Browse All Articles

With Black Friday weekend over, customers are hustling to wrap up their shopping. Retailers who emphasize convenience and make finding the perfect gift easy will be well-positioned for a merry season. This brings us to the next trend in our Holiday 2019 series:Multiline retailers dominate both online and in-storeLast year, Multiline retailers like Target, Walmart, and Amazon not only accounted for 60% of all online spend, but they also made up 45% of all spend at physical stores. This indicates that consumers prefer to check all the items off their shopping lists at one location—regardless of whether they’re doing so in person or at the click of a button. Specialized retailers who sell one category of goods must give customers a reason to make that extra trip.

Which categories are winning specialty share?​While Multiline took the lion’s share of holiday spend, several categories drove customers to make more specialized trips. Runners-up for biggest share of online spend include Apparel (15%), Home & Garden (9%), and Electronics (5%). Several categories of specialized stores are faring a bit better at their physical stores. Apparel (19%), Home & Garden (17%), and Beauty & Health (8%) picked up the largest share after Multiline. Actionable Tips:To protect their share, both Multiline and specialized retailers should consider offering sales on exclusive brands or products and highlighting them in any promotional materials.Remember to emphasize the unique convenience factors of all your shopping channels. For instance, verifiable quality and knowledgeable staff for physical retailers, shoppable gift guides for online retailers, and easy in-store pickup to foster valuable omnichannel shopping behavior.Want more Holiday insights? Check out our other holiday spend trends, and check back weekly for new holiday insights.

