Understanding the Digital Shelf Intelligence Report
Knowing your ROAS is one thing. Understanding why it looks the way it does is what drives smarter investment decisions. Are shoppers not finding your products at all or are they finding them but just not buying? The Digital Shelf Intelligence report connects those dots by combining shopper engagement signals with total online sales outcomes (both organic and attributed) at the brand and SKU level for Onsite Display and Sponsored Products campaigns. Use it to see where you stand in each category, identify performance gaps, and decide where to focus your media investment.
What You Can Do With This Report
The Digital Shelf Intelligence report helps you answer three questions about your portfolio:
Are shoppers engaging with my products? See how your product detail page (PDP) views compare to the category benchmark.
Is that engagement turning into sales? Understand whether shoppers who find your products are buying—or going to a competitor.
Where should I focus? Pinpoint the retailer, category, and SKU combinations with the strongest opportunity.
How to Access The Report
Log in to Criteo Commerce Max.
Click the Analytics tab in the top navigation bar.
Select Insights from the left-hand menu.
Open the Digital Shelf Intelligence report.
Report Views
The report offers two views depending on the depth of analysis you need.
Brand View
Use the Brand view for a high-level picture of performance across:
Brand
Category
Retailer
Week
When to use it: Track category position and benchmark trends over time, compare performance across retailers, or summarize the story for a planning conversation.
SKU View
Use the SKU view to drill into individual products across:
Parent SKU and product name
Brand, category, and retailer
Week
When to use it: Identify which products are driving results or underperforming, understand whether challenges are isolated to a few SKUs or spread across your portfolio, and inform assortment decisions.
Filters
Narrow your analysis using any combination of:
Brand
Retailer
SKU
Category
Metrics
You can drill down on specific metrics by clicking the Edit button on the right-hand side of the SKU view or Brand view table. All of the following metrics are selected by default, buy you’ll be able to deselect any you don’t want to see:
Metric | What it measures |
|---|---|
Total Sales | Total online sales, organic and attributed |
Total Units | Total units sold online, organic and attributed |
Sales Rank | Your brand's relative sales position within the category |
PDP Views | Total product detail page views |
PDP Views Rank | Your brand's relative shopper engagement position within the category |
Consideration Index | Shopper engagement per SKU compared to the category average |
Sales Index | Sales efficiency per SKU compared to the category average |
Listing Price (SKU view only) | Directional price context for each SKU |
How to Interpret The Benchmark Indices
The Consideration Index and Sales Index show how your products compare to the category average. Together, they tell you whether the opportunity is about earning more shopper attention, or converting that attention more effectively.
Consideration Index
Measures whether your brand earns more or less shopper engagement per SKU than the category average.
Above 1.0: Your products attract more engagement per SKU than the category average
Below 1.0: Your products attract less engagement per SKU than the category average
Sales Index
Measures how efficiently shopper engagement translates into sales, relative to the category average.
Above 1.0: Your products convert engagement into sales more efficiently than the category average
Below 1.0: Your products convert engagement into sales less efficiently than the category average
Digital Shelf Intelligence Use Cases
Put budget behind products that actually convert: Not every SKU earns its media investment. The Sales Index tells you which products convert shoppers into buyers above the category average and which ones are absorbing spend without delivering proportional revenue. Use the SKU view to assess conversion efficiency across your portfolio, then concentrate investment on the products where paid support compounds already-strong organic performance. The result: better ROAS, less waste, and a portfolio that grows where it should.
Protect your best sellers before competitors move in: A top-selling SKU with a declining Consideration Index is a warning sign. It means shoppers are finding it less often, and competitors will fill that gap. Use the report to monitor your hero products week over week. When visibility starts to slide, even if overall sales still look stable, that's the moment to add targeted paid support and defend your shelf position before recovery becomes harder. Don't wait for the Sales Rank to slip before you act.
Fix what's leaking revenue: A high Consideration Index and low Sales Index means shoppers are finding your products, but not buying at the rate the category average would predict. Before adding more media spend, investigate what's driving the gap. Pricing, product page content, reviews, or availability may all be factors. Paid media amplifies what's already working; it won't fix an underlying conversion issue. Identify the leak first, then amplify.
