According to our recent survey of 1,000 U.S shoppers, asking their opinion(s) on private label brands, 43% of respondents say private label quality has significantly improved, offering comparable or even better quality than national brands in many categories. 

Some of the biggest names in retail like Target, Sephora, and Walmart all invest in the development and marketing of their private label products — and see massive success. 

The retailers that push the limits of their private label branding will be the ones that continue to elevate their status and change the generic stereotype. To do that, you’ll need to focus on branding, value, quality, and insights. Discover what your retail business stands to gain from offering store brands and how to develop a winning strategy.

Chapters:

1. What are private label brands?
2. The private label branding opportunity
3. How to create a thriving private label brand in 6 steps
4. Private label brand strategy examples
5. Improve your private label branding with customer insights

What are private label brands?

Private label brands, also known as store brands, are products owned by retailers and sold along with other brands in their product catalog. The retailer is often the sole developer of the brand and its products, or it may come from a third-party wholesale partner.

Some of the most successful private label brands include 365 by Whole Foods Market, Amazon Basics, and a ton of Target brands. 

The private label branding opportunity

The newfound interest in private label brands directly correlates with a struggling economy, an influx of higher-quality store-owned products and options, and an increase in private label-based rewards programs.

Consider these stats from our private label research:

• 40% of respondents say their perception of private labels is positive, they offer good value and they trust the store branding — another 42% haven’t noticed any significant differences in quality between private labels and national brands
• 36% of respondents plan to purchase more private label products next year compared to previous years
• Over half of respondents (56%) have switched their preferred brand for a private label product based on a loyalty program or reward

That’s to say, when it comes to the private label branding opportunity, it’s no longer a “nice to have.” The overall increase in positive sentiment, value, and quality, have made them difference makers for any retailers bottom line.

In terms of specific industries, the most popular categories for private label products are:

Besides a thriving private label branding market, there’s other business benefits for retailers who offer store brands. Some top advantages include:

• Product ownership: In addition to literally owning private label products, retailers also have control over the product design, materials or ingredients, and other manufacturing details
• Higher profit margins: Because retailers own their private label brands, they don’t have extra supply chain fees or higher cost of products from a national brand. This makes their product costs lower, allowing a bigger profit margin — not to mention the added benefit of keeping customers happy with lower prices
• Branding: Just as it owns the product design, the retailer also has creative control over the private label branding, from the aesthetics to the voice and promotion

Leading retailers are leaning into the private label apparel category specifically and partnering with luxury designers, like Walmart’s collaboration with Brandon Maxwell.

How to create a thriving private label brand in 6 steps

Now that you know the potential of private labels, find out how you can breathe new life into your owned brands, or successfully launch new ones, with the following tactics.

1. Build a strong retail brand identity

To have a thriving private label brand, first, you need to have a strong overall retail brand. 

When you earn brand loyalty and the positive public perception that comes with it, consumers will naturally trust and gravitate to your owned brands. 67% of the respondents to our private label research strongly or somewhat agree that the quality and range of a retailer’s private label products positively affect their overall perception of the retailer’s brand and reputation.

So, how do you build brand trust and loyalty to attract customers to your private label products? Some essential methods include:

• Appealing to your target audience’s values and interests
• Providing great customer service
• Offering deals and discounts

But, of course, these community-building efforts will only work if your products are unique, valuable, and serve customers’ needs. Our own research validates this approach, given that the top two reasons shoppers gave for selecting private label products are that they love them and they are well-priced. 

With the right practices in place, your customers will come for your retail experience and stay for your private label brands, creating a sustainable cycle that propels your business forward.