Ross McNab joined Cardlytics on October 1 from MediaMath. I sat down with him to learn more about why he chose Cardlytics, what he’s been up to during his first few months, and what plans he has in store for 2020.Welcome to Cardlytics! Tell us a bit more about what brought you here.ROSS: Thanks! Happy to be here. When I made the decision to leave MediaMath, I outlined a list of criteria that I felt was important for my next opportunity. The first category was Does the Company Matter, and the good news was that for Cardlytics, the answer quickly became “yes!” as I got to know the people and understand the value proposition. The second category was Are They in a Growth Market, and again, the answer to that was “yes, absolutely.” There is more money flowing into media and digital than ever before. The third category was Business State. I wanted to join a company that was winning, and Cardlytics is absolutely winning with immense opportunity. The fourth category was Leadership Group. It was quickly apparent that the leadership team here is extremely high caliber. The final category was Role in Organization, and Cardlytics scored high in this area as well. Cardlytics was hands down the best experience that I had when interviewing, and that also helped set it apart from the other companies I was talking to at the time.What did you do before you joined Cardlytics?ROSS: After I moved to Sydney from my hometown of Perth, Australia, I started working for an AdTech company called MediaMind. I ran the APAC team in Hong Kong for a year, and then was moved to New York. Eventually, I moved back to Sydney and started my own business (Kinected) which acted as an AdTech launch vehicle for multiple AdTech technologies into the APAC marketplace. I came back to New York in 2014 and sold that business to a company called MediaMath, which is where I’ve been for the past five years.You started on October 1. How have the first few months been?ROSS: Truthfully, I feel like I’ve been going to school. It’s been quite a learning experience! When I joined MediaMath, I had a long-standing relationship with them, so I knew the business very well and I knew many of the decision-makers there. Since I did have my own company at one point, I’ve worked in almost every role – I’ve done operations, I’ve done account management, I’ve done analytics, I’ve done sales, and I’ve done HR. I’ve even overseen the kitchen ordering. Needless to say, it’s been a long time since I’ve taken on a new role at a completely new company, and it has been a big learning experience. I’m getting to learn a lot about the Atlanta scene, too, which has been quite an experience.You’ve been in Atlanta quite a bit lately. Are you planning to stay in New York?ROSS: Yes, I will be based in New York. New York is important to the business because it’s the center of the advertising universe. It’s appropriate that a company of our stature and potential has an executive presence there, and we already have a great team in the city. It’s a team that we will certainly want to invest in and rally around. In fact, we’re already outgrowing our office and are looking to move into a larger space. That has all happened over the course of two months. However, I know that early on my physical presence in the Atlanta office will be very important so that I can build credibility with the team. So, I’ll be in Atlanta a lot, too.What have you learned about Cardlytics since you started?ROSS: The main learning is that yes, we matter. And put simply, our clients are better off because we exist, and that is really cool. That is not normal. Most businesses address a certain part of the market and they add some value, and they do it maybe 5 to 10 percent differently than everyone else. But we really matter, and we make a positive impact on our clients. And the best part is that we can prove it with our data.The other neat part about our platform is that it’s incredibly defensible. It is almost impossible to replicate the unique relationships that we have created with our financial institutions. We need to be continuously proud of that.I’ve also learned that there’s still phenomenal opportunity, and I don’t think a single person who works for Cardlytics would disagree. There are opportunities to expand, explore new revenue streams, target new customer segments, and to introduce automation in the business. To put it in a one-liner, I don’t think we came this far to come this far. There is still a long road filled with opportunity ahead.What’s on deck as we begin 2020?ROSS: If these first few months have been a learning experience, the next few months will be me embracing our motto and Getting Shit Done. I’ll be shifting my focus to what we need to do as a business to capitalize on our many opportunities for growth and the amazing foundation that has been built over the last 10 years.I see this time period as a great opportunity to realign, step back, and decide who we can do great work for. What are the types of clients that we could do our best work for? What do they look like today? How do we find more like that? How do we encourage and repeat the great things that are going on?We need to put the client at the center. Just like any business that has grown up over 10 years, we have evolved, and we have certain ways that we do things because that’s how we’ve had to do them. Right now, we have an interesting opportunity to step back and make sure we are putting the client in the center.I’ll also be focusing on the organization of my team. What’s the right team structure? What are the right roles for those teams? What are the right definitions of those roles? How do we help the people who are already very successful in their roles keep growing? How do we augment those roles with new talent coming in? What things need to change in order to replicate the success we’ve had? We need to decide who we exist to do great work for by looking at who we already do great work for. There is a lot I will be thinking about as we enter the new year, and I’m excited for the positive change and the success that lies ahead.________________________________________________________________________________________Ross McNab joined Cardlytics as President, North America Advertising from MediaMath, an independent programmatic company for marketers. While there, he tripled the company’s revenue from leading marketers by forging strategic improvements to commercial strategy as their North America Managing Director. In his role at Cardlytics, McNab has joined the executive leadership team, and will lead the North America advertising team to drive continued revenue growth for thecompany.A native of Australia, McNab co-founded Kinected in Sydney, Australia in 2012, which would eventually be acquired by MediaMath. Prior to its purchase, Kinected operated ad technologies in Australia, New Zealand, and the wider APAC region. As Co-Founder and Chief Revenue Officer, McNab oversaw sales, client service, finance, and HR. Prior to Kinected, McNab was the Director of Global Business Development at MediaMind, where he incubated a managed-service demand-side platform offered in North America, EMEA, and APAC.

Retail continues to evolve with the introduction of new disruptors and innovative sales experiences. In analyzing the top holiday spend trends, Cardlytics saw that customers are quickly embracing two major shopping trends that are driving growth across categories: eCommerce and direct-to-consumer brands.eCommerce retailers spread good cheer​Retailers no longer require a physical presence to gain customer awareness. In the past year, eCommerce brands saw an increase of 12% in overall holiday spend. These companies were generally established as online-only, with the vast majority of their sales still taking place online—for example, Wayfair, Casper, Warby Parker, Etsy, and Stitchfix.eCommerce brands saw significant growth across several categories—often outperforming their non-eCommerce counterparts. Growth categories include Pets (+51%), Multiline (+14%), Beauty & Health (+12%), Branded Apparel (+9%), Sporting Goods (+6%), and Home & Garden (+5%).

