Media and non-participative promotion
Communications with no promotional offer
This chapter examines the plethora of ways with which to communicate with the customer/shopper through a wide variety of marketing communications, and mentions those that require no action on the part of anyone receiving the message. For any communication, the person can ‘switch off’ and ignore the message. To avoid being ignored, clearly the message or something creative needs to attract attention (see Chapter 4) and draw the attention of the shopper/buyer.
At one extreme, just standing on a street corner holding a placard (sandwich board!) for a food outlet counts as a marketing communication – a useful promotion if a shopper is a tourist looking for somewhere to eat! At the other end, shock tactics (gruesome pictures), movement (flashing lights, changing panels, scrolls), a strong, distinctive smell (coffee, bacon or newly baked bread aroma) or noise (music, a jingle) are used to draw attention to a communication.
It is of course strongly advocated by this author and the IPA that a promotion is used with any communication through any media, if only to attract the shopper/buyer to bother with the message (say, add a free drink voucher handed out by the placard operative or a QR square to scan for a promotion alongside a shock message) and because the effectiveness of media is greatly enhanced by a promotion – as researched by the IPA. The opportunity to describe here each media, in relation to every other media without any promotion, is hopefully helpful.
The media that the shopper/buyer and brand manager, supplier and retailer face are legion. Today’s media environment has clear characteristics that are radically different from just 10 years ago:
• It is abundant and easy to populate with content, but consumers have become adept at ‘switching off’.
• It is cheap to buy media – and sometimes free, but it is more expensive to reach mass audiences due to fragmentation, and where once a channel had one platform, now it has many.
• A shift of advertising away from mass media towards personalised forms of marketing including, for example, direct mail, the internet, mobile, retail media and word-of-mouth has seemingly diluted the impact of non-participative media, but as a result of the engram research, it would seem to be an important part both of initiating the consumer’s engram ‘hook’ and building the ‘mind file’.
• All media are under pressure because of issues of accountability and ROI. Financial auditors and CEOs now expect to see measurement of the effectiveness of any media activity.
It is worth measuring effectiveness – and the majority haven’t a clue how to do it! Of course, those overseeing the marketing communications budget ought to know that they are getting value for money and should insist on having a measure of effectiveness – it would seem a no brainer. The Grocer reported that 61 per cent of retailers do not measure anything – nothing at all. Making a comparison between media and channels is also important. Note that measuring marketing effectiveness is relatively easy to do and is covered in a separate book by Roddy Mullin (Value for Money Marketing). The main requirement is the intent – the will to do it. It is, of course, the only way to find out what works for the customers you target, with the marketing communications you pay for. A summary of that book is in Chapter 15. Using data is a further neglected available source of Insight about the shopper.
What can each media do? This is shown in Table 6.1. Some media are good for coverage, some are liked by the trade, some are intrusive and, as for duration, it is said that a cinema ad is impactful, but that the impact only lasts for about 15 minutes. The internet and mobile marketing are moving ahead of the other media, which reflects reality.
Table 6.1 Illustrative effectiveness of media
Source: Based on a Saatchi & Saatchi idea.
The persuasiveness of the different media will of course vary for each customer – depending on a number of social and cultural factors. How well developed a media is in any country will also have an impact, along with the legal environment in which the marketing communications operate. There are enormous variations between urban and rural media in any country.
Again, there are general principles that apply, and some media are better at making customers aware of brands, their products and services from others. Such awareness, if effective, is stored away in the subconscious by a customer until some need prompts a search of the knowledge stored in the brain and the media is recalled. How this works is explained through engrams (see Chapter 3). Experience is a powerful re-enforcer of memory, and so those retailers that allow customers to test or try a brand may really benefit long term (see Chapter 7). This applies to intangibles such as software too. Seventy-four percent of digital businesses, according to Econsultancy, now recognise that user experience improves sales.
The customer, however, will look at the total Offer, and the six Cs will feature in the customer assessment of any purchase (see Chapter 3). Table 6.2 illustrates the way that the alternative media impacts on the customer. Experiential marketing is doing well.
