Member Spotlight (January-February 2024)
Ellen Donato
Brand Manager, E-Commerce
Heineken USA
Main job responsibilities: Creating and monitoring e-commerce marketing moments across B2B and B2C media outlets, best-in-class digital shelf maintenance, and managing product ratings and reviews.
How you win with shoppers: We develop content that engages consumers to anticipate and meet their needs with our products, targeting the right shopper at the right point in the path to purchase. We also continue to work with our media agency to ensure the platforms we use are generating strong ROAS and brand awareness.
New marketing tactic that you use: We leaned heavily into retail media through demand-side platforms and look forward this year to continuing this trend as it becomes more available within the three-tier system of adult beverage.
Best career advice you’ve received: We sell beer — let’s try new things, learn, and have fun.
Memorable aha moment in your career: Realizing it is never too late to make a change and follow a new path.
What you are reading or watching right now: “Lessons in Chemistry” and “The Crown.”
Recent travels and spring plans: I spent the winter holidays with my family in New Jersey. Next, I’m traveling to Kilkenny, Ireland, in May to see Bruce Springsteen.
McCord Chapman
Vice President, Commerce and Omni Planning
Public Label
Main job responsibilities: I lead the key shopper and commerce marketing accounts for Public Label, a Denver-based, multi-funnel creative agency. We specialize in shopper and experiential marketing, with exceptional brand stewardship at its core. I’ve been with the agency for a few years, and my primary account work is Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream. This includes client management for shopper, sales and brand clients. We handle annual planning, integration, alignment and execution of more than 25 retailer accounts, directly managing some key retailers and working with our field team experts on others. A focus for me has been evolving our measurement solutions capability to ensure quick results and simple summaries leading to actionable implications.
I will always consider my most important role to be that of a leader and mentor. The team I have is fantastic and I strive to keep them engaged, happy, learning and building skillsets to serve them for the rest of their careers. I love working with people across the organization, but helping people grow is the most rewarding.
How you win with shoppers: Interrogating performance analytics and innovating our solution sets. Understanding the true fundamental drivers for not only good results, but also for suboptimal results has been the secret sauce to optimize wild success in these uncertain times. Our team developed a massive dashboard for all our activations to be reviewed together and we refine weekly to ensure we review current results and optimize frequently. By bringing these together we can get to a more realistic ROAS estimation, plan and allocate dollars more actively. Given the influx of data in the last few years, the expectations for proof of performance ahead of time — and an ability to confidently forecast sales impact — has grown significantly. If we are going to recommend where your first dollar goes, we need receipts to back it up.
New marketing tactic that you use: Geo-targeted, routine-based digital ads focused on driving in-store traffic and conversion. It’s not entirely new, but we have made a more substantial investment in multiple accounts and have seen strong results. Driving in-store visits, and tracking when not purchased online, is very hit-or-miss with other approaches. These programs are built around shopper routines to ensure wasted impressions are limited by serving the ads not only to relevant shoppers, but doing it right before they typically go to the store and when in-store to remind them. There’s a very purposeful frequency based on shopper behavior. As to be expected the results have been even more impressive when the ads feature and click directly to an offer/promo.
Retail media networks are getting better at showing the in-store impact of their programs, but the geo/routine targeting is a nice complement to the other more traditional purchase and demographic-based targeting. It can reach relevant shoppers much more efficiently than the cost of traditional in-store vehicles.
Best career advice you’ve received: "All projects are good projects; you just never know where they lead." – This is how my previous manager and current friend Matt Rader and I always approach the work. But it’s not just a matter of never being too good for an affectionately referred to "cheap and cheerful" project. These are the types of things that quickly become a decent sum, but more importantly what really builds the relationship and trust between agencies, clients and the retailers. It’s the opportunity to engage more frequently. I love to build relationships and trust between agencies, clients and retailers.
Also, it’s more fun to be nice, especially in a service business. We all have difficult clients but if they have any hesitation calling us because we’re perceived as difficult, then we aren’t doing our job.
What you're watching on TV right now: "Welcome to Wrexham" is such a fascinating story both emotionally and from a business/marketing perspective. Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenny are the reason the show exists, and the football team is getting an influx of support, but everyone does a fantastic job not letting them take over the story. It really focuses on the passionate fans and players and why this town and team mean so much to them.
Recent travel plans: I went to Mexico in February last year and that was great timing. So it’s very possible I’ll decide to go somewhere warm at the last minute.