It’s no surprise to retailers that online holiday sales are expected to continue to rise in 2016, with some estimating that ecommerce holiday sales will make up almost 25% of total retail ecommerce sales for 2016. However, savvy retailers know this increase in online traffic will also spell increased foot traffic, especially during the holidays. For brick-and-mortar retailers, online advertising can be an exciting avenue to pursue new customers and to encourage repeat visits. Programmatic advertising from Goodway Group can help connect the dots between a consumer’s cyber footprint and your store’s foot traffic with three easy tactics: 1. Match offline data stored in a CRM system, loyalty program, or email-marketing platform to target customers online. By establishing the right data connections and algorithms, we can match consumer data to cookie IDs across devices to target users with digital ads based on their past purchases, browsing history, and more. Don’t worry; our technology preserves the integrity of all Personally Identifiable Information (PII) by using an algorithmic hash process that protects users’ anonymity. 2. Provide relevant, localized information to drive shoppers in-store and improve the customer experience. Consumers are online more than ever before, but ecommerce still only represents 8.1% of total U.S. retail sales as of June 2016. Retailers can retarget digital users who searched relevant terms previously, allowing the retailer to share product in-store availability to consumers looking for a similar product through seamless native content integrations. Then using beacons, complementary mobile coupons can be served in-app when that shopper is nearby to increase the likelihood that he or she will walk into the store and make the buy, or assist those in the store contemplating what purchase to make. A recent Google study showed 82 percent of shoppers consult their phones in-store about a purchase they’re about to make. 3. Leverage multiple ad tactics and optimize continuously to achieve better results with greater efficiency. Your store may be a one stop shop, but your digital ad programs shouldn’t be. Give special consideration to how you target consumers across all of their devices—desktops, mobile phones, and tablets—and be sure to leverage a variety of targeting tactics, such as behavioral targeting, predictive modeling, contextual targeting, and retargeting. Also, consider day-parting your campaigns to place ads during the optimal times of day that will encourage foot traffic, like lunchtime and rush hour, to deliver quick and efficient results. And don’t forget that the lines between shopping via ecommerce and in-store are blurring. Many people are literally doing both simultaneously by engaging in webrooming (researching items online then purchasing them in-store) and showrooming (browsing items in a store and purchasing them online later) behaviors throughout their shopping process. According to eMarketer, 85% of Internet users plan to webroom during the holiday season in 2016. Top products that users webroom include appliances, electronics, men’s apparel, toys and games, and kitchen items. Engaging them on both their desktop and mobile devices is critical to making your holiday revenue dreams come true! To learn how to keep your business competitive with programmatic media during the holidays and beyond, contact us today.