Scale what's working across more retailers and categories: Your strongest SKUs are a blueprint. When a product earns a strong Sales Index and a high PDP Views Rank at one retailer, use those signals to find where similar conditions exist across your other retail partners. Growth doesn't always mean new products — sometimes it means doing more of what already works in a new retailer or category context.
Plan for revenue peaks before they happen: Organic PDP view trends reveal which SKUs naturally surge ahead of major sales moments. Use the report to identify those patterns across prior weeks, then coordinate paid investment ahead of those peaks rather than waiting until after they start. Getting in front of natural demand means capturing the full-funnel opportunity at its height, rather than catching up once the moment is already underway.
Diagnosing Performance Gaps
These patterns help you identify the most likely constraint on performance so you can act on the right lever.
Pattern | What it likely means |
|---|---|
Low PDP Views Rank + Low Consideration Index | Visibility gap — not enough shoppers are finding or engaging with your products |
High Consideration Index + Low Sales Index | Conversion gap — shoppers are interested, but not buying at the rate the category average would suggest |
Strong indices + weaker category ranks | Scale opportunity — your efficiency is strong; the focus should be on expanding reach and coverage |
Using This Report Alongside Campaign Reporting
The Digital Shelf Intelligence report shows total online outcomes. It does not connect directly to your paid media metrics within the same view. For the clearest picture, use both together:
Use the Digital Shelf Intelligence report to identify your priority retailers, categories, and SKUs, and to diagnose whether the gap is in engagement or conversion.
Review paid media performance in your campaign reporting to see how your current investment maps to those priorities.
Align your paid strategy to support the areas with the highest opportunity.
Digital Shelf Intelligence Best Practices
Start with the question, not the metric. Are you defending share, scaling a category, launching a product, or diagnosing soft performance? Let the question guide which view and which metrics to focus on first.
Use the Brand view to frame the story; use the SKU view to find the drivers. This two-step approach keeps analysis focused and actionable.
Track trends across multiple weeks. Benchmark indices are most meaningful over time and single-week snapshots can be misleading. Look for patterns across several weeks before drawing conclusions.
FAQs
Why do I see different performance across retailers for the same category? Retailer sites differ in assortment, shopper behavior, and category structure. A brand may earn strong engagement at one retailer but not another due to differences in audience, competition, and onsite experience. Compare benchmarks across retailers to identify where you're strongest and where gaps exist.
Why does my Sales Rank differ from my PDP Views Rank? These metrics measure different things. PDP Views Rank reflects relative shopper engagement; Sales Rank reflects relative sales outcomes. It is common to have a strong engagement rank with a weaker sales rank (a conversion gap), or a strong sales rank with a weaker engagement rank (a visibility challenge).
What does it mean if my Consideration Index is above 1.0 but my Sales Index is below 1.0? This indicates a conversion efficiency gap: shoppers are engaging with your products above the category average, but that engagement is not translating into sales as efficiently as the benchmark. Drill into SKU view to identify which products are driving the gap. Keep in mind that the underlying cause may have nothing to do with your paid campaigns — factors like pricing, product page content, availability, or competitive promotions can all affect conversion. Treat this pattern as a signal to investigate further before adjusting your media investment.
What does it mean if my Consideration Index is below 1.0? Your products are receiving less PDP attention per SKU than the category average — a visibility or discoverability gap. Paid media support can improve consideration for these products.
Why did my indices change week over week? Indices can shift due to changes in your own PDP views or sales, the number of SKUs in the category, competitive dynamics, or seasonal and promotional effects. Look at trends across multiple weeks and use SKU view to identify whether changes are driven by a few products or broader portfolio movement.
Why might I not see a SKU I expect? This can result from category classification differences by retailer, product mapping, or your active filter selections. Confirm your filters first. If the SKU is still missing, check SKU view for naming variations or contact your account team.
Does Total Sales Revenue include organic sales? Yes. Total Sales Revenue and Total Units Sold reflect total online outcomes — organic and attributed. The report is designed to give you a complete picture of category performance, not just the share driven by paid activity.
Can I see paid media performance directly in this report? Not in the current version. For tactical campaign decisions, pair these insights with your campaign reporting to connect priorities to paid performance actions.
How should I use listing price in SKU view? Listing price is directional context only. Price changes can correlate with performance shifts, but price alone does not confirm causality. Use it to generate hypotheses and pair with other signals when investigating.