Nestlé

Direct-to-Consumer insights from a Two-Sided Experiential Marketplace.

Introduction

Founded in 1866, Nestlé is the largest CPG company in the world. With a portfolio of brands covering the spectrum of consumer goods, Nestlé is continually innovating and experimenting within its brands, most notably through its Silicon Valley Innovation Outpost (SVIO). As VP of Digital Innovation, Mark Brodeur explains, “the SVIO is designed to keep Nestlé plugged into the latest trends and technologies and spark innovation within Nestlé and its portfolio of over 2,000 brands.”

As part of the SVIO’s focus on new business models and channels, Nestlé identified an opportunity to create a two-sided experiential marketplace that could have broad application and reach beyond a single brand. To innovate quickly, SVIO imagined a two-sided marketplace in the pet space where dog owners could connect through interactive experiences that included cost-effective resources, education, and training.

Nestlé’s goal was clear, but time was tight — they had just three months to test this concept — so they had to work quickly. Despite the tight time frame, the team knew there was a significant opportunity to make a difference for dogs and their owners. This opportunity was being accelerated by the pandemic which had reduced options for in-person training and driven a spike in pet adoptions.

Objectives

Nestlé’s program had two core goals:

• Build a functioning two-sided marketplace to generate direct customer insights (e.g. understand how increased access to resources and positive reinforcement training improves pet/owner relationships).
• Connect with dog owners through meaningful online experiences.

While simple in theory, the infrastructure necessary to deliver this functionality needed to be reliable and scalable. This presented several key challenges for the team, including:

• Building a proof of concept for a first-of-its-kind two-sided, online experience marketplace.
• Understanding the impact of the marketplace and how it could be used for other brands.
• Offering innovative online experiences built on the marketplace.
• Engaging with training professionals and consumers simultaneously to learn about them, market to them, and build loyalty.
• Measuring results to define target price ranges, establish baselines for customer satisfaction, and find messaging and experiences that resonate.

Experiences (The Solution)

Given the broad scope of Nestlé’s experience solution, it might be easy to think a single partner could not deliver the functionality and scalability necessary for success. Working with AnyRoad, however, Nestlé found the suite of tools and adaptable framework necessary to bring their marketplace to the public.

Utilizing multiple products across the AnyRoad Experience Relationship Management (ERM) platform, specifically AnyRoad Atlas and AnyRoad Experience Manager (with Marketplace add-on), the Nestlé team leveraged the platform’s core functionality across products, to build a powerful solution that:

• Engaged trainers from across the United States to create unique online experiences for dog owners.
• Offered individual, group, and recurring sessions.
• Configured the marketplace to organically offer a variety of price points and experiences to find most effective experiences for creating dog owner and trainer satisfaction.
• Brought innovative experiences to the digital market to create enriched relationships with customers, positioning the brand expert educators and connectors.

Nestle’s fully bespoke AnyRoad solution also included a custom-branded Help Center including 24/7 customer support; live, small-group onboarding sessions for trainers in the marketplace; weekly custom insights consultations and industry benchmarking. The two-sided marketplace delivered a full service solution that engaged both owners and trainers, captured meaningful data, and hosted real-time online experiences at scale.

Results

With a robust infrastructure built on AnyRoad, Nestlé’s two-sided marketplace delivered several impressive results. Most notably, the program:

• Delivered a best-in-class NPS score of 100.
• Built a fully-operational two-sided marketplace in 60 days.
• Proved viability and value of the marketplace proof of concept.
• Enabled the two-sided marketplace at scale with AnyRoad Experience Manager.
• Delivered safe, accessible experiences to dog trainers and pet owners — even late technology adopters.

“For us, the big win was how quickly we were able to stand up something meaningful — with meaningful data and results — with AnyRoad. In just 60 days, we were able to look at usage and make adjustments in real time to make the project a success.”

ANGELA SMITH, DIGITAL INNOVATION SPECIALIST AT NESTLE USA