Table 6.2 What the media can do
Source: Illustrative – based on an Admap idea.
The media and channels themselves. The key, by way of comparison of different media and channels, may be to use ‘Share of Voice’ and here, the report from the IPA showing how advertising is improved with the addition of other approaches is helpful. There are some really important new research papers; the author finds the IPA research showing the magic number three (that three media is the best number to get hard results), according to the IPA, is a good start, recognising that more than one media is required, but it is insufficient in the holistic overview of the shopper’s journey to purchase – six is a better number, allowing for the building up of the engram ‘mind file’.
Outdoor (see next, after advertising) and some research done by the BPS (British Population Survey) show the importance of local media. The author suggests that the shopper’s perspective should be paramount. It is common sense; examine the shopper’s environment, as only there will be presented messages that are effective on the shopper’s journey to purchase. For example, if bus stops have bus shelters, there is an opportunity for posters – digital or appearing in sequence or static.
Synergy works
The IPA report ‘Models of Marketing Effectiveness’ looked at the lead medium – the medium the authors identify as the primary channel with the highest spend or focus. This analysis was restricted to TV, press and outdoor as there were too few cases in the IPA databank where other communications channels were noted as the lead. Using press as the lead medium demonstrates the biggest hard business effects, whereas outdoor drives the biggest intermediate effects such as brand fame or awareness. However, synergy delivered the best overall results.
The IPA stated that three proved to be the most effective number of advertising media to drive hard business measures but ‘the more the merrier’ applied for intermediate measures. See Chapters 7, 8 and 9 for more on this. The author, as a result of the engram research, now believes six are required.
Advertising coupled with a sales conversion channel, such as direct marketing or sales promotion, was the most effective combination to drive hard business success such as sales, or market share.
Advertising coupled with sponsorship or with public relations (PR) were the two most effective combinations to drive intermediate metrics such as brand fame.
Message situation. As discussed elsewhere (in Shoppernomics, chapter 2, on the communication canvas), the location of a message has an impact on the way that it is received – “The medium is the message” is a phrase coined by Marshall McLuhan meaning that the form of a medium embeds itself in the message, creating a symbiotic relationship by which the medium influences how the message is perceived. This is certainly the case for messaging in venues.
Research by the IPM for the British Council of Shopping Centres showed that visitors in shopping centres and pedestrianised city centres were in a much better frame of mind to receive complex messages. Those in high streets with traffic were concerned with safety. Meanwhile, venues such as train stations left people more stressed (too many other messages to concentrate on). Meanwhile, garden centres actually understress people. You need to be engaged properly with your surroundings to be able to take in everything new coming your way. So always consider the surroundings at the same time as the message.
Non-direct media
Media selection. For completeness, the selection of the appropriate parts of the promotional mix has a further dimension: the selection of the appropriate media and communication channels. For example, advertising may be selected from the promotional mix and the press as a media, selected over TV, with newspapers preferred over magazines and the broadsheets selected over the ‘red-tops’, and the Guardian and the Independent finally chosen. These two papers would then be entered into the channel plan.
Magazines have to meet ad-receptivity criteria; that is, is it at the right time and place for the specialist consumer? Over 500 magazines close and over 500 open most years. With a spend on magazines of around £2 billion and an ad spend of £827 million, magazine advertising is not dead yet, but until there is a better measurement of magazine success (rather than twice-yearly ABC figures), they will not find it easy to persuade businesses to advertise readily.
Promotions are covered in detail in Chapter 9, including a comparison of value versus price promotions and the twelve promotional objectives. How to use and implement promotions is in Chapter 12.
Advertising. Advertising is not an individually targeted medium. In advertising, you pay to have your message placed in a newspaper, on TV or on a radio spot, or outdoors on billboards, both static and digital.
Advertising embraces many sub-disciplines. The classic mechanisms are outdoor (posters and billboards – static and dynamic), print (newspapers and magazines) and broadcast media (radio television and cinema), where typically a 30-second audio/video message is put across; there is also packaging and the point of sale.
BRIEF 6.1. Ad gender facts. Advertising that is gender-positive and empowers females is better as opposed to ads that use female sex appeal (Facebook IQ research). In a Qualtrics survey of 1,547 people in the US aged over 18, 51 per cent of women and 45 per cent of men feel more loyal towards a brand when it promotes gender equality. On Facebook, 79 per cent of women and 75 per cent of men feel more positive towards a brand when it promotes gender equality. Women are 1.85 times more likely to be interested in watching a movie if the trailer features a woman dressed as a firefighter versus a woman dressed in revealing clothing (men reacted similarly to both).
In a study of 60,000 campaigns across more than 20 countries (Nielsen), ads targeted towards men had a 62 per cent success hit rate, as opposed to towards women at 50 per cent: ‘Online advertising has plenty of room for improvement in hitting advertisers’ desired audiences. Better use of the available technology, incorporating wider sources of data, particularly first-party data, as well as buyers taking more action on the Insights they’ve gotten from previous campaigns to improve future results, can make a difference.’
Outdoor advertising (posters, including digital posters which change or video posters which show a video clip – now common on the London Underground). The Outdoor Media Centre (OMC) approach to the customer journey is a four stage process:
• absorbing (the shopper becomes aware of the message);
• planning (considering what to do about the message);
• obtaining (purchasing a product or service);
• sharing (telling others about the message/purchase).
The research across all categories is for static (typically 48-sheet poster) and dynamic-phase posters which scroll or are electronic.
Static billboard results show that it is rated higher for ‘absorbing’ (see above definition).
Dynamic results indicate that 70 per cent remain in the absorbing stage, though two thirds generated a ‘feel’ or ‘do’ response.
There is clear evidence from the engram research to support the premise that advertising does move people onwards on the journey to purchase by building the shopper’s ‘mind file’.
By way of comparison using the OMC approach,
TV is best at the absorbing stage,
Online is best for planning,
whereas radio and press communicate detail better at the obtaining stage, but TV and outdoor can assist if there is a driver here (a promotion), giving a call to action.
Outdoor advertising is best used locally on routes to venues, shops, outlets or events.
Transport advertising. Can be considered as a part of outdoor advertising; however, when displayed on external surfaces of the transport, it is in effect a moving billboard. Posters on walls, walls opposite platforms, escalators, steps (all of which can now be dynamic) have a time measured in seconds for people to view. Small posters are also placed on the inside of buses, tubes, trains, trams.
TV advertising. The 30-second slots are usually sold alongside appropriate programmes. Some programmes of a certain type or genre can be sponsored, meaning that the advertisements are more suitably linked to the target audiences. These advertisements can also be interactive, where the customer can feed back a response using the buttons on the remote controller (direct response). Remember that a TV commercial can also be used online.
Note that TV advertising with promotions shows a greater response rate than without – see Table 6.3.
Booz reports that, alongside filmed comedy, the Target Corporation offers shoppable content (they run outlets similar to Walmart) providing the chance to buy clothes and other items as shown or worn by the characters in the film. The shoppers were linked to the website but also to social media for product reviews by other shoppers. Marketers in areas including consumer electronics, clothing/apparel and consumer packaged goods (CPG) are investing in direct-to-consumer relationships to drive value across the path to purchase and close the loop between engagement and sales. Nike, with its Fuelband mobile fitness experience, links with the shopper’s personal fitness profile, introducing shoppers to other Nike products that supplement the fitness experience.
Table 6.3 Channel combinations effectiveness
Source: IPA.
Local radio advertising – slots are offered alongside commercial radio broadcasts.
Cinema – national and local-only advertisements can be placed on screen before feature films. See Case study 29 also.
Print – magazines, newspapers – all take advertisements.
Advertorial – where the advertisement is written in a magazine or newspaper style seeming to be an editorial; inserts – printed loose-leaf pages inserted into a magazine or newspaper; tip-ons which are stuck onto the relevant page.
House literature – when a retailer offers (usually free) leaflets at entrances and exits.
Supermarkets, department stores and hotel chains often use publishers (such as River Publishing) to produce a free monthly magazine, again offered through outlets.
Packaging
A key placement for the engram – the product package itself may be the engram.
POS material
Alongside the product or service that draws attention to the product, POS material may be hung from the ceiling, stuck onto the floor or be on the shelf (adjacencies), or a special dispenser or arrangement (ensembles) can highlight the product.
In-store video can give advice on using products that help people to buy while on their shopping mission.
Public relations
The CIPR defines PR as follows: ‘Public relations is the discipline which looks after reputation, with the aim of earning understanding and support and influencing opinion and behaviour. It is the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics’.
PR is the opposite of advertising. In PR, the article that features your company is not paid for. The reporter, whether broadcast or print, writes about or films your company as a result of information he or she has received and researched.
Publicity is more effective than advertising, for several reasons. First, publicity is far more cost-effective than advertising. Even if it is not free, your only expenses are generally phone calls and mailings to the media. Second, publicity has greater longevity than advertising. An article about your business will be remembered far longer than an ad.
Publicity also reaches a far wider audience than advertising generally does. Sometimes, your story might even be picked up by the national media, spreading the word about your business all over the country.
Finally, and most important, publicity has greater credibility with the public than does advertising. Readers feel that if an objective third party – a magazine, newspaper or radio reporter – is featuring your company, you must be doing something worthwhile.
Sponsorship. This is a very broad subject and is particularly useful to indicate a brand dimension. It is a part of PR. Support for a charity (for example, the name of the charity appearing on their website, stands or vehicles) can show a caring dimension of a brand. Even police vehicles may now be sponsored in the UK. Football strips, however, need to have the sanction of their team’s supporters! The Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) has a website that can advise on local charities by category. Contacting the CAF may be helpful as they can align the objective of the sponsorship to a specific charity.
Individually or near-individually targeted message media
Direct marketing is a communication between seller and buyer directly. Direct marketing is the generic term. No intermediary media is used. It is visual and sometimes auditory (telemarketing). It is also, to an extent, sensual and olfactory. The thickness, embossing and smell of paper can deliver a perception of quality. It is most often in print or text format. Originally using just the post, but now encompassing the internet (e-mail), telemarketing, mobile marketing (SMS/MMS and social media), direct marketing is targeted towards an individual, though not always by name – it is enabled by the customer choosing to open or to activate the message. The original purpose of direct marketing was to get the shopper to buy through the post or ask for a catalogue, to request a demonstration or to persuade the shopper to physically visit a bricks and mortar establishment (for example, a store or restaurant or personal service establishment such as a spa or hairdresser) or to participate in some way.
Direct mail is the original form of direct marketing. This is when a personally addressed letter is sent, making an offer to the individual. Software programmes now allow the letter to be personalised using data held on the individual. A sample can often be added to a direct mailing in addition to or instead of a promotion. A direct mail should give a clear benefit to the recipient and be persuasive and appropriate. The response of the shopper to the direct mail varies by the attractiveness and creativity of the message and the offer it conveys. Rates are published by organisations such as Central Mailing Services, British Market Research Bureau, the Royal Mail and others for the success of such mailshots. Nine out of ten people open direct mail. Seventy per cent like to receive a voucher or offer. A third of the UK population responded to direct mail in 2011 and, as a result, 6.2 million went online and 7.3 million went to a store. The response rate stands at 3.42 per cent, and 17.7 million people ordered from catalogues received through direct mail in 2010.
Door-to-door (D2D) delivery is when the message – still usually in letter or leaflet format – is delivered to a house but not addressed to the householder by name. The service is offered by the postal service or by other organisations that deliver D2D such as local newspapers or specialist firms that deliver to houses. Samples and promotions are again used to make the unaddressed message of greater interest to the receiver. Again, the success of D2D depends – as for direct mail – on the rates of response, which are usually lower, with people assessing such material as junk mail.
BRIEF 6.2. Door drops. Research for the DMA shows that 96 per cent of consumers are aware of door drops and 72 per cent take action on money-off coupons, with 80 per cent following up on supermarket offers. Research in the US shows that 84 per cent believe sales promotion enhances the brand, with 69 per cent agreeing that a sales promotion does this on its own and 44 per cent saying it generates a favourable attitude to a TV advertisement. The need for accountability and measuring the success of marketing activities is now with us. Since 2009, the ISP awards now show the return, too. There is hard graft and detail in sales promotion. At its heart is the serious business of building long-term, profitable customer relationships. Good promotions are not a substitute for serious thinking or for building deep staff and customer relationships; they are, however, a part of the same process.
Inserts are included in magazines or newspapers delivered to the door – though also they are available when the magazine or newspaper is purchased in a shop (for example supermarket, newsagents). They are similar to leaflets and handouts (see below) but the delivery mechanism is different and depends on the shopper noticing the material and taking action. Inserts can also be glued on to the advert or to a front cover. These are known as tip-ons.
Telemarketing/telesales. Telemarketing is the outbound activity of a call centre. Experience shows that telemarketing is more effective with B2B messages as long as the offer is both relevant and beneficial. It is even more effective if the telemarketing call is preceded by a letter. Telesales is where an existing customer is contacted. The call centre can be used to acquire data about the shopper being called. Codes of practice exist for telemarketing, and ‘cold calling’ is often not appreciated by shoppers. It has been extensively used in the UK for PPI claims calls, with energy companies and telecommunications companies seeking householders who are prepared to change their supplier or service provider.
Leaflets/handouts. These are normally sheets of paper left in places where people can pick up information, typically about holiday and tourist venues (available in tourist information centres, hotel and B&B lobbies) and activities or cards that are offered by persons standing in the street or in places where there is a high footfall, usually advertising an event such as a store or restaurant opening. Local councils, concerned about litter, often have by-laws about what may be handed out when and where and marketers may need to check and obtain permission – certainly this applies on station concourses too. A person holding a placard can be a temporary solution to market communication near the point of sale.
Websites/social media are covered in Chapter 7.
Brand manager/retailer implementation
If you seek to simply educate, inform or just build the brandgram in the shopper/buyer ‘mind file’, then non-participative promotion without a promotional offer is sufficient, using any of the media listed in this chapter.
The author advocates that a promotional offer should always be added. It does require effort (proceed to Chapter 9), and there is a cost. Insight shows that with TV, it increases response by 2–7 times the level without a promotional offer. The same probably applies to all media. Think of the rush in a cinema there would be if a free drink was offered (say 1 in 5) in a draw or a simple BOGOF to those buying a coke or popcorn rather than just the invitation to visit the foyer before the main feature starts.
BRIEF 6.3. Help to select media. Econsultancy has produced a ‘Marketing Automation 2015 A Buyers Guide’, suggesting which media to use. The guide describes which firms undertake analytic work.
BRIEF 6.4. The new Argos digital ‘bricks and mortar’ outlets. Argos has replaced catalogues with tablets. The walls are all digital with promotional (and scarcity) messages displayed alongside news, weather and local messages. Staff are equipped with tablets too for competitor comparison. Delivery has been speeded up both in-store and from online-placed orders, with a hub system for items not held in store. Around half of Argos’ total sales now start online, but 80 per cent of customers will visit one of 842 stores to pick up their goods.
BRIEF 6.5. Ford Fiesta. A TV ad has a young woman driving a car, and to exploit the new in-car talking text message feature, the young male passenger makes a stupid remark, then texts his apology to the car, seeking forgiveness. The text is read out and causes the young woman to smile – so all ends well. There is no other message than text that it is a Ford Fiesta. This clearly is designed to build a favourable image of a Ford Fiesta, added to the engram.
BRIEF 6.6. Gatwick Airport. On the LUL Victoria Line, there are now statements inside the carriages advocating an extra runway for Gatwick Airport. There is no call to action.
Case studies
Case study 27 – The Art of Breakfast by Bray Leino Limited for Tefal
For many consumers, buying things like kettles and toasters has shifted online, making it a relatively removed and uninvolved experience. Tefal wanted to enter the breakfast category with a bang and shake it up with its stylish Breakfast Maison range, initially consisting of a toaster and a kettle. The products offered competitively priced style rather than cutting-edge technology.
The idea of ‘The Art of Breakfast’ is that even a humble slice of toast can be an art form with the right equipment. To bring this to life, food artists Fresh Heather created a collection of artistic masterpieces – out of toast – which featured in a pop-up in the heart of London at morning rush hour, an Art of Breakfast gallery enticing people in with the offer of free toast.
During the campaign period, sales increased by 556% with a direct correlation between website conversions, site visits and sales. During the initial campaign, Tefal sold out of the products. Tefal is still using the Art of Breakfast idea and creative on its website and in communications. An IPM 2017 Gold Award winner.
Case study 28 – Discomfort Future by Sense London for The Economist
The Economist is not only competing with other similar publications, but also with the plethora of modern channels where people spend their time. To ensure the future growth of its subscriber base, The Economist had to find a way to attract new readers in search of a challenge. The problem they need to overcome is the misconception that The Economist is just dry, financial articles. It is so much more than that, so this campaign had to get people to re-evaluate everything they thought they knew.
To help incentivise new readers to sign-up, The Economist runs a free issue with a ‘12 issues for £12’ introductory offer. Unfortunately, many people who sign up to this cancel after the 12 weeks are up. So the challenge wasn’t just to increase subscriptions, it was to find those who would want a long term relationship with The Economist. The campaign had to deliver both quantity and quality. Rather than shy away from the fact that The Economist is a dense and challenging read, Sense developed a campaign that embraces it and makes it the main selling point. The campaign originally launched as a one-day test in 2014; that test was so successful that the activation has been running ever since, clocking up more than 600 live days across four continents. Each year has seen a Discomfort Future story – ice cream and crepes enriched with insects to provide protein. and coffee ostensibly made with recycled portable toilet water. These are deliberately divisive activations that make some people uncomfortable, but one person’s discomfort is another person’s intrigue.
Since launch, the Discomfort Future campaign has successfully delivered against subscription targets and has brought in more than 30,000 in total. Perhaps more significantly, the retention rate over the last two and a half years has been 60 per cent (compared with a target of 25 per cent) and the various activations have enhanced brand perception, with the target audience now far more likely to agree that the magazine’s articles are interesting. It has also delivered significant media coverage, reinforcing the key message, and is now being exported to other countries where the magazine sells – such as the US. Winner of the IPM Grand Prix 2017.
Case study 29 - Cornetto Beyond the Screen by ID for Unilever
Cornetto targets the elusive 16–24-year-old market – ‘Generation Z’ – who needs to be entertained, involved and surprised. The campaign built on Cornetto’s ‘Cupidity’ romantic short films campaign. Cornetto’s latest ‘Two Sides’ film is a beautiful tale of young love, and its premiere used ground-breaking techniques to transport the viewer into the story, with binaural sound technology and unique point-of-view camera work which allowed consumers to switch viewpoints throughout the film. It invited the audience to step through the cinema screen into a library set from the film. The film’s actual actors then led them through a live performance, featuring a choreographed song-and-dance show. Brand ambassadors gave guests personalised Cornetto samples in pairs to ‘tear and share’ with their friends, with a note encouraging them to tweet about their experience using #CornettoCinema.
The experience attracted over 850,000 real-life impressions, with 6,305,727 social impressions for the hashtags #CornettoCinema and #TwoSides.
Summary
The way you stack media does, to an extent, influence the outcome that you get. The engram research supports a stacking of media, both non-participative and individually targeted media as described above, but to trigger the tipping point, use a promotion (the effectiveness of which is covered in Chapter 9), applying it across all media.
If you stack hard (promotion) on top of softer lead media such as advertising, media or outdoor, you are much more likely to get hard outcomes. So if profit is your goal, this is the route to start with. Remember that media also includes elements that you might not normally consider, such as point of purchase, as part of the marketing budget.
If, however, you are seeking brand fame, image or reputation – just building the brandgram through the engram hook – then opt for other partners, such as PR.
Self-study questions
1 What platforms must a promotional video operate across?
2 What is the preferred communication that Insight has determined shoppers seek? What frequency should a retailer operate such a communication?
3 How might augmented reality be used
• By a shopping mall?
• For a furniture store?
• When reading a print magazine?