Retail Media Eye Tracking: What 98 Shoppers Reveal About Digital Signage

How Retail Media Actually Works: Eye Tracking Data From 20,000 Store Visits

Family Mart and Gate One Inc. partnered with Zenith Partners to measure what shoppers actually look at in convenience stores. The findings challenge common assumptions about digital signage placement and reveal why movement matters more than size.

Retail media has become a battleground for Japan's three major convenience store chains. Family Mart's response, Family Mart Vision, places three digital screens above checkout counters to display product advertisements, artist features, and exclusive merchandise highlights whilst customers queue. Stores with this system report measurable sales increases, but the company needed to understand why some screen layouts performed better than others.

Why measurement matters more than intuition

Gate One Inc., Family Mart's research partner, had already collected survey data through the Famipay app and deployed AI cameras to track what they termed "consciousness change data" (shifts in attention and purchase intent). However, these methods couldn't answer a fundamental question: where do customers actually look, and for how long?

Yuki Kimura, a planner in Gate One Inc.'s Customer and Market Knowledge Department, recognised the gap between knowing that something worked and understanding why it worked. The team needed biological evidence, not guesswork.

Testing four screen configurations

Family Mart Vision screens can display content in four distinct patterns:

• Dynamic video spanning all three screens

• Static centre image with video flanking both sides

• Static images across all three screens

• Identical video repeated on each screen

Previous performance data suggested these layouts produced different results, but the mechanisms driving those differences remained unclear. Understanding the specific visual pathways would allow content creators to design advertisements that aligned with natural viewing behaviour rather than fighting against it.

What 98 participants revealed about attention

Zenith Partners conducted the eye tracking study using wearable eye trackers to capture precise gaze data. The research involved 98 participants (men and women aged 20s to 50s) who viewed 12 different creative displays over two days. The technology recorded where participants looked, fixation duration, and which elements attracted initial attention.

The findings confirmed some expectations whilst challenging others. The centre screen consistently captured the most attention, particularly when displaying movement. In the first few seconds, viewers scan all three screens to assess the overall scene. The typical pattern: eyes start at the middle screen, jump to any moving elements regardless of position, then settle on the most dynamic content.

This sequence matters for content strategy. If the centre screen remains static whilst the side screens display motion, viewers will bypass the premium centre position. If all three screens show identical looping video, attention disperses rather than concentrates. The layout must account for predictable eye movement patterns, not interrupt them.

Turning observation into creative strategy

These insights directly inform how Family Mart and Gate One Inc. structure their retail media content. Instead of treating the three-screen system as three separate advertising opportunities, they can now design unified experiences that guide attention through deliberate motion sequencing.

For brands buying advertising space, this data provides clear direction. Movement in the opening seconds captures initial attention. The centre screen should anchor the key message once that attention is secured. Supporting information can occupy side screens without competing for the primary gaze path.

This approach shifts content production from aesthetic preference to evidence-backed design. Creative teams no longer debate which layout "feels" better. They build content around documented viewing behaviour.

Connecting gaze patterns to purchase behaviour

Gate One Inc. plans to integrate this eye tracking data with their existing AI camera infrastructure. The goal: track how customers' gaze moves from signage screens to products on shelves, creating a complete map of visual attention from advertisement exposure to product selection.

This integration would answer questions that isolated data streams cannot. Does a customer who fixates longer on the centre screen display higher purchase rates for featured products? Do specific motion patterns trigger shelf scanning behaviour? Which creative elements predict conversion versus which simply generate attention without action?

For retailers and brands operating in competitive markets, these questions determine whether media spend translates to sales or simply generates unmeasured impressions. Family Mart Vision demonstrates how measurement infrastructure turns retail media from a branding exercise into a performance channel.

Why this matters beyond convenience stores

The principles tested in Family Mart's environment apply wherever visual attention drives commercial outcomes. Shopping centres deploying digital directories face similar questions about screen configuration and motion. Supermarkets testing shelf-edge displays need to understand natural scanning patterns. E-commerce platforms optimising product page layouts must account for gaze behaviour on mobile screens versus desktop monitors.

Eye tracking research provides the biological baseline that other methods miss. Surveys tell you what customers remember noticing. Analytics show you what they clicked. Only eye tracking reveals what they actually looked at, including everything they saw but didn't consciously register or later recall.

For businesses expanding into Southeast Asian markets, understanding these attention patterns before launching becomes particularly valuable. Consumer behaviour varies by culture, age demographic, and shopping context. What works in Tokyo may not translate directly to Jakarta or Kuala Lumpur. Testing locally before committing to full rollouts prevents expensive mistakes.

Want to understand what your customers actually see? Zenith Partners uses eye tracking and behavioural research to reveal the gap between what you think customers notice and where their attention actually goes. Book a free consultation to discuss your research needs.