2. Devise a smart product strategy 

Once you have a solid foundation for your retail brand, you can begin to develop your own private label products. Your products need to meet the essential criteria to hook shoppers from the beginning and keep them coming back for more. To make your store brand the preferred alternative to the national name brands, make sure its value proposition is unique.

a) Develop your concept(s)

The formula for creating your store brand concepts is simple. Find the gaps in your inventory selection — what missing products could fulfill a customer need, price point, or variety? That white space will determine what and how many private label products to develop. This will guide your entire product strategy. The process could look something like the following steps:

1. Start by sorting your target customers into different segments and define the needs of each one
2. Research the price points and product features that make sense for each industry category
3. Research your competitors’ products in each category
4. With those insights, analyze your current product catalog to find what’s missing
5. Determine what alternative products your retail business can produce at a lower cost but that are equal to or better quality than the name-brand options

If your business is new to private label branding, you might want to start small with one to a few options within your bigger product categories to test the performance. Once you’ve decided which products to pursue, define the guidelines for your supplier and company stakeholders to follow.

This will ensure that your costs are accurate to fit your price point and profit margin — and that the materials used, functionality, and quality all meet expectations. 

b) Pricing and variety

Since value is the top consumer driver of store brand sales — lower price compared to national brands is the main purchasing influence for 72% of shoppers, according to our private label research — the key is to offer a price that is lower than your competition, while maintaining your target profit margin.

Identify the leading competitors in your store-brand product categories to base your pricing and quality criteria. 

In addition to pricing, variety is a key component of your product strategy. What flavors, pack sizes, format sizes, and other differentiators can you offer in each category? Use an internal system to keep track of your pricing and variety architecture so you can gradually fill in gaps with your store brand offerings.

c) Packaging

Early private label branding strived to mimic the presentation of its national brand rivals. But now, the industry leaders are aiming to stand out rather than blend in. Packaging plays a huge role in purchase decisions, so this is an important area to focus on. The design should ideally be distinct and include the unique and attractive features of the product, whether that’s easy functionality, sustainable ingredients, or something else. 

For example, the packaging for retailer ShopRite’s store brand, Bowl & Basket, stands on its own with a prominent font, clean design, striking product photography, and a pleasant and soft color palette. It has a simple and clear product description that draws the consumer in. 

d) Innovation

The best way to generate interest in your private label brands and be a progressive outlier in the space is to consistently innovate. To pull this off, you need to leverage your store brand as the solution to your customer’s wants and needs.

If you look at leading private label brand retailers, many of their owned products are “value-added lifestyle items.” This is a niche to focus on that will lead to innovation, like Trader Joe’s iconic Everything But the Bagel seasoning.

Sourcing is another point of leverage for innovation. For example, locally sourced ingredients that benefit underserved communities can help your products stand out and satisfy consumer preferences.

3. Collect authentic reviews of private label products 

Product reviews are one of the most effective ways to win consumers’ trust. According to the 2022 Bazaarvoice Summit, 94% of shoppers report needing at least 10 reviews to “consider the product credible.

The recency of reviews is also a top decision-making factor for most (85%) of shoppers. So, you need to actively source reviews to grow your volume and keep them up to date. Luckily, there’s a variety of different ways you can generate authentic reviews. Just ask your customers!

• Request a review with a review request email
• Send an SMS message after a customer’s order is delivered
• Direct customers to leave reviews via your social media channels
• Offer customers a discount on a future purchase in exchange for a review
• Utilize a sampling campaign and exchange free product samples in exchange for honest reviews 

Ratings and reviews don’t just have a huge impact on e-commerce but on in-store sales, too, based on the 40% of shoppers who claim to read online reviews before buying offline. Helpful, descriptive, and substantial reviews are essential, but those featuring media can go even further. Customers’ photos and videos of product purchases make 62% of shoppers more likely to buy.

Reviews also have great search engine optimization (SEO) value because they contain a lot of the same descriptive keywords that shoppers are searching for. So, not only will reviews increase conversions when shoppers land on your e-commerce site, but they can also be the vehicle that gets them there. 

Reviews communicate the value that customers find in your products and the features that are important to them. They give your customers a platform to express their own opinions about your brand, which resonates with other shoppers.

4. Grow awareness and interest with targeted product sampling

Whether you’re launching a new private label brand or product or rebranding an old one, product sampling can help it take flight. We’re not just talking about a taste of kombucha in a paper cup or a cheese cube on a toothpick, but a custom product sampling package delivered to your target audience.

