“The Last 20 Yards” is the in-store stimuli trigger where a shopper's purchase behaviour is unplanned and impulsive. It is the place where your target audience is 20 steps away from your brand. Many brands neglect the importance of the last 20 yards in the customer’s journey and therefore are missing out on shopper conversion opportunities at the point of purchase. Even though shoppers claim that they know what they want to purchase the moment they enter a store, surprisingly 84% will make impulse purchases in categories they had no intention of even considering. Now how can marketers influence that decision to their advantage?

The ways customers want to learn about your brand and its products have changed. They are now technology-oriented and quite sophisticated. When a buyer is interested in making a purchase, they depend heavily on digital content before making a decision. Easily transmitted information that is delivered in a catchy, attractive manner has a major effect on a customer’s buying decision. With traditional signage going digital, advertisers can see results where it is most effective; inside the store. Digital signage, in the right location and with the right strategy, could be the most successful marketing tool for CPG and FMCG brands.

While ROI is crucial, it is also important to pay attention to factors that drive the behaviour of the customer; the ROO (Return on Objective). In this case, digital signage is your win-win strategy where you accomplish extraordinary customer experience (CX) and increase sales. CPG and FMCG brands should be focusing on displaying their ads in the last 20 yards to achieve their ROO and turn them into sales objectives; convert shoppers into buyers. 

So why is the last 20 yards so important and how is digital signage contributing to its effectiveness?

Building awareness - The buyer may not even be aware about what exactly they want. They only know they have a problem that requires a solution or they are struck with a craving. Your ad displayed on a digital signage in the last 20 yards has a potential to influence their next step. As a shopper's attention gets harder to grab and keep, Digital Signage helps you rise above competing distractions in the most crucial point of decision. It attracts and engages the viewer with high-end quality and attractive colours. You catch the potential buyer’s attention and build lasting impressions. Digital signage boosts your brand awareness by 47.7%.

Connecting personas - Your digital signage is a great opportunity to communicate your brand’s identity to your target audience. Since visual aesthetics appeal to human emotions, you should be positioning digital signage in your brand strategy. Digital Signage is proof your brand cares about innovating, therefore trustworthy and reliable. The last 20 yards is the perfect time to genuinely connect with customers on a personal level. Your creatives or ads should be reflecting the tone of your brand in terms of sounds, logos, colours, characters, and other strategies you choose to integrate. Your digital signage then complements the rest of your marketing efforts and helps make customers more devoted to your brand. Using your signage to further your branding efforts will help ensure that one-time buyers turn to loyal customers.

Beating the competition - When your target audience is in the last 20 yards, walking past your digital screen, you just have a few moments to reach them and influence their decision. Digital Signage helps you optimize those few seconds. Why should they choose you over other competitors laying next to your brand? With powerful and eye-catchy imagery, you get to communicate all of your selling points, rotated through multiple messages that work together and successfully affect the customer’s decision. You could also show how your product is used; displaying customers using your brand so that prospective customers could imagine themselves using it too. This drives them to trust and instantly connect with your brand and are more likely to choose you over competitors.

Sometimes, people are so used to living with a problem that they don’t even recognize they want help or a solution. Dynamic digital signage is an opportunity for you to show people common problems and how your product or service can help fix them. You communicate with your customers not only in the most influential retail place; in-store, you also display your ads in the critical moment of truth, where it really matters; the last 20 yards. Contact us today to reach your brand’s full potential. Get in touch!