What Consumers Are Looking for This Prime Day 2020

Amazon’s long-awaited Prime Day is finally almost here. Next Tuesday and Wednesday, October 13-14, where Amazon Prime shoppers will be treated to big savings…but will brands deliver on consumer needs?

Here is our take based on connecting a host of online data sources in our advanced analytics platform:

The pandemic has created a focus on essentials. As many people continue to work from home and dining out is not necessarily an option, the lunch segment and at-home fast food preparation in general are categories that should continue to do well, and this dovetails with the immune health trend we have previously talked about here on our blog. Brands that speak to these combined needs should come out on top.

¹Source: Skai Food Market Overview, June 2020

Inventory issues may impact what consumers end up buying as opposed to what they were originally looking for. Since the pandemic, many Amazon Prime customers have noticed the original 2-day delivery promise dissipate as both the retailer and manufacturers struggled with increased demand for specific items while there was a breakdown in the availability of ingredients, packaging materials and logistics personnel.

Questions abound now on whether Amazon will be able to handle the surge of this Prime Day, while brands who are well prepared and can service the consumer directly (more on Direct to Consumer below) will be able to capture market share from incumbents and others who have not recovered from their supply chain problems earlier in the year.

While retail has rebounded to pre-pandemic levels since the nationwide shutdown in the spring, there is still a recession mentality and affordability will take center stage this Prime Day perhaps more than ever since the inception of this annual sale event. Nevertheless, quality brands and private labels can compete by creating messages that resonate with consumer sentiment.

With the massive shift to e-commerce we are experience, this Prime Day also provides brands with unique opportunities to target the newest demographic groups that joined the online buying cycle – elderly and people with high risk conditions. These are new users that care about brand purpose, such as family values, social justice viewpoints, national values.

Perhaps the biggest opportunity for brands however, this Prime Day, however, is to capture the audience and the troves of market intelligence that will follow. On average, close to four million product reviews are left on Amazon each month. By capturing specific sentiments and associations in these posts and combining them with other data sources using advanced analytics specifically, brands will have an unprecedented ability to plan for the next wave of promotional events and other marketing campaigns.

With over 40 FMCG brands covered among the connected data sets in the Skai platform, that also incorporates curated taxonomies and business-ready models, brand manufacturers are able to now capitalize on this much more easily.

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*This blog post originally appeared on Signals-Analytics.com. Skai acquired Signals-Analytics in December 2020. Read the press release.