In today’s competitive retail landscape, a strong visual merchandising strategy can make the difference between success and obscurity. Brands and retailers spend millions per year on in-store displays and signage, and for good reasons. Well-designed retail experiences get folks in the door and can increase the likelihood of purchase, according to Inmar Intelligence.

Conversely, companies can suffer due to visual merchandising flops. In the U.S. alone, GlobalData and One Door report that companies lost $125 billion, or an average of $10 billion per month, in sales in 2024 due to poor visual merchandising.

With tighter budgets, shorter timelines and increasing demands for measurable impact, marketers and retailers alike face immense pressure to get it right — the first time. In this environment, marketers need efficient pre-market testing to ensure that their visual merchandising will drive the desired customer engagement and ROI.

“Brands that want to excel in an omnichannel marketplace shouldn’t hedge their bets. There’s another way: Tap into modern and efficient pre-market testing,” says Lily Wen, Director of Product Marketing – Data & Media at Quad. “With Accelerated Marketing Insights by Quad, brands can get virtual and in-person feedback from real customers to know what drives engagement and sales with efficiency and expertise. This is proactive pre-market testing designed by marketers for marketers.”

What is visual merchandising in omnichannel campaigns?

Visual merchandising has evolved from traditional department store mannequins and grocery store signs to sophisticated omnichannel, multimedia campaigns that seamlessly integrate both in-store and online experiences, transforming the shopper experience into a comprehensive user experience.

For example, 72% of adult shoppers in North America use their mobile devices to compare product prices while standing in the aisle, per an Emarketer survey. Today’s shopper landscape requires that brands and retailers address these complexities with omnichannel visual merchandising campaigns. To ensure success, brands can lean into real-time, real-world pre-launch testing.

Accelerated Marketing Insights for Omnichannel In-Store & At-Home Campaigns  

Benefits of testing omnichannel visual merchandising before launch

Traditional in-market tests can take months to over a year as marketers wait for performance results before determining if they need to rework existing visual merchandising assets. With omnichannel pre-market testing, they can cut waiting time down to just weeks.

Testing solutions such as Accelerated Marketing Insights by Quad give brands the pre-market data they need to get their visual merchandising campaigns right the first time. Pre-market testing allows them to understand the highest performing creative assets across an integrated online or in-store consumer experience.

“With a process-oriented methodology offering actionable insights, we’ve seen marketers bring visual merchandising to life six times faster using AMI compared to traditional in-market testing,” Wen adds.

How to test omnichannel visual merchandising

With Quad’s Accelerated Marketing Insights pre-market testing solutions, brands utilize data from customer feedback, behavioral analyses, online and virtual multivariate studies and shopper-simulated environments so they can launch with confidence. Here are Quad’s key testing strategies to prepare for today’s visual merchandising environment: 

  • Align panelists with real customers 

    In-store displays, packaging models and digital assets should be tested with a representative sample of a brand’s real audience. With Accelerated Marketing Insights, brands can test replica audience segments and personas across mediums such as email, direct mail, in-store displays and retail media, taking out the guesswork of “who” so marketers can move onto execution. 

  • Pinpoint unconscious customer attention 

    The shopper experience involves subtle decision–making. Eye–tracking technology utilizing advanced neuroscience and behavioral analyses — key components of Accelerated Marketing Insights — can determine what will grab the customer’s attention first on a store shelf, during early, subconscious moments. 

  • Tap into online multivariate studies 

    For both digital and in–person assets and displays, there are thousands of elements marketers choose from, from headers and imagery to QR codes and illustrations. With Accelerated Marketing Insights, companies can test more than 2,000 unique element combinations in multivariate online A/B tests within a single study to understand which options consumers prefer prior to an external launch. 

  • Replicate the shopper experience 

    To bridge offline to online, brands can employ both virtual and live shopper tests. Virtual tests help brands extend their retail designs to the right audience across the country. Store walk–through tests can simulate the high–impact techniques of, for example, a grand opening, a product launch or a seasonal set. Using this test data, brands and retailers can adjust creative displays on–site to eliminate launch delays and better cater to customer preferences. 

Excel in omnichannel visual merchandising with Accelerated Marketing Insights

Optimizing visual merchandising across omnichannel campaigns with pre-market testing can help brands attract customers, boost sales and meet consumer demand, giving brands the confidence they need to launch.  

Accelerated Marketing Insights by Quad offers companies a faster, more efficient omnichannel test solution to excel in today’s hybrid consumer marketplace. Get started with Quad. 

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