Maximising Re-targeting through Full Funnel Data Science
I wonder what you would say if you were asked for your confidence levels for the attribution of success for your last digital marketing campaign. There are, after all, some very good agencies out there that proport to measure ROAS (Return on Advertising Spend) based campaign success accurately. Yet, most brands still depend upon Google Analytics as their source of truth. Albeit they measure last click and not what’s driving that click, and in what proportion.
Why should we care?
After all, measuring the impact of every penny spent in the correct proportion to its impact on your desired key performance indicators has usually been filed under ‘too difficult.’
Well, some brands care very deeply. The use of data science to determine with high degrees of success the impact of the full funnel activity in the eventual sale is increasingly driving efficiency in marketing budgets. It’s a recognition that fewer buyers are active in a Cost-of-Living crisis, so you have to work smarter to win share of spend. A bigger bang for your buck! In any market that’s extremely helpful. In challenging trading conditions that’s gold dust.
Time to change the approach
Like a lot of businesses, for your typical multi-channel retailer, the Covid pandemic changed the way people operate and are regularly told that nothing will now be the same.
Some marketers have heard this and are seeing this as an opportunity to take a more scientific approach to measuring where success is being driven in their campaigns and calibrating the interaction of their budgets across the marketing funnel. Spending less on TV ads and more on driving quality traffic across the funnel and measuring how the upper funnel activity drives the cost per recruitment of new customers. The Awareness Impact, the Consideration Impact, and the Re-targeting Impact. In short, taking a longer term, more holistic, view of prospecting.
The Halo effect
Take a brand like ProCook, suppliers of quality cookware with a good reputation for quality, service and value. On the surface their client base might be less affected by the cost-of-living challenges. That also means that other brands may be tempted to move their branding into this area of the market. ProCook recognise that they need to be more assertive to protect the strong audience they have curated.
To do this it’s essential to understand how, and to what relative extent, value is being driven across the marketing funnel. Then how to use multiple channels to drive incrementality for revenue growth.
Using this approach ProCook are achieving 7-8x the target ROAS figure set for their campaigns and incremental revenue 35% higher than projected.
They also now understand how upper funnel advertising is influencing the overall purchase funnel. By looking at the “halo effect” of their marketing they can more accurately assess the impact upper funnel activity has in driving more traditional lower funnel activities like affiliates, brand search and email.
This kind of outcome requires detailed, data driven hard work. Multiple disciplines and channels must work together through Traffic Analysis, Search Uplift measurement, Halo Effect Analysis and Incremental Testing with hold outs for Re-targeting in order to drive campaign success.
Be in no doubt though that if your prepared to work with your partners to understand attribution on a more scientific level and take a longer-term view of how to generate revenue growth for your brand, the rewards are clear. Moreover, the rewards are measurable, and they will set you apart from your competition