“AiDeal’s highly flexible hesitant buyer solution perfectly tackled retailers’ pain points in operation, turning brands from passive into proactive positions, deploying the room of profits timely, and avoiding the impact on overall profits from spamming coupons to all users. Moreover, with the retargeting advertising leading our strategy, Carrefour was able to gain customers and end up with better marketing budget allocation. With the support from the Appier team, we could design complementing digital strategies based on intelligence that fits our marketing needs in different campaigns, allowing Carrefour to come out tops in a competitive online retail environment. ”
Brand Story
Carrefour, established in France in 1959, is the largest retail group in Europe and the second largest in the world. In 1989, Carrefour opened its first hypermarket in Taiwan. In response to the shopping habits of Taiwanese customers, Carrefour has developed various business models, such as supermarkets and online shopping, which have been popular among Taiwanese consumers. In the last two years, Carrefour has accelerated its expansion in the Taiwan market by completing the acquisition of Wellcome and Jasons Market Place to reinforce its supermarket coverage and attract mid to high-end customers. Further, the group has supplemented its business with an online shopping platform to grow toward its omnichannel strategic goal.
Goals
Carrefour launched its online store 2015 in Taiwan and further set up a dedicated digital and e-commerce department to speed up its advancement in digital technology and strengthen its competitiveness. Regarding its marketing strategies, Carrefour first adopted Appier’s cross-screen solution to increase the platform’s brand awareness and the number of visitors and then enhanced transactions and optimized Cost Per Conversion (CPC) by combining Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques. However, with the rise of small and large e-commerce platforms and the saturated retail market, even a retailer like Carrefour, having operated in Taiwan for over 30 years, has to execute online marketing to precision, in order to solidify sales of newly acquired stores. Even during the current pandemic, Carrefour could pivot its business models into online shopping and delivery seamlessly, to grow its zero-touch economy.
Challenges
Marketing budgets would be blown out of proportion if using mass advertising as a tool, and even then, it could not achieve the desired performance.
Spamming newsletters/coupons to all users would be blocked by mail systems and ignored by users, which is not an effective method of engaging customers, and lowers the brand value.
Consumers are fatigued by the endless marketing campaigns from the retail industry and email newsletters would be fighting for the attention of the customer in a very competitive online retail environment.
