Understanding Brand Competition Using Micro and Macro Scanner Data

Abstract

Recent advances in data gathering through checkout scanners have produced vast amounts of data on the actual behavior of consumers in the marketplace, creating new opportunities for managers and researchers to understand competition and consumers’ response to the marketing mix. Previous analyses of this data in the literature have focused either at the household (micro) or store (macro) level. The authors propose a method of enriching the analysis of competitive behavior by combining the in-depth consumer information obtained from a micro-level household scanner panel with the comprehensive market data supplied by a macro-level retail-tracking panel. The approach offers the manager detailed information about consumers (e.g., identification of consumer segments in terms of brand preferences and socioeconomic characteristics) along with strategic diagnostics of the product-market (e.g., the sensitivity of the market to price promotions, impact of a brand's strategy on competitors, vulnerability of the brand to competitive actions).