In today’s fast-paced retail media world, simply showing up isn’t enough. To make a meaningful impact, brands need purpose-led strategies built around clear objectives. That’s where objective-led planning comes in – prioritising strategic goals over defaulting to media channels.
What is objective-led planning?
Unlike traditional above-the-line (ATL) approaches focused purely on conversion, objective-led planning starts with defining an overarching strategic goal. From there, tactics, budget splits, and channels are selected to support goals such as educating consumers, recruiting new shoppers, building loyalty, or shifting brand perception.
As the shopper journey has become less linear, customers now engage with campaigns at any stage of the funnel. This shift makes it essential to align each phase with the right objective. Objective-led planning demonstrates that, with clearly defined goals, brands can drive impact throughout the journey by using data-driven insights to optimise both channel selection and creative strategy.
The benefits of objective-led planning
Objective-led planning offers significant advantages for brands. It enables hyper-targeted campaigns by identifying the most effective tactics to influence shoppers at the point of purchase, reducing budget wastage and preventing fragmented experiences. It also encourages brands to think more strategically by tailoring campaigns to the unique strengths of each retailer. In addition, it ensures alignment between objectives and channels, focusing not just on where audiences are, but how each channel influences decision-making.
Most importantly, customer data sits at the heart of objective-led planning.
Customer data plays a crucial role in informing objectives, offering insights into shopper behaviours and barriers. By understanding what current or potential customers look like through segmentation, brands can tailor creative and media strategies to best meet their needs.
Overcoming the challenges
Shifting to an objective-led approach takes a mindset change. Established brands often have separate shopper and brand teams, while challenger brands tend to be more agile. Encouraging a collaborative approach to planning and measurement is key. But to do this, brands and retailers must align on how success is measured. A more standardised approach to measurement would allow brands to measure campaigns with greater confidence, making it easier to embrace a wider range of objectives.
To succeed, brands should define clear goals from the outset and align internal teams around them. Effectively using retailers’ rich customer data and embracing a test-and-learn mindset to refine strategies will also help brands reach the right audiences and cut through the noise, while an omnichannel approach will ensure all channels work towards a shared campaign goal while serving distinct roles.
The future of objective planning
As retail media and objective-led planning continue to evolve, they will drive a mindset shift that breaks down silos and fosters stronger brand-retailer collaboration. Greater transparency and more consistent measurement will give brands the confidence to assess impact accurately and embrace a broader range of objectives. At the same time, advances in technology and AI will enhance campaign execution, making strategies more personalised, optimised, and firmly rooted in clear objectives.