Renowned brand Petco recently rolled out a sampling campaign specifically to bolster review volume for its private label brands and increase SEO impact.

To date, the campaign has led to a 48% increase in revenue per visit (driven by a 28% increase in conversion rate and 15% increase in average order value) for sampled products and an 80% increase in clicks from organic search. Not to mention, that data that sampling provides.

We’ve really seen a positive impact on visits, conversions, and improving the discoverability of new products. From a results standpoint, it’s been a positive experience to see that we can get 10-15 reviews for new products quickly

Hannah Kredich, Category Specialist at Petco

First-party customer data also provides tons of useful information you can use to plan a product sampling campaign. Let’s say you notice customers buying a lot of the same national-brand products in one category, you could send them a sample of your store-brand alternative or a complementary product from your store brand. 

And if you’re starting from scratch with a brand-new product launch, sampling is a great upfront investment. In a survey of over 6,000 Influenster members who have been recipients of a product sampling campaign, 63% purchased the product they sampled. Many also reported buying additional products from the brand and recommending the product to family and friends.

Lastly, another huge benefit of product sampling is the user-generated content (UGC) it can produce in the form of product reviews, images, and videos. This is especially important for new product releases so you can be equipped with the customer reviews necessary to give other shoppers confidence right from the launch. 

5. Optimize your product pages for conversions

One common concern for retailers is the lack of rich content, including product reviews, across all of their product pages on their e-commerce websites. This can be particularly challenging for retailers with an extensive product catalog. This is why it’s crucial to encourage customers to write reviews so you can enhance your product pages with UGC. 

You can set up those reviews to post directly on the product pages they correspond to, which will make a huge difference in sales — nearly 40% of shoppers won’t make a purchase if UGC is absent from the product page. And that includes visual UGC too. As part of our recent Shopper Experience Index, we asked 7,000 shoppers:

Additionally, almost half of shoppers specifically look for customer photos on product pages when considering purchases. Encourage customers to upload their own photos and videos of their purchases to your product pages with a hashtag campaign.

To optimize your private label product pages to their full extent, include: 

• Star ratings 
• Review categories based on product features, positive reviews, and negative reviews
• Detailed product descriptions that highlight your product’s best attributes
• Professional product photos
• Customer-submitted product photos and videos 

6. Attract more customers on social media

Whether it’s Gen Z on TikTok, millennials on Instagram, or older demographics on Facebook, social media is a critical marketing tool for your private label growth. 

Social media content supports a more modern, cutting-edge, approachable, and innovative perception of your store-brand products. Consumers come to social media to discover brands and be entertained, and there’s a ton of features and content types you can leverage to appeal to them. That includes short-form video like TikTok and Instagram Reels, quick and temporary content like Instagram Stories and Snapchat, and even livestream shopping on a number of different channels. 

Influencers have proven extremely successful for brand marketing, and social media is the perfect platform for an influencer partnership. Collaborating with influencers to promote your store brand is another way to drive demand through a public figure whom consumers trust. 

You can also use social media as a tool to generate more visual UGC that you can feed to your product pages. Encourage your followers to share their purchases on social media and tag your brand profile. This will supply you with more content and introduce your products to a wider audience.

Not only can you market your private label products on social media, but you can also sell them, too. With social commerce features such as Like2Buy and social media shops, you can upload your products and sell them directly on your social media channels. 

Private label brand strategy examples

As private label brands have evolved over the years, there’s plenty of retailer examples to draw inspiration from. Take notes from some of these trailblazers who are shaking up the store-brand category. 

Target’s Future Collective

Target might just be the pinnacle of store-brand potential, neck and neck with Amazon. Target has multiple private label brands, but as the retailer says, their Future Collective brand is the “first of its kind.” This fashion-forward apparel brand is “co-designed with a rotating roster of style and cultural influencers with diverse points of view in fashion.”

This innovative approach enables Target to leverage different guest designers and influencers to bring in different perspectives on fashion, while offering a continuous stream of fresh variety for customers. The brand is dedicated to inclusivity, offering something for everyone.

