Macy’s Inc. has expanded its retail media network capabilities, working with technology provider Rokt to leverage artificial intelligence. The retailer says this move will make the shopping experience more personalized and relevant to every customer.
The corporate’s retail media business, called Macy’s Media Network, is an in-house platform that connects promoting partners with Macy’s customers. Rokt uses AI technology that it says is powered by greater than 4 billion transactions a yr. Through the partnership, Macy’s Media Network seeks to support Macy’s initiatives for its bank card enrollment and membership in its loyalty program, called Star Rewards.
Macy’s Media Network began in 2020, and it first began its Rokt integration in the autumn of 2023. Among the many integrations it uses is an ad served on the order confirmation page after a customer completes a transaction, Michael Krans, Macy’s Media Network vice chairman, told Digital Commerce 360.
In Macy’s Media Network’s current state, Krans said, “the overwhelming majority of our revenue stems from digital promoting, whether it’s on-site promoting or through off-site media activations.”
Macy’s also uses digital screens for promoting in 98 of its stores, which its media network uses.
Macy’s is No. 16 within the Top 1000 Database. The database is Digital Commerce 360’s rating of North America’s largest online retailers by their annual web sales. Within the Top 1000, Digital Commerce 360 categorizes Macy’s as an Apparel/Accessories retailer.
Digital Commerce 360 projects Macy’s total web sales in 2024 will reach $7.30 billion.
Macy’s web sales by yr
Importance of first-party data in a retail media network
The Macy’s retail media network’s unique selling proposition, Krans said, stems from its first-party data. Other retail media networks have highlighted similar benefits, particularly in light of Google’s recently curbed plans to deprecate third-party cookies for user tracking. Nonetheless, Krans said Macy’s Media Network’s strength stays in the standard of its first-party data, which no other data provider can sell.
From there, it comes all the way down to the retail media network’s ability to succeed in known customers in open web environments after which measure against those media campaigns. That helps Macy’s achieve closed-loop attribution and measurement, he said.
“That has a profit over using a third-party audience ’cause you possibly can deterministically reach the Macy’s or the Bloomingdale’s customer,” Krans told Digital Commerce 360.
“A really high majority” of Macy’s customers use traceable — or digital — tender at checkout, even in physical stores, he explained. Unlike when a customer uses money or a present card, a customer using a bank card or digital wallet helps the retailer close the loop with regards to marketing attribution.
“We have now a excellent match rate with regards to attributing the shop sale to someone who’s been exposed digitally to an ad,” he said, declining to specify the speed.
How Macy’s Media Network uses Rokt technology
Since starting the Rokt integration last fall, Macy’s Media Network slowly ramped up how many purchasers it exposes those ads to, Krans told Digital Commerce 360. He added that the media network has now fully scaled its Rokt integration on Macys.com.
The combination can also be a brand new way for non-endemic brands to advertise on Macys.com. In other words, Macy’s Media Network is offering a brand new way for brands that Macy’s doesn’t stock in its stores or on its ecommerce website to advertise with Macy’s customers.
“We’re continuously iterating on the creative spec, the copy — testing different copy formats, testing an ad with a logo, with no logo, the location, like when the client receives the ad,” Krans said. “Most of our customers receive it as an overlay, which is kind of a pop-up, so after you complete the transaction. Between whenever you press click to purchase and also you land on the order confirmation page, you receive an overlay ad. That ad appears to you kind of as an in between. In other cases, you land on the order confirmation page and the Rokt is an embed on the order confirmation page.”
Krans said Macy’s Media Network uses Rokt to assist make decisions, feeding off the billions of transactions it powers “to tell which non-endemic advertiser and which particular offer will resonate most with a given customer.”
What Rokt brings to Macy’s Media Network promoting
Rokt also “reads signals” from Macy’s Media Network’s first-party data, Krans added.
“A variety of what’s on the core of Rokt is the way you take care of what we call the paradox of selection, where whenever you’re confronted with more, your conversion is less,” Rokt chief marketing officer Doug Rozen told Digital Commerce 360.
Using AI, machine learning and generative AI to assist with decision-making, Rokt tries “to place the perfect offer in front of the perfect person at the perfect time with the intention to be sure that less is more,” Rozen said.
He added that sometimes, machine learning and AI predictions tell Rokt that an ad won’t be the perfect motion to take for a certain consumer. As an alternative, it is likely to be a third-party offer, or in Macy’s case, an internal initiative resembling its loyalty or bank card programs.
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