It’s time for CPG marketing professionals to take a step back and rethink their approach.
More has changed in retail over the last 2 years than in the previous 20 combined. From tactics and technology to consumer behavior and macroeconomic trends, there’s a lot to consider as you map out 2025 and beyond.
I’ll start by providing some context via the top trends currently reshaping the CPG industry:
- The Rise of Private Label
- The Better for your Boom
- Sustainability and Ethical Consumption
- Personalization and Data Driven Marketing
- Digital Transformation and AI Integration
If you’re curious to learn more, I take a deeper dive into these trends here. But for the purpose of this article, I wanted to address how you can apply these trends to your brand strategy.
4 Guiding Principles for CPG Brands in 2025
Build a Consumer-Intelligence Engine
It’s a safe bet your marketing team has a system in place for managing core functions like creative development or file and asset management. But what about data and analytics?
On some level I’m sure you do – it’d be hard to execute a campaign without it. But ask yourself, is your approach ready for the new era of CPG?
Two-thirds of CPG companies say they have put data-driven marketing at the top of their agenda (source). In other words, this is where your competition is investing in growth.
What’s important is to recognize that your competitors aren’t just making a minor pivot, they’re investing in a wholly new process for collecting, managing, and translating vast datasets into actionable information: a consumer-intelligence engine.
Ultimately, the goal here is to create a dynamic, 360-degree view of your target consumer that facilitates personalization at scale. For example, instead of targeting moms 35-54 with kids, you could target moms 35-54 with teenagers who live in a certain zip code, shop at Kroger, and buy organic.
Building a consumer-intelligence engine will vary by company and category, but fundamentally it will require 4 key components:
- Organizational alignment that prioritizes communication between departments and seamlessly connects various data streams from across the company
- An AI engine to process information and recommend high-value actions
- A marketing technology stack to deliver the right message, to the right consumer, on the right channel, at the right time
- A test-and-learn mentality that keeps feeding the consumer-intelligence engine with more and more information – improving decision making over time
This will likely be a big lift for many organizations, but the benefits seem clear: companies that prioritize data-driven marketing can see a 3 to 5 percent growth in net sales and improve marketing efficiency by 10 to 20 percent (source)
Find Ways to Add Value
The average supermarket carries something like 47,000 products (source). In this crowded and commoditized landscape, how can you break through the clutter?
As we point out in our shopper marketing strategy guide, today’s retail requires a new strategic playbook. To illustrate, let’s look at a recent picture I took of the condiment aisle at a local grocery store.
One quick thing to point out: the eye-level shelf space (highlighted yellow) is a store brand.
There are 20+ individual sauce brands and around 60-70 SKU in this aisle. Which would you choose?
Let’s compare value using the 4 Ps of traditional marketing:
- Product: Each of the sauces have similar bottles, labels, ingredients, and brand messaging.
- Price: The private label brand has the best price point across the board.
- Promotion: Of the 45 SKUs shown, 36 of them are running a price promotion (yellow tags).
- Place: Sweet Baby Ray’s and the private label brand dominate the space.
Here’s the point: unless you’re a large brand with deep pockets and national notoriety, it’s going to be increasingly difficult to compete against private label using the traditional retail marketing matrix. What’s needed is a way to level the playing field – a value add that extends beyond price or product features (i.e., keto friendly).
A good example is Bombas and their “one purchased = one donated” program. For every purchase you make, they’ll donate the #1, #2 and #3 most requested items in homeless shelters. While there isn’t anything inherently special about their products (no offense, but socks are socks), they set themselves apart by delivering added value to customers via a charitable donation. This in part has helped Bombas generate more than $1.3 billion in retail sales since they launched in 2013.
Delivering added value to your customers doesn’t necessarily need to be in the form of some grand gesture. Great customer service and data-driven personalization can go a long way in helping you stand out.
What’s important to remember is that consumers are willing to pay a premium for products that align with their values. A potential blue ocean opportunity for companies struggling to compete against lower priced private label brands.
As we talk about in our 5 Emerging Trends in CPG Food & Beverage blog, macro consumer trends like health & wellness and/or sustainability could be a good place to start.