Thrive Market

Thrive Market is a successful e-commerce retailer that specializes in health-conscious products, including name brands and its own store brand. 

Not only is Thrive an excellent private label brands example, but also a great example of how to develop products that meet the needs of target customers. For example, one of its best-selling private label products is its coconut milk. What makes its particular coconut milk unique is that it leaves out a commonly used ingredient, guar gum, which isn’t Paleo diet friendly.

This solved a problem for its Paleo customers, who make up a big chunk of its clientele. 

Foxtrot

Foxtrot, a fast-growing specialty convenience store chain, is another example of a retailer going above and beyond with its owned products. Foxtrot’s goal for its store brands is to beat the well-known national brands in all categories, not just price. 

Just as Target partners with influencers for Future Collective, Foxtrot partners with industry leaders for its food and beverage products. As an example of this, the company has a hot chocolate mix developed by an acclaimed pastry chef and a bourbon made in collaboration with a beloved local Chicago cocktail bar. According to the Washington Post, Foxtrot’s profit margins for its private label products are 10 – 15% higher than those of its external brands.

Improve your private label branding with customer insights

One of the most important steps you can take as a retailer to grow your private label brands and business as a whole is to listen to your customers. Pay attention to the insights revealed in your product reviews, customer satisfaction surveys, customer support conversations, social media interactions, and anywhere else you can find them. 

What do your customers like and not like about your products? What are they saying they need that you don’t currently offer? This invaluable information can help you make store-brand product modifications and improvements that will provide more value for your customers. 

Once you’ve established your private label branding, it’s time to take it to the next level. Learn how to position your private label for continued market success with our new on-demand masterclass: How to leverage new customer insights for private label success.

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4 strategies to achieve private label success

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Why are retailers investing in store brands? It’s a direct result of the cosmic shocks the whole industry is dealing with. The retail industry has been hit with two big disruptions through the pandemic. First of all, lockdowns and widespread infection have lead to supply chain issues, which are still a major issue for most retailers. As recently as the 2021 holiday shopping season, consumers saw a staggering 6 billion out-of-stock messages.

On top of that, inflation is on the rise. In the US, it’s sitting at 7.5%, the highest in 40 years. People are feeling that in their wallets already.

There’s a brighter side to this — or an opportunity, at least. Shoppers are shifting to buy store brands and products, due to a combination of their lower prices and greater availability. 

• 90% of consumers are currently purchasing store-brand products
• 50% say they’re increasing their purchase of them in recent months

What’s great is that this will help retailers grow, in difficult economic times. The greater profit margins benefit the retailer, while lower prices and more reliable availability keep the customer happy. That drives both acquisitions, as customers seek out retailers with good offers, and loyalty, as they grow used to buying them. 

You can capitalize on this gold rush by focusing on three areas:

• Building brand trust
• Growing brand awareness
• Prioritizing product innovation

Let’s dive deeper into each of these. 

Brand trust

Perhaps not surprisingly, back in 2019, Gartner found that 81% of consumers refuse to buy from brands they don’t trust. So, the big question is how do we build trust? You know the answer: Ratings & Reviews. 

But to benefit from that as a store brand, you need the same volume, quality, and recency of reviews as national brands. How many reviews should launch with? Look at your national brand competitors, and make sure you align with them.

94% of shoppers say they need at least 10 reviews to consider the product credible. 75% of shoppers look for reviews with three or more sentences. And, yes, 85% of shoppers do look at how recent reviews are as part of their decision-making process. 

There’s a drop-off in customers’ perception of relevancy when reviews get over three months old. That might be the reason that your sales are dropping. for example. Keep those reviews current.

So, if you’re serious about your store brands, you need to be serious about developing your review and rating content.

The good news is that this effort won’t just fuel online sales. 40% of consumers that buy offline — in retail stores — read online reviews first. And reviews with images are even better. Shoppers want to see real photos and real feedback from people like them:

• 62% are more likely to buy after viewing product images of videos from customers 
• 150% increase in conversions when there are user products on a page

The more UGC you have, the better. 

