-defined is 90% solved,” he said. “If your objective is well-defined, therefore your performance metric can be set up effectively.”

• That means prioritizing concrete outcomes.
• “When you go talk to a buyer... ROAS isn’t their love language,” he said. “Their love language is: how many households, how many trips, and how many units per trip did your campaign deliver?”

The need for speed: Agility is critical for brands right now, said Rader.

“You have to run your business creatively like you’re two people in a garage,” he said. “If you’re not taking it to the market, the market will take it to you.”

However, brands need to distinguish between being current and chasing fads that won’t resonate with their audience.

• “It always depends,” said Scott. “Sometimes we think '90s nostalgia works, and then we test it and realize your evergreen creative works better.”
• Instead, he urged brands to build systems that allow them to rapidly test creative and “succeed quickly or fail fast.”

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