Thought Leader: Using pop-ups to create local brand advocacy

By Mike Fantis, VP, managing partner, DAC Group

The UK e-commerce market has grown by 324% over the past decade, and estimates from eMarketer suggest that online sales will represent about 36% of total UK retail sales for 2022.

While British shoppers have whole-heartedly embraced e-commerce, it’s perhaps ironic that online could (and should) have a role to play in bringing customers back to town centres. With 40% of UK retail space now standing vacant, there is a cost-effective opportunity for brands to use the customer data they hold to create considered pop-up experiences, developed for audiences that have already demonstrated an interest online.

Why brands should use pop-up stores

Pop-ups are a great option for both digital-first and traditional brands that have moved away from the high street to build (or rebuild) brand awareness, drive sales and build advocacy within communities.

Any brand-to-local strategy starts at the top of the sales funnel, when customers are in the research phase. Analysis of search terms can reveal what issues people are grappling with at certain times of the year, whether that’s laying decking or decking a Christmas tree. And it’s very possible to discern locations where there are clusters of similar searches, or locations where a brand’s target audience has a high index, to help define where you’re most likely to drive the best results.

Homeware and DIY retailers are particularly well placed to offer experiences built around solving customers’ problems. Those with a demonstrable interest in a particular project or product can be engaged online by inviting them to a workshop or demonstration in their area – an opt-in value exchange that benefits both parties.

Measuring success

Securing first party data, or indeed sales uplift, isn’t necessarily the only metric that counts when it comes to community engagement campaigns. A key objective should be to build trust, and this can be measured through any resulting customer reviews across Google and TrustPilot, both under-used but hugely influential digital platforms for brands.

Advocacy is also a key component of trust and the longer-term ambitions from these events can be to amplify positive sentiment across both physical and digital communities. A first port of call should be social media sites. Twitter is still key for engagement on a national level and is highly measurable through hashtags, retweets and so-on. However, on a local level, we shouldn’t discount the significance of community pages on Facebook, which tend to speak to a less tech-savvy demographic.

Facebook is well-suited to building and extending conversations, gauging sentiment and identifying the high-value individuals that should be nurtured over the longer term. It is these ambassadors that will help keep your brand front of mind long after the pop-up has departed.

So, don’t discount the high street. It still has an important role to play in omnichannel customer experiences, but it can pay to think differently about the role it plays on those journeys.