Grow brand awareness

Are you meeting your consumer where they are online? For example, think about search. We all use it, so you want to rank well. 43% of global e-commerce traffic comes from organic search.

Believe it or not, reviews help you rank higher on Google because they’re loaded with rich keywords. You start getting SEO benefits once you have eight reviews or more. 

And, of course, social media is no longer an option, it’s a necessity:

• 70% of consumers discover products on social
• 50% are influenced by social in their choice of products
• 1 in 3 have bought on social in 2020 and 2021

Prioritize product innovation

Data rules everything, it’s how we measure the impact of what we do on our businesses, However, if data is king, the customer feedback you get in reviews is its queen. 78% of business people say that customer feedback is the most important data to drive innovation. 

We see that again and again, with our customers using the themes in negative reviews to generate very specific feedback to the product teams, allowing rapid iterative improvement of our products:

• 4% of reviews point out manufacturing flaws.
• 2% suggest useful product improvements

Our tools make it easy to surface this information and get it to the teams who can act on it, making your store brands better, and faster. For example, one of our customers, Oliso, used feedback to improve its iron with a longer cord, extended shut-off period, and greater power. They went from selling a couple a week to dozens a day at one retailer. 

And that’s the sort of speed you need to capitalize on the own-label gold rush.

Key takeaways

• Optimize product pages with customer content to build trust and increase conversion
• Show up strong on channels like social media and Google search to grow brand awareness
• Use customer feedback and sentiment to improve products

The retail industry is as strong as ever. And consumers hold the power like never before. They decide how a brand is perceived, and the risk of boycott in today’s cancel culture is very real. The dramatic power shift to customers has led to heightened actions and vocalizing for authenticity, improved experiences, and above all, for consumers to feel heard. Catch up on Bazaarvoice Summit to see how to win hearts and minds of today’s consumers.

For retailers looking to establish customer loyalty with these discriminating shoppers, rolling out a private label brand may be an ideal solution.

Private label brands are manufactured by a third party and sold under the retailer’s name. In many instances, the products are made with the same materials and/or ingredients as their name-brand counterparts. Case in point: Costco sells private label coffee that’s actually made by  — wait for it — Starbucks.

For retailers, these products are traditionally cheaper to manufacture, which translates to lower prices for customers. But price is just the beginning. They also offer retailers a unique opportunity to deliver a better, more engaging customer experience.

The rise of the private label

Private label products are nothing new. Walmart launched its first store brand, Ol’ Roy dog food, way back in 1983.

But when the Great Recession hit in 2007, private labels saw a new surge in popularity. With the economy on shaky ground and food prices rising 5-6%, consumers needed lower-priced alternatives to their favorite brands. 

Even after markets stabilized, the trend continued. By the end of 2017, private label brands were posting dollar growth of more than 3x the rate of branded products.

Today, with the COVID-19 pandemic heralding a new economic crisis, private labels are back in the spotlight. Purchasing store brands was one of Consumer Reports’ top tips for customers looking to save money on their 2020 holiday celebrations, right up there with clipping coupons and buying in bulk. According to the popular site, private label foods and beverages are 20-25% cheaper than name brand equivalents of the same product. 

While price is a big factor for consumers, it’s not the only one. In our own recent survey, almost 55% of respondents said they’d purchased a private label brand in the past year. Respondents were allowed to pick from multiple reasons for buying the store brands. 51% said their decision was based on price, 56% said they did it because they simply liked the product. 

Benefits to retailers

Beyond staying competitive on price, private label brands have additional benefits for retailers. Because you can control every aspect of the products’ positioning and marketing, as well as the buying experience, you can drive customer loyalty in new ways. 

Some retailers use this opportunity to create stories. For example, Whole Foods’ store brand, 365 Everyday Value, is positioned as a solution for shoppers who don’t want to pay high prices for organic products.

Target’s Everspring household brand caters to shoppers looking for “clean products.” The store also offers lingerie and sleepwear brands that are promoted as being inclusive of all body types. 

Savvy retailers are invested in creating an entire brand around their private labels. And it’s paying off handsomely.