Peace, joy, and brand loveIn addition to adopting eCommerce-only retailers, customers are increasingly willing to purchase directly from the brands they know and trust. Rather than look for a preferred brand at a multiline retailer, customers can browse a full product line-up and purchase directly within a brand’s own environment—for example at Nike.com or Nike-branded stores. These branded properties saw year-over-year growth in categories where their multi-brand counterparts saw a decline. Examples include branded Sporting Goods (+8%), Shoes (+7%), and Apparel (+4%). 

Actionable Tips:Channel the eCommerce trend: Strengthen your online and mobile properties with price matching, shoppable gift guides, and free shipping to attract more digital customers.Build strong brand connections: Well-recognized brands are driving holiday shoppers to make specialized purchases. Consider emphasizing deals on branded goods in your holiday marketing materials—whether your store sells one brand or one hundred—to make the most of this spend trend.Find out where your customers are shopping when they’re not shopping with you: Are key competitors in your category offering a selection or price that you’re not? Beyond your category, are there potential tie-ins or partnerships that might align with your best customer’s shopping habits? Using powerful purchase history, Cardlytics helps answer these questions and more, putting insights into action to ultimately drive sales and grow market share.Want more Holiday insights? Check out our complete list of 2019 holiday spend trends.

Let’s face it: while much has been said this year about the Retailpocalypse – or the numerous stores and malls shuttering around the country—in-store is still bringing in substantial sales. This brings us to Cardlytics’ third holiday spend trend for marketers:Online channels continue to grow share, but in-store sales still dominate holiday spend​Purely eCommerce retailers like Amazon may make up the fastest growing channel, but they’re far from being the largest channel in terms of share. Last year, the vast majority of all holiday spend—over 78%—still happened in physical stores.

While convenient, Online Only retailers grew by 1.3 share points at the expense of in-store spend, traditional Brick & Mortars were able to offset some of their share loss by driving customers to their online and mobile properties. These Brick&Mortar.coms saw a 0.2 increase in share points year-over-year and made up 8.4% of overall holiday spend.Actionable Tips:

1. Brick & Mortar retailers: be sure to emphasize the unique convenience factors of in-store shopping in your holiday marketing. For instance, knowledgeable staff, verifiable quality, easy gift returns, and the ability to shop 11^th hour deals after shipping deadlines have passed.
2. Online Only retailers: Strengthen your online and mobile channels with price matching, shoppable gift guides, and free shipping to attract more digital customers.
3. Brick&Mortar.coms: Promote in-store pickup options to help customers flow more easily between your online and in-store channels. This flexibility will help foster valuable omnichannel shopping behavior (more on that next week).

Want more Holiday insights? Check out Cardlytics’ other holiday spend trends and stay tuned for next week’s post. We’ll be detailing the massive upside of driving omnichannel shopping behavior during the holidays.

Today’s consumers value convenience and flip easily between online and in-store shopping. This omnichannel behavior presents a valuable opportunity for retailers—and brings us to our fourth holiday spend trend:Holiday shoppers spend more at retailers when they shop both online and in-store                   At Cardlytics, we’ve found that the industry buzz around omni is more than just hype. Omni customers who shop both in-store and online at the same retailer spend twice as much during the holidays as those customers who also made multiple trips but stuck to just one channel.

While the majority of holiday shoppers inevitably shop both online and in-store, they rarely do so at the same retailer. In fact, only 10.3% of customers at top retailers are omni customers with that brand during the holidays. This means there is incredible headroom for marketers to boost their sales by encouraging omni behavior.Actionable Tips:To unlock the value of omni customers, it’s critical that marketers resist the temptation to push shoppers from one channel to the other. Instead, they can build campaigns that empower customers to easily purchase with their brand—regardless of the channel.Cardlytics allows customers to earn valuable cash-back offers however they choose to shop. Using powerful purchase history, we help marketers identify and reach customers who are heavy omni shoppers, with them and with competitors, to ultimately drive sales and grow market share.Want more Holiday insights? Check out our other holiday spend trends, and stay tuned for next week’s post on the top three things yule need to know about seasonality.

