Baby Boomer Segmentation:

3. Store Attributes. These may range from physical store
attributes like size and presence of specific departments
to proximities to high traffic intersections or landmarks
like beaches or universities.
4. Performance Attributes. These can range from basic
sales rates to promotion response to consumer-driven
category opportunity gaps.
Dynamic clustering brings criteria together into a cohesive
framework that leverages critical differences within the store
segments. Some companies may be able to execute effectively
using just two clusters; others may require 200; but clustering
is a necessary prerequisite for integrating action to “crack
the retail C.O.D.E.”
Step 4: Executing for the consumer
The final step in the C.O.D.E. approach takes us full circle,
back to the consumer and how best to shape and direct
activities to each store or cluster’s shoppers. Merchandising
strategies based on item roles, promotional and sampling
programs, space and facing allocations—all tailored to
defined dynamic clusters—can now be managed by following
the four-step C.O.D.E.
The C.O.D.E. approach makes high definition marketing
possible, allowing marketers and retailers to zero in at the
most granular level possible—the store. Working from a
shared viewpoint, with shared definitions for target clusters
or stores, manufacturers and retailers can collaborate on
promotional and assortment strategies with optimal appeal
to the right set of consumers, and operational strategies that
take cost out of the system by reducing inefficiencies such as
out-of-stocks and distribution voids.
The C.O.D.E. holds the secret to finding opportunity gaps,
making the most of consumer profile information, and
improving logistical execution to squeeze more bottom-line
profit out of even more top-line sales.
See pages 48 and 49 for a case study that illustrates the
C.O.D.E. process in action. C i
46 Fall/Winter 2006