Retail marketing encompasses all of the ways a consumer business attracts customers and generates sales of its goods and services. Retail marketing strategies touch virtually everything in a company’s operations, including signage, store layout, sales and promotions, pricing strategies, advertising, checkout processes, and customer service.

A retail marketing mix is similar to the traditional marketing mix, also known as the “4 Ps” of marketing. These include product, pricing, place, and promotion. The retail marketing mix adds two more “Ps” to the mix: people and presentation. These elements represent the value of sales associates and other staff in retail settings, as well as the importance of aesthetics and design in retail locations.

The right marketing mix is a must-have differentiator in the highly competitive retail industry. Rich retail data on customer demographics provides significant opportunities to test and optimize all aspects of the “6 Ps.” These strategies include enhanced in-store marketing and merchandising, unification of online and offline data, effective pricing strategies, improved conversion rates, and better overall shopping experiences. All types of retailers, from small “mom-and-pop” businesses to national big-box merchants, can capitalize on retail data to optimize their retail marketing mix.