Increased competition equals more innovation

A generation ago, there was a distinct gap between the quality of private label and brand name products.

Today, that’s simply not the case. In a Nielsen study, about 75% of shoppers said store brands were a “good alternative to name brands.” Even more exciting for retailers, almost 40% said that private labels deliver “higher quality than name brands.” 

Only a mere 17% of respondents said store brands were, “for people on tight budgets and (who) can’t afford the best.” 

As consumers embrace the value of private label products, it will drive brands and retailers to find opportunities to lower prices without sacrificing quality. We predict this will drive innovation across the retail industry, leading to better products and lower prices in every vertical. 

Embracing the private label movement

It’s become increasingly clear that private labels are the real deal. Even as the current economic crisis subsides, there will always be a segment of consumers looking for high-quality products at low prices.

To succeed in this space, retailers need to devote the same strategy and resources as name brands do in the product development process. 

Invest in the research to understand what shoppers need (or don’t realize they need). Then create a roadmap for delivering a solution in-house. Offering unique products and solutions customers can only find in your store is one way to guarantee they keep coming back for more.

4 strategies to achieve private label success

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In the past, private label brands were considered commodities purchased solely on price. But that’s changed. Who among us hasn’t sought out Trader Joe’s Cauliflower Gnocchi or Target’s All in Motion clothing?

Price definitely still matters. But private label brands now focus on value, purpose, and quality, and are aligning their strategies with national brands. Over the past year, especially, the state of private label has evolved just as quickly as the retail environment as a whole. Now greater opportunities exist for private label brands and products.

Chapters:

1. The rise of private label brands
2. Private label brand strategies
3. Private label brand strategy in action

The rise of private label brands

Retailer experience and the private labels they offer are interconnected. Establishing high-performing private labels boosts loyalty and drives more traffic to retailers both in-store and online. According to eMarketer, shoppers choose retailers based on the store brands they offer, and 66% said they generally assume their favorite retailers will have quality private labels. 

Private label brands also became popular with new consumers during the pandemic when their usual brands weren’t available due to supply chain issues. According to a McKinsey survey, 40% of consumers tried new products or brands during the COVID-19 crisis, and of those, 40% plan to continue purchasing these new brands. This shopping behavior could further grow the private label sector. 

Our own data revealed similar trends. In a survey of Influenster members in July, over 90% said they currently purchase store brands. Another third prefer buying store brands over national brands.

Private label brand strategies

With the state of private label today, and new trends reshaping shopping behaviors, private label brands have the opportunity to win over consumers. Retailers need to position them as true brands of their own. How? By becoming market leaders, investing in marketing and research, and capturing shoppers’ attention in a digital-first retailing environment.

Here’s four strategies for private label success.

1. Lean into permanent change by aligning to the new path of purchase 

E-commerce should no longer be an afterthought — it should be a forethought. Private label brands need to maximize their presence beyond brick-and-mortar. Product search and discovery overwhelmingly begins online, so success depends on revisioning your funnel for a digital-first retailing world. 

The pandemic and stay-at-home orders accelerated online shopping. This momentum is bolstering online sales of private brands, which has been on a steady growth trajectory. In 2019, online sales of private brands reached $1.7 billion, an 87% year-over-year increase, according to CPG Matters. The upward trend is expected to continue well beyond the pandemic.

Even for in-store purchases, the 2019 Bazaarvoice Shopper Experience Index found that 82% of shoppers research products online before heading to the store, and 50% browse online while shopping in-store. 

So, it’s time to rethink traditional in-store marketing strategies. Product sampling is one way to raise awareness about products and inspire purchases online and in-store. According to Bazaarvoice research, 60% of shoppers have purchased a product they sampled, and sampled products often become favorites. Shoppers also recommend products they sample to friends and family.

Then use user-generated content (UGC) to optimize product searches for private labels and discoverability online. 

2. Strategize like a national brand 

To capture the full potential of private label brands, retailers need to position them as true consumer brands. You can do so by leveraging varying marketing strategies designed to drive trial, awareness, and brand loyalty. Think of social media as your virtual endcap that has the capability to stop shoppers in their tracks and inspire new purchase behavior. While this includes running paid social media ads, one of the most authentic and trusted ways to drive awareness is to encourage shoppers to share details about your products on social media. 

