The Retail Media Auditor

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  • What is the Difference between Attributed Returns and Incremental Returns?

    Attributed returns are a measure of cost efficiency while incremental returns indicate the actual effectiveness of the campaign.

    Attributed Return on Ad Spends (aROAS)

    What is it?  Attributed ROAS is a media metric that measures the efficiency or cost effectiveness of a digital advertising campaign.

    What does it indicate? This metrics indicates how efficient individual media tactics are at gaining sales and reaching the right audiences. However, this metric is not designed to indicate or drive sales growth.

    Why it’s important? Brands closely monitor optimization and tactical performance to ensure positive trends that will inform efficiencies for future investment decisions dependent on the campaign objective.

    Formula: Attributed Sales Return on Ad Spend = (Media Revenue/ Total Ad Spend)

    Incremental Return on Ad Spend (iROAS)

    What is it?  Incremental ROAS is a marketing metric that measures the incremental sales lift between audiences that were exposed and not exposed to a digital advertising campaign.

    What does it indicate? The impact and necessity of the total media investment in driving sales to the exposed audience vs the non-exposed audience.

    Why it’s important?  This tells you the true value of a media investment and helps brands understand if they contributed to total sales growth goals.

    Formula: Incremental Sales Return on Ad Spend = (Test Group- Control Group) / Total Ad spend

  • Is Funding Search AND Display Media a Must?

    Funding both search and display media on reatiler.com is critical to delivering the full conversion strategy.

    If a marketer only invests in display or social media, the brand creates awareness but risks losing conversion to competitors who dominate the search space. On the flip side, if only search is funded a brand competes for existing demand which is expensive and limited.  The best strategy is to fund both display and/or social and search tactics to create AND capture demand for a full funnel approach that maximizes ROI and market share.

  • What Tactics are Considered Retail Media?

    The most commonly used retail media tactics include onsite and offsite display which utilize retailer’s 1P data to reach qualified shoppers.   Large brands with agency partners prefer self-serve media which their agency can buy in real time because it enables quick decision making and costs efficiencies.  However, most RMNs continue to only offer managed services that they sell directly. This ideal for small brands or agencies without the bandwidth for hands on activation, though it does come with addition costs.

    Other tactics include programmatic offsite video, paid social amplification, shoppable display, homepage takeovers programmatic CTV, digital instore display and audio, programmatic digital OOH, email, push notifications and streaming audio.

    Social media is typically Meta and Pinterest, though accessing reporting can be a challenge depending on the retailer’s partnership with these parties.  Currently, very few RMNs offer TikTok with Walmart being the primary leader in this space as of Q1 2026.

    Sponsored search display ads are also typically considered retail media in a marketing budget but depending on the agency or brand they may consider it as a separate part of the strategy depending on the objective.  It is imperative to have a search campaign live if display media is also running.

    It depends on who you ask, but if the tactic can be billed externally to an agency partner it’s typically considered media.   If it bills directly or through Trade, it is likely not considered media by most brands.

  • What is Retail Media (and what is it not)?

    Retail media is

    • A Tool to drive brand incrementality both instore and online
    • A strategic investment to access 1P retailer shopper data, retailer social handles and onsite inventory
    • Part of a tactical E2E marketing plan, built to drive specific campaign KPIs & outcomes
    • Serves as a critical last touchpoint influencing customer purchase decisions

    Retail media is not

    • A tool to negotiate in-store price, promotion, volume or display
    • A retailer incentive to improve a brand’s position with a merchant or buyer
    • A tactic that can be rolled into sales packages without channel selection, price transparency or reporting
    • A sales tactic for a trade JBP