Understanding the Tech Stack Behind Retail Media Networks

Retail Media Networks (RMNs) serve as a digital connection between a retailer’s shopper data and an advertiser’s campaign. The tech stack is the “backstage” technology that converts millions of transactions into targeted and measurable adverts.

The stack is typically organized into four critical layers: 

1. Unified Data Layer (The Foundation)

This layer collects and organizes first-party data, which is the most valuable asset of an RMN. 

• Customer Data Platforms (CDP): Aggregate data from loyalty programs, Point-of-Sale (POS) systems, and online browsing to create a “single customer view”.
• Data Management Platforms (DMP): Used to organize these customers into specific audience segments for advertisers.
• Data Clean Rooms: Secure environments (like Habu) where retailers and brands can collaborate on data without sharing raw personal information, ensuring privacy compliance. 

2. Media Sales & Booking Layer (The Interface)

This is where advertisers interact with the RMN to plan and buy ad space. 

• Demand-Side Platforms (DSP): Tools used by brands to bid on ad inventory and manage campaigns across multiple retailers.
• Self-Serve Portals: Allow brands to upload creatives, set budgets, and choose targeting criteria directly, similar to Amazon Advertising or Walmart Connect. 

3. Delivery & Activation Layer (The Execution)

This layer determines which ad to show, where, and when. 

• Ad Servers: The “backbone” that serves the ad to the shopper’s device or an in-store screen and tracks clicks and impressions.
• Supply-Side Platforms (SSP): Used by the retailer to manage and sell their available ad “inventory” (space on their website or app).
• Recommendation Engines: Use AI and machine learning to suggest relevant products in real-time based on current shopper behavior. 

4. Measurement & Analytics Layer (The Proof) 

The final stage links ad exposure to actual sales, known as “closed-loop attribution”. 

• Attribution Engines: Connect a digital ad click or view to a physical or online purchase.
• Real-Time Analytics: Tools like Apache Flink or Kafka process thousands of events per second to provide instant performance feedback.

What was once a simple, analog, transaction-based system at brick-and-mortar stores has transformed into a dynamic, digital-first experience. From the time a consumer sees a tailored ad on social media to their encounter with digital displays in-store, modern retail is a key scene in the digital revolution.

But how do merchants provide these seamless, tailored, and measurable experiences across many platforms and touchpoints? The solution is to use Retail Media Networks (RMNs) with a robust technology stack.

The Power Behind the Display: the Tech Stack

While customers see these personalized experiences through digital signage displays and tailored offers, what they don’t see is the complex tech stack working behind the scenes to deliver them, beginning with CMS platforms, augmented with integrative software that can programmatically schedule advertising similar to an Internet/Mobile media buy. It’s a bit like a theater production: the audience sees the performance, but backstage there’s a whole system of lighting, sound, and set changes all working together to create the show.

In retail, the tech stack is what makes these seamless interactions possible – it’s what gives customers an engaging and immersive experience. It allows retailers to deliver the right combination and blend of advertising and content tailored to the audience, based on various data sets from daypart traffic to point of sale transactions. And moreover, it ensures the right message is delivered at the right time and right place on the journey to optimize and maximize shopper behavior.

At the core of RMNs are several critical components that work in conjunction with CMS Platforms that run digital signage. Demand-Side Platforms (DSPs) allow retailers to buy ad inventory programmatically, targeting the right customers at the right time. Supply-Side Platforms (SSPs) help retailers, or publishers, manage and sell their advertising inventory.

Data management platforms (DMPs) and customer data platforms (CDPs) store and analyze consumer behavior, helping retailers understand who their customers are, what motivates them, and what they want. When these systems are integrated properly, they create a smooth flow of information that delivers the right message at the right moment.

This behind-the-scenes infrastructure ensures that the experience feels seamless to the customer. It’s what allows a shopper to receive a notification about a special offer while they’re browsing a store aisle or see personalized recommendations on a digital display as they walk past.

Read Also: The Key Players in the Retail Media Ecosystem

While many retailers have begun to assemble various technologies to create an offering, they’ve quickly encountered a series of challenges.

1. A lack of cohesion: Varying data sources can have incompatibility issues when processed into a single source of truth. Manually compiling, standardising and querying datasets is complex work that requires a trained data specialist.
2. Inaccessibility: Even if you have a dedicated data team, there’s no guarantee they’ll be available at a moment’s notice. In today’s fast-paced market, marketing and sales teams need readily-accessible and real-time insight into customer data.
3. Reduced performance: To advertise effectively, retail brands need to understand their customer’s entire purchasing journey — joining the dots across first, second, and third-party data sources, and across online and offline touchpoints. When your organisation can’t collect and present these insights accurately,  you will struggle to sell the full value of your audience segments.
4. Incomplete reporting: Retail media networks need to be able to close the loop on performance – feeding actions back into their customer view and providing clear reporting on performance. Transparency over performance is one of the top priorities of brands advertising in retail media, and if this is not available in-flight, a retailer’s ability to rebook campaigns will be hindered.

How to Build a Robust Retail Media Technology Stack

To become competitive, retail brands need an intelligent technology stack that can process large volumes of customer data and deliver media campaigns for advertisers from the information gathered.

Your stack should consist of three clearly defined layers (as shown in the diagram), awarding function and ease-of-use without compromising capability.

Back-End: Data Management Layer

Sufficient access to behavioural and transactional data is a fundamental starting point for any retail brand that wants to execute onsite and offsite marketing campaigns. To efficiently collect and process data, your technology stack needs an Online Analytical Processing Engine working behind-the-scenes. This would allow for the seamless aggregation of your data to create a single customer view, crucial to powering the rest of your technology stack.

Back-End: Processing Layer

To successfully publish adverts at the right time, to the right audience and, in the right format, every technology stack needs an element of campaign management. This includes the ability to query your data management layer to create audience insights and segments and then activate those into digital media for advertisers. An integrator technology helps to push these segments through product recommendation tools (like Criteo) and DSPs (such as Google) to then return campaign data to your data management layer for accurate measurement.

Front-End: UX Layer

Your technology stack needs to be catered to its end user. Often, this is a retailer’s internal data team. Ideally, though, it will be your marketing team or even your end clients who operate your retail media technology. The UX layer sits on top of the other layers to transform the entire system into something usable – meaning individuals don’t have to work through a complicated bundle ofApplication Programming Interfaces (APIs) and database languages.  

Finally

Empowering RMNs requires more than just technology; it must also be used to establish real connections between companies and consumers. As society evolves, so must retail, and RMNs provide a road forward that combines innovation and personalization. The message to retailers is clear: now is the moment to invest in the correct tech stack to build a future in which shopping is an individually tailored experience for each individual.