It’s been a month of new releases in the entertainment market with four iconic global entertainment brands launching their own answers to the rise of streaming services in popular culture. Apple, Disney, and ‘Britbox’ - the joint venture between two British television channels, the BBC and ITV - have all launched to the public in a matter of weeks. It’s clear that traditional entertainment brands are all vying to claim their slice of the pie in the online streaming market. This should come as no surprise…Cardlytics data shows that UK consumer spend on streaming services – such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and NOW TV – rose by 28 percent in the last year alone[1]. It’s a trend that is set to continue. Month-on-month spend growth last year remained consistent, between 20 to 35 percent, indicating the meteoric rise of streaming services shows no signs of slowing.Despite the average annual cost of a streaming subscription staying at an affordable £10, just 16 percent of the average price of an annual paid TV subscription, spend on streaming services now equates to 10 percent of total spend on paid TV subscriptions offered by the likes of Sky, BT, and Virgin. The numbers are stark and show the significant appetite for streaming services among consumers.Yet, there’s a clear age divide in the use of different entertainment services with 20-39-year-olds accounting for 30 percent of overall streaming spend. This reveals it is the younger generations who are responsible for driving the growth in streaming. By comparison, older generations remain loyal to traditional paid TV, responsible for the majority (66 percent) of spend in this area. The big ‘switch’While Sky, Virgin, and BT continue to take the lion’s share of consumer spending in the entertainment market by value, the number of consumers switching to new TV streaming services is on the rise and eating into their market share.Our data finds that consumer switching from paid TV to streaming services grew by 40 percent in the last year. Again, it's young people driving the trend, with over half (60 percent) of 20-39-year-olds having switched from a paid TV subscription to a streaming service in the last year alone. That said, traditional paid TV brands needn’t be too concerned. While switching was on the rise, spend on paid TV subscriptions did not experience a dip between 2018 and 2019, suggesting that traditional brands are themselves winning new, higher spending customers. Clever partnerships, like Sky’s tie-up with Netflix to offer the service as part of its ‘Ultimate on Demand’ subscription package, show paid TV providers are working hard to stay relevant and respond to the growing demand for streaming services. The cost of content Netflix is the most popular streaming subscription in the UK, with 11 million subscribers, but it is becoming increasingly expensive, with its most popular package now priced at £8.99 a month. The rising cost of streaming services is no coincidence, as content plays an increasingly important role in enticing customers. More players entering the streaming market have created an arms race for content, with each provider investing heavily to produce the next hit series, film, or documentary which will keep consumers coming back for more. In April 2019, the final series of Game of Thrones aired on Sky Atlantic and streaming service NOW TV, with the finale drawing an average of 3.2 million viewers in the UK^[2], leading to a 28 percent spike in spend on streaming services that month versus the same month the year before. For leading brands like Netflix and Amazon, using insights like these to better target their audiences is a way of ensuring they defend their prominent positions from encroaching competition. Likewise, analysing spend data to identify which and why audiences still watch paid TV will help paid TV providers to personalise their offers further and maintain their market share. As the entertainment wars intensify, it’ll be those who can use data most effectively to understand their consumers who will come out on top.

[1] Data was obtained in the year up to September 2019, and compared with the corresponding period in the prior year. For 2018, data was tracked from September 2017 to September 2018

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/may/21/game-of-thrones-uk-tv-ratings-viewers-2am-finale  

The Super Bowl is an exciting time for all football fans, and/or people who just love a good party. But, it’s also a great time for marketers, as the cities of the competing teams often see a spur in economic activity before, during, AND post-Super Bowl.

