“Marketing to end users isn’t part of our strategy right now.”

“I have bigger fish to fry internally before I think about consumers.”

“If we focus on consumers, we’ll lose sight of our channel partners.”

“Our budgets aren’t big enough to reach end users.”

We’ve heard all of the above, and, with all due respect, we disagree.

It may seem like retailers have limited options, if they want to succeed in today’s wacky brick-and-mortar store environment.

Here's a familiar situation: You're eyeing something interesting online that you might want to buy, so you sign up for the email newsletter—something that might just offer a discount code or special access to a sale. After you click “submit,” the anticipation grows.