Consumer-packaged goods (CPG) companies face disadvantages in the digital world, given their historical lack of direct-to-consumer relationships. But with or without troves of customer data, CPGs are forging ahead. eMarketer’s Lauren Fisher spoke with Eli Chapman, senior vice president and managing director of media at digital advertising agency R/GA, about how CPGs are placing greater emphasis on direct-to-consumer initiatives—especially programmatic—to push greater performance from their digital media buys.
Are there any major shifts in programmatic buying habits among CPGs?
Many CPGs now have internal teams building more direct relationships with consumers. There are ecommerce teams emerging that actually do their own buying, separate from the rest of the business.
Those teams, in addition to those dealing with either direct to consumer or membership in some form, are starting to have more influence over media budgets. I think this trend will persist over the next five years as they continue to be acquisition focused and hungry for performance.
And companies with internal stakeholders using programmatic effectively to accomplish those direct-to-consumer or acquisition-based goals will generally gain more traction and have more influence over the buy.