Prioritize Digital Experiences
Although most people prefer to shop for groceries in-store, the majority of their path to purchase takes place online. You can think of it like an iceberg, where the physical, in-store shopping experience is only a small part of a much bigger, online buyer’s journey.
Beyond illustrating the concept, I wanted to use this metaphor so I could share this image. Why? It’s an AI generated image to a prompt I gave to Google Gemini – pretty cool, right?
My point is that digital innovations like AI are rapidly transforming the way we do business, and since the vast majority of your consumer interactions take place online, it’s essential to prioritize digital-first consumer experiences.
To clarify, when I say digital experiences, I’m talking about two separate, but interconnected things: the commerce experience, and the brand experience.
- The commerce experience is basically your online sales funnel. It’s the path you want consumers to take after they click on an ad, signup for a newsletter, make a purchase, etc. What’s key is removing points of friction to create a seamless user experience.
- The brand experience is the storytelling you weave into the commerce experience. It’s the reason someone clicks on your ad in the first place.
A fun example is our recent Sunkist Mandarins campaign. As part of an overall brand refresh, we created a gamified brand experience with a shoppable ecosystem including, mobile games, AR, and more.
Putting this in context, here’s what made the campaign successful:
- A mobile-first experience. As if you didn’t already know, 91% of consumers 18-49 buy things using their smartphones (source). Not only did a mobile-first approach cater to our core demographic (on-the-go moms), it also provided a shoppable platform to support a broader omnichannel effort.
- Multichannel Scalability. As you’re aware, retailers vary by scale, geographic, tactics, etc. We prioritized flexibility by using multiple content applications that could push sales across a wide variety of channels. For instance, we offered retailers interactive quarter bins with dynamic QR codes. As needed, we could update the bins to feature different aspects of the mobile experience.
- A unique value-add. There are many ways to create value with consumers: coupons, content, contests. These are all tried and true but offer little differentiation. We took the path less traveled by creating a series of branded mobile games that could be used across multiple years.
- Proprietary Data. Finally, the experience was designed to be “sticky.” The more peopled engaged with the site, the more we could learn about them and create personalized content or offers around their interactions (consumer-intelligence engine).
Authenticity Matters More Than Ever
In a digital world saturated with content and now optimized by AI, people’s BS meters are on full alert. In fact, eighty-six percent of people say authenticity matters when deciding what brands they like and support (source).
AI generated images, like the iceberg I presented above, take less then 10 seconds to create. And while that may seem very enticing as a way to save money and speed up efficiency, it can also be a double-edged sword.
At its core, authenticity is about removing the filters and embracing who you are. Now more than ever, it’s important to show up as your genuine self– not some computer-generated caricature.
Authenticity in Practice: How to Embrace It
Knowing the importance of authenticity is one thing; integrating it into your content strategy is another. Here’s how CPG brands can embody authenticity in their marketing:
Humanize Your Brand
Give your brand a human touch. Share behind-the-scenes glimpses, employee spotlights and customer stories. Let the faces behind your products shine through. This human connection fosters a stronger bond with your audience.
Tell Stories That Matter
Storytelling is a powerful tool. Narrate the journey of your products, the impact on the community or how sustainability is woven into your business practices. Stories that align with your audience’s values will always resonate more than a sales pitch.
Engage in Meaningful Conversations
Social listening is vital. Engage with your customers, respond to their queries and participate in conversations. Authentic engagement shows you’re not just there to sell but also to support and listen.
Stay True to Your Voice
Your brand’s voice is its signature. Whether it’s friendly, professional or quirky, ensure that your content reflects this consistently. A genuine voice helps in building brand recognition and loyalty.
Embrace Vulnerability
Not everything will always go as planned, and that’s okay. Sharing your challenges or learning moments can be incredibly impactful. It shows that your brand is real and relatable.
Need some help?
I recognize this was a lot to digest. But hopefully, it has you thinking differently already.
If you could use some advice about where to get started, drop a question in the comment section below and we’ll do our best to help out.