Navigating the eGrocery Landscape: Lessons from Walmart’s MAU Growth
The most interesting data point we’ve seen in recent months is the increase in MAUs for Delivery.
If you look a little bit deeper into these numbers, you can connect the increase to a discount perk (50% off) being offered by Walmart to members who commit to its loyalty program for an entire year. This, alongside other recent initiatives from the big retailer, suggests that Walmart is shifting focus slightly to further retain the customers they initially attracted with lower prices.
To this point, Walmart has done an excellent job of not only leveraging its inherent pricing advantage but also communicating value and convenience to customers as part of a broader retention strategy.
This should raise some alarm bells for grocers that need to include these two consumer drivers in their service offering.
Yes, that could mean fees based on delivery speed and highlighting savings at checkout. But to really make a difference, they have to focus on personalizing the overall customer experience.
Every month, in our analysis of eGrocery sales data, we emphasize the importance of providing customers with an engaging experience. There is nothing more engaging and relevant than communicating and providing targeted savings on products that a customer regularly buys timed to when they buy it.
That level of predictive personalization, of contextualized commerce, is the best means for grocers to compete with the value offerings of larger retailers and win back their market share.
Mark Fairhurst
Chief Growth Officer
Mercatus
