Ours has been called the experience economy. Consumers rule a complex marketplace that offers them multiple – and multiplying – touchpoints and devices. And consumers want experiences, not simply transactions from those touchpoints. A recent survey by Epsilon found that 80% of consumers said they were more likely to do business with a company that offered personalized experiences.
Marketers need their “A” game to meet this expectation. That means being agile, efficient and effective in everything they do. A high standard to meet while navigating a fragmented landscape of data, technology and content requirements. And don’t forget optimizing the marketing spend. Pressure to deliver sky-high results using earthbound resources and dollars is constant.
Still, there are significant opportunities to improve marketing operations, from planning through content creation and media deployment. Changes in these areas can yield BIG results. But identifying what needs to change while immersed in the day-to-day of getting things done is tough. It is worth it, however. The following brands would agree:
National health and beauty aid brand redirects media spend for bigger impact
Over 75 years, this producer of health and beauty aids grew from a family-owned business to a leading national brand. But recent new product launches had performed below expectations. The company used traditional TV and radio channels for the launches and to support products, but the returns on its investments were sub-optimal.
The brand needed to broaden its target audience to include younger generations, but was hesitant to broaden its media spend into the digital and social media channels they favored. Complicating matters, each product group had its own team of internal and external resources with their own budgets and strategies for product launches.
The company knew that its process was outdated, and asked Quad, a longtime packaging partner, for help. A multi-capability Quad team mapped the media spend process and recommended reducing the number of parties involved and unifying the budget. They also reallocated a portion of the budget to digital and social media using a step-by-step approach with built-in tracking results. That way the company could repeat what worked and stop doing what didn’t.
Quad also suggested a new sampling strategy that was better integrated with the product launches. Before, product samples could last six months, so marketers couldn’t see whether sampling was effective for recruiting new customers. We found a relatively inexpensive single-use sample package so results could be linked more directly to sample distribution.
The brand was able to make its marketing budget go further with an iterative spend that tracked results and adjusted accordingly. It also reduced overhead by using fewer outside partners. And it gained customer insights and data that helped with future media planning.
Outdoors retailer re-evaluates content workflow and creative production
Growth is prized in retailing, but it comes with many demands. The marketing department of a successful outdoor retailer with a thriving store and catalog business was still operating with the print-centric processes of its early days. As new channels appeared — digital, mobile, etc. — it added new teams. But their workstreams weren’t connected. Loop-backs, manual processes and unnecessary steps were common.
This added time, costs, and opportunities for errors when creating marketing content. “We had highly qualified individuals who didn’t have the tools they needed — workflow, content management — we were muscling everything through,” the company’s CMO said of the situation.
Quad, which had been printing the retailer’s catalogs, was asked to come up with a solution. Our workflow and continuous improvement experts mapped a better process, one that cut 44 workflow steps. And we helped the retailer turn seven disparate marketing departments into one integrated content hub.
Quad also introduced technology that streamlined content production, including virtual vs. hardcopy proofing, workflow management systems for photography and video production, and a unified digital asset management system. For the company’s catalogs, we reorganized and managed creative operations so they could produce appealing, relevant content at scale.
Altogether these changes:
- Cut eight weeks from content production
- Reduced the overall marketing spend by 40%
Localized media campaigns power national food and drug retailer’s success
One of the nation’s largest food and drug retailers, operating in 35 states, under 22 banners conducts several recurring promotions each year. One of the most important is its anniversary celebration, which features select consumer packaged goods (CPG) brands. A successful promotion encourages CPG suppliers to contribute to joint marketing throughout the year.
Store traffic had been down the year before so the retailer wanted a new plan that would deliver better results, without costing more money. Quad developed and then executed a multi-channel plan with multi-level creative for each of the retailer’s banners. Advanced printing and logistics technology kept the program’s complexity and versioning manageable.
Each banner got customized radio spots, produced by Quad, that spoke to its specific geography. We also produced individualized weekly circulars with local offers that maintained a consistent brand look and feel. Depending on how big a geographic area the banner served, this involved creating up to 10 and sometimes as many as 20 versions for each banner.
In addition, each banner got its own in-store Quad team. These created localized signage and displays linked to the offers in the circulars, as well as digital and print advertising. The onsite teams also managed behind-the-scenes tasks such as distribution and fulfillment, and made sure sales and other data was populated to the correct stores.
The promotion lasted about two weeks. The results demonstrate how effective a refreshed media deployment can be. Data from the retailer’s consumer insights team showed that:
- 45% of customers were more aware of the anniversary promotion than the previous year
- The campaign reached 83 million listeners through broadcast and digital radio spots
- There were 560,000 more customer transactions than the year before
- The CPGs reported a 2% year-over-year uptick in sales of their units
- The campaign produced 1.1 billion impressions
The bottom line here is that brands and marketers should never avoid overturning existing processes and approaches, and should prioritize efficiency when choosing vendors and resources. Because making the right changes delivers a big impact.
To learn more about how to create a truly integrated marketing campaign, visit QUAD.com