We analyzed nine total weeks in 2017 – four weeks prior to the Super Bowl, Super Bowl week, and four weeks post Super Bowl, and found:

• People in the competing cities generally wait till the final weeks to buy their tickets. We saw that just three weeks prior to Super Bowl week in 2017, ticket providers’ sales among Georgia and Massachusetts (last year’s competing team states) saw a 24% spike from the weekly average.
• During the week of Super Bowl 2017, nationally, grocery sales were up 6.8% from the average and pizza sales were up 2.6%.
• During that same week, however, grocers in Georgia and Massachusetts, saw a 7% increase in sales, while pizza restaurants saw a 5% increase during Super Bowl week.
• While wholesale clubs didn’t see any major spikes nationally during that week, Georgia and Massachusetts wholesale clubs saw a 4% spend increase from the average.
• The euphoria around the big game causes more overall spending in competing team states. Georgia and Massachusetts customers spent nearly 16% more, overall, than the weekly average during Super Bowl week in 2017, while the national spend was actually below average that week.
• Nationally, people wait to see the winner to get their gear, as we see the national increase in sporting goods stores increase in the weeks post-Super Bowl.

While the Super Bowl is just one day, we see that the economic effects can linger for weeks beyond the game itself. So, for marketers looking to capture increased spend around the Super Bowl, specifically sporting goods retailers carrying team gear, you still have time to reach fans and drive sales.

Good timing for marketers: Cardlytics’ data reveals last year’s holiday sales were up 2% year-over-year. Even more great news, the forecast is showing continued growth for 2019.So how can retailers make sure they’re maximizing their sales potential? To help answer this question, we analyzed over $2.8T in purchase data across our banking partners and identified the biggest holiday spend trends.Here’s a deeper dive into the second trend marketers need to know now that the busiest retail season is officially upon us:Holiday shoppers are making more frequent but smaller purchasesThe biggest driver of holiday sales growth last year was an increase in the number of purchases customers are making.Last holiday season, customers made 2.7% more purchases vs. the year prior—although this was slightly offset by a 0.7% decrease in basket size. This means customers are spending more frequently than last year, but spending a bit less on each purchase.

Frequent small purchases were particularly important for online channels. Purchases increased 16.6% year-over-year for online-only retailers and 6.8% for traditional retailers’ online stores—what we call Brick&Mortar.coms—while basket size decreased by 2.6% and 1.7% for each channel, respectively. As we have all personally experienced, with shipping becoming faster and cheaper, there's less incentive to buy everything at once in order to save on shipping costs. ​Actionable tips:Retailers should continue to explore—and quickly execute—ways to make it easy for customers to continuously chip away at their holiday shopping lists. Promoting gift guides and convenience benefits, such as free shipping and ship-to-store options, will go a long way to drive customers to make that one more purchase with them. When customers know they can head to the store to pick up their online order, they will hopefully feel inspired to do some additional shopping!Want more Holiday insights? Check out more key spend trends here and stay tuned for our next blog post next week, when we’ll dig deeper into spend trend #3: Brick & Mortars dominate holiday spend, but online channels continue to steal share.

Halloween may come first, but the winter holidays are already gaining attention – and aisle space. With nearly 40% of holiday spend occurring in the four weeks before Black Friday, early bird shoppers are gearing up to tackle their holiday shopping lists—even picking up candy canes alongside their candy corn. By analyzing $2.8 trillion in actual purchase data across our banking partners, Cardlytics has identified key trends in holiday spend behavior for marketers to leverage during the busiest retail shopping season of the year.Here are four of the top holiday spend trends for 2019:1.  The time period between Halloween and Black Friday is key for capturing holiday shoppers

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]2.  Holiday spend is on the rise year-over-year, with customers making more frequent but smaller purchases

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]3.  In-store sales still dominate holiday spend, but online channels continue to steal share

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]4.  Holiday shoppers who spend both online and in-store at the same retailer spend more than those who shop just one channel

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]5. The three things yule need to know about Holiday spend seasonality

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]6. 'Tis the season for convenience

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]7. eCommerce and brand love spread good cheer

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]8. Focus on fa la la la loyals

Download the high-resolution image[/caption]Want more Holiday insights? We’ll be digging deeper into each of these trends and revealing more holiday insights in the coming weeks. Check back for more purchase insights and tips to capture spend all season long.