G/O Digital Research Finds Holiday Planning Is Equal Parts Digital Connectivity And Local Store Sales

CHICAGO, Oct. 29, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- G/O Digital, the leader in local, integrated digital marketing solutions, announced today the results of its two-part holiday shopping research. The resulting directive – to both national brands/retailers and small businesses – is that 2014 holiday planning is equal parts about digital connectivity and equal parts about physical stores.

As the Holiday Shopping In An Omnichannel Retail World study reveals, personalized content, webrooming and local activation will be mission-critical for retailers and brands to generate omnichannel sales and win the battle against Amazon this holiday season. In fact, price and product comparisons drive webrooming behavior of 55 percent of respondents who buy gifts from national retailers and brands. This signals a major shift in the retail landscape, where webrooming – also known as "reverse showrooming" – now sits at a critical intersection of the digital and physical worlds and will bring shoppers into stores this holiday season.

Similarly, the Holiday Shopping With A Local Mobile Twist study highlights the dominant role paid search and mobile marketing will play in driving consideration, leads and sales for small businesses this holiday season. In fact, 84 percent of shoppers use an online channel first when considering buying holiday gifts in-store from local/small businesses.

"The consumer is different, but in many ways the same – as digitally savvy as she may be, she still prefers to shop in-store 90 percent of the time within three to five miles of her home," says Jeff Fagel, CMO of G/O Digital. "Physical retail is that necessary point of differentiation for businesses to win against pure play threats like Amazon. So for businesses – big and small – the challenge centers on activating local marketing across multiple touch points and stages of the buying journey. After all, consumers don't have a channel strategy; they have a shopping strategy."

Additional findings from national retailer/brand study include:

• Personalized content and mobile deals kick offline sales into high gear on Black Friday – and even Cyber Monday. 65 percent of shoppers believe mobile deals and promotions are powerful enough to influence them to buy holiday gifts in-store on Black Friday, Thanksgiving – and even Cyber Monday.
• Local activation raises the standards of online and mobile video ads. 43 percent of shoppers believe online and mobile video ads are useful in learning more about products and prices available in-store and 24 percent believe they make it easier and more efficient to buy items in-store.

Additional findings from the small business study:

• Search engine marketing jumpstarts consideration for small businesses. When searching for holiday gifts from local businesses, 79 percent of respondents will first visit one of the top three search engines – Google (73 percent), Bing (4 percent) and Yahoo! (2 percent).
• Mobile coupons reign supreme with holiday shoppers. 42 percent of shoppers place a high premium on using mobile coupons while shopping in-store.

The first study, Holiday Shopping in an Omnichannel Retail World, was fielded from August 15, 2014 through August 24, 2014 to 2,000 U.S. adults, aged 25-55 years old, who are interested in holiday shopping from national brands/retailers and own at least one computer/laptop and a smartphone or tablet.

The second study, Holiday Shopping With A Local Mobile Twist, was fielded from August 21, 2014 through August 28, 2014 and garnered a total of 1,023 responses from U.S. adults, aged 35-54-years-old, who expressed interest in buying holiday gifts from local/small businesses and own at least one desktop/laptop computer and a smartphone or tablet. The complete studies and findings can be downloaded from the G/O Digital website.

About G/O Digital
The G/O Digital vision: To Transform Local Marketing and #WinLocal.

For Local Businesses, G/O Digital, a Gannett company (NYSE: GCI), is a one-stop shop for local businesses looking to connect with consumers through digital marketing, from search to social and everything in between.  For National Brands and Agencies, G/O Digital delivers local digital activation at national scale with push-button simplicity powered by G/O Digital brands: Shoplocal, BLiNQ Media & Key Ring.

G/O Digital partners with more than 5,000 of the nation's top brands and retailers, including P&G, Target, Walmart and Walgreens and leads digital marketing programs with thousands of local businesses across more than 110 local markets. For more information, visit www.godigitalmarketing.com and @godigitalmktg.

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SOURCE G/O Digital

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