SIGNALS from Sub2 – Prospecting just got much more exciting.

SIGNALS from Sub2 is a game changer. It’s making new customer acquisition for growth cost-effective again across both Display and Social Media channels. In so doing, is delivering real competitive advantage at a time when it’s genuinely needed. Fully compliant and fully protecting consumer privacy. Why is that happening and how could you take advantage?

In April 2021, Apple changed its privacy rules. Similar plans are being advanced by Google to limit and remove the use of cookies for targeting consumers. This has led to mild panic in some parts of the Digital Marketing industry.

Further confusion maybe afoot with the current UK Government threat to amend existing GDPR guidelines to create a Specific set of rules to protect UK consumers, presumably more business (and less consumer) friendly.

Nevertheless, it is perfectly reasonable for consumers to expect that their data is protected, and consent be at the heart of how that data is used. Indeed, it is an increasing expectation.

The commonplace response of Agencies whose job it is to advise and guide Advertisers through this changing landscape is to encourage brands to build up existing customer databases and focus on customer marketing. If this is managed via a Customer Data Platform to enable good decision making, it can be and is, very effective.

But what of prospective, new customers, that brands are yet to meet. The active consumers who drive growth in the market. The kind of people you’d prefer were buying from you.

Well one impact of a well-intentioned and necessary privacy first agenda is that targeting pools in digital media have reduced dramatically, with some estimates putting current targeting pools at30% of what they were. While this has inevitably led to increased CPM’s due to greater competition for these constricted targeting pools, it has presented an opportunity for smart Advertisers and Agencies to develop innovative methods to reach “lost” audiences which still contain active in-market consumers.

Even more prescient is that fallow audiences like that, which have not been targeted effectively for some time, tend to be very responsive to the right messaging. It seems crazy to ignore them.

But it doesn’t have to be that way!

The new breed of Agency establishing themselves in the UK get this. They understand that the correct combination of vast Data mining made actionable through carefully curated Tech Stacks, designed specifically for digital marketing performance is changing the game.

Agencies are becoming much cleverer at using algorithms to leverage the value of contextual data for improved CPM’s. Sub2 Technologies, for example, are employing a data-led strategy for Programmatic and Social with their SIGNALS targeting system. The concept is straightforward, if not ambitious in scale.

Sub2 are able to process up to 2 billion datapoints every day. The careful combination of contextual data, analytics and technology has allowed Sub2 to develop a unique set of actionable variables that determines the likelihood of any consumer to respond toa brand message across all the digital channels at any given point in a totally cookie-less way.

SIGNALS is finding advertisers new, in-market customers at CPM’s that traditional targeting solutions can only dream of. Moreover, it is doing that cost-effectively in both the Display and Social channels. The results to date have seen SIGNALS audiences outperform “In-platform” audiences by between 40 to 50%. Crucially, SIGNALS delivers advertisers, otherwise unavailable, audiences across both Safari/IOS and Firefox and provide clients with greater brand awareness and clear competitive advantage.

The concept has proven highly successful in both Online Retail and Financial Services and is having a significant impact.

Ripe Insurance, a provider of specialist insurance to Sports and Leisure Enthusiasts needed to exploit growth investment that the business had received. Previous tests to attract new customers from Programmatic and Paid social media had been unsuccessful. They ran a six-month test with Sub2 SIGNALS to determine if they could open new audiences for their services. Results were strong with growth at up to, and over, 80% better than targeted CPA. Moreover, test outcomes out-perform Google in-platform audiences by, again, up to 80%.

Lisa Meadows, head of Marketing at Ripe Insurance says “We have been impressed with the combination of Sub2 expertise in Data and Technology and their campaign service levels. The results they deliver give us real confidence.”

Being able to target new customers in this way is proving lucrative across all the digital channels. Advertisers are able to test the same concept in Display, Search and Social Media seamlessly through the pre-built system, already linked directly to all the main market platforms.

Respecting consumer privacy in data is paramount. The clever use of data driven technology to continue to enable brands to thrive and succeed in their growth ambitions is an example of how the creative use of data driven innovation continues to drive Digital Marketing success. For ambitious brