CMO Briefing Holiday 2014

CMO BRIEFING HOLIDAY 2014

four emerging performance m a r k e t i n g s t r at e g i e s f o r t h e b i g g e s t h o l i d ay e v e r

RETAIL SALES ARE EXPECTED TO INCREASE

5%

this season

5% increase

3.4% increase

a jump over last year’s

2014

2013

3.4% increase

digital sales will continue to grow

8.4%

share of all sales in 2014

vs.

7.6% last year

MOBILE

37.3%

OF DIGITAL GROWTH

DUE TO GREATER CONFIDENCE IN MOBILE SHOPPING

WILL BE A KEY DRIVER

ACCELERATING YEAR-OVER-YEAR

how can retailers capitalize on these trends and have the biggest holiday ever? IT’S TIME TO MOVE BEYOND THE BASICS & CONSIDER A FEW EMERGING PERFORMANCE MARKETING STRATEGIES. eMarketer (September 2014)

“

location-based marketing, especially with the rise of mobile, is key to driving shoppers to stores.

1 Integrate Paid Search & Product Listing Ads

(PLAs)

Due to high search engine results page (SERP) prominence, PLAs have enjoyed tremendous progress over the past few years. For Performics U.S. clients, PLA spend is up 600+% year-over-year. Last December, PLAs comprised 23% of total paid search spend (Marin Software, June 2014); and we expect PLAs to make up an even bigger percent this year.

For holiday 2014, it’s critical to approach PLAs as an extension of your traditional generic paid search campaigns. In many instances, we’re seeing greater efficiency in PLAs than generic paid search. Retailers should look at PLAs and regular paid search holistically - by product category - to make informed decisions on budget allocation across the formats, including whether to shift dollars from regular paid search to PLAs.

2 UP YOUR LOCAL DIRECTORY GAME Location-based marketing, especially with the rise of mobile, is key to driving shoppers to stores. eMarketer reports that 51% of people now use their phones to search for local info on-the-go, and 41% use them in-store. But still, many brands aren’t fully optimizing their local online presences to support their offline stores.

Ensuring that you have a framework for displaying consistent and correct local info to searchers across the increasingly large number of online directories (e.g. Google, Yelp, in-car navigation systems) is table stakes. For holiday 2014, retailers with large local presences need to create richer local listings. For our clients, we’re optimizing feeds in new ways like: showcasing the most popular products per store, noting whether inventory is in stock (particularly important in PLAs post Shipping Deadline) and managing local review data at scale (e.g. Yelp reviews) to surface customer feedback by location that can be used to optimize in-store shopping experiences.

“

On amazon, utilize paid search best practices like: goal setting and measurement, keyword research and development, ongoing copy and creative testing, bid and budget optimization.

3 maximize marketplaces Amazon added 30 million new customers in 2013, bringing its total active user base to 244 million. And now, advertisers have a new way to engage Amazon’s rapidly growing base: Amazon Sponsored Search. Much like traditional paid search, Amazon Sponsored Search ads are triggered by Amazon user search terms.

Many searchers are using vertical engines like Amazon for specialized queries - like shopping - rather than mass engines like Google. And like searchers, search advertising is also expanding well beyond Google. All retailers should leverage Amazon this holiday. Utilize paid search best practices like: goal setting and measurement, keyword research and development, ongoing copy and creative testing, bid and budget optimization.

4 forge a path to profit management Many retailers treat every sale the same by optimizing based only on metrics like ROI. In reality, each customer (e.g. new-to-file vs. loyalist) or product sale (e.g. high margin vs. liquidation) has distinct values. For holiday 2014 and beyond, retailers must forge a path to profit management by integrating customer data into digital campaigns. This will enable you to target, and convert, the most profitable customers, not just any customers.

First, leverage customer data to predict profit. Develop predictive models based on the value of each channel, geo, device, time, partner and placement to predict future revenue, and integrate these values into optimization and reporting platforms. Then, leverage the models to buy advertising based on the true value of each customer, including: • Geo-targeting ZIP codes with the most qualified customers • Boosting bids for keywords that drive larger shopping carts • Allocating budget across screens, engines, placements, devices and day parts based on profitability • Creating experiences by screen (copy, landing pages) tailored to needs of ideal customers

for help activating any of these performance strategies for holiday 2014, contact performics today.

Lindsay Landsberg SVP, Business Development Lindsay.Landsberg@performics.com +1 312 739 0670 www.performics.com