From packaging and design to advertising and social media strategies, private label products should resonate and feel authentic to consumers. Invest in strategies like search, SEO optimization, sampling, and UGC optimization. Taking a 360-degree approach that balances physical and digital marketing that includes emerging third-party intermediaries will ensure your brands actively engage with consumers across the shifting shopping journey. 

Shoppers are discovering, browsing, and shopping on social media, with more than a third using buy buttons and clicking on shoppable stories and posts. Social media chatter about brands also translates to conversions, especially as consumers are paying just as much attention to your company values as the products you offer. 

Retailers and brands are being judged based on environmental, social, and governance metrics more than ever. 55% of UK consumers make purchasing decisions based on a company’s transparency, ethical values, or authenticity, according to Accenture. Leading retailers have been using cost-effective channels to communicate the story behind their store brands, such as how ingredients are sources or where products are made. 

3. Deliver value, not just price

Retailers must heighten their focus on quality, value, and driving engagement to see a competitive edge for private label products. Our data shows that value is shoppers’ number one purchase consideration, followed by cost. With more people at home and shopping online, shoppers are splurging on new products more so than in the past. 

So, how do you show your value to consumers? Make sure you have a clear set of brand values, and communicate what your brand stands for, how you give back to the community, and what your company can offer that others can’t. 

As shopping behaviors continue to evolve, customer sentiment of private label brands will increase the competitiveness between retailers, and influence consumers’ decisions about where to shop. Retailers need to make their private label brands more than just a product on the shelf, but a valuable brand in their own right.

The key to success is meeting customers where they are. Align your strategy with the new purchase journey, and capitalize on digital marketing that will drive discoverability, consideration, trial, and brand loyalty.

4. Prioritize innovation in product development

Elevating your private label programs is more critical than ever. But, when it comes to developing new products, look beyond your competition and become a leader in innovation. Build and execute new private brand brand product strategies based on what your customer wants and needs, identified through in-depth research. 

Most retailers know that the first step to becoming a product category leader is to beat other brands to market with innovative products. According to a Daymon report, best-in-class retailers devote 43% of their private label programs to value-added lifestyle items, when the industry average is just 16%. Going this route enables private label brands to stay on trend and progress beyond industry norms.   

Private label brand strategy in action

Looking at one of our own Bazaarvoice customers here, Oliso, because of their ability to prioritize product innovation. Oliso is a San Fran-based home appliances manufacturer, that was massively struggling to reach sales targets for its new products — smart irons.

To combat this, the company founder took the iron to quilting events. Attendees not only loved the product, but gave feedback on how they could be improved with longer power cords and higher wattage.

The brand introduced a new model incorporating this feedback, and customers immediately fell in love. As a result, more stores started carrying them, and retail sales went from a few each week to dozens a day. That’s the sort of product development strategy you need for private label brand success.

We’re up $40,000 at that store in just weeks, which is a lot of money for a small company. Retailers are taking notice, as more and more are carrying our products.

Kyle Koenig, Director of Business Development, Oliso

To win your private label brand strategy, you’ll need a defined plan for innovation. It should involve taking risks and committing to a culture of innovation. Learn how to fully implement these strategies, with brand examples, in our full e-book below. Or connect with us below to see how Bazaarvoice can help you get started.

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4 strategies to achieve private label success

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With the close of that chapter comes a slew of insights. Brands, retailers, and shoppers faced a year unlike any. Quick pivots both professionally and personally lead the way for new strategies, partnerships, and needs.

The brands and retailers that stepped up and found new ways to meet their customers’ needs excelled. And shoppers were vocal about what worked and didn’t.

With all these changes, we wanted to better understand what behaviors shoppers have internalized and committed to habit, and how these adjustments will change retail going forward. We surveyed over 6,000 shoppers in the United States, Mexico, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Spain, and Australia to find out. And let’s just say… banana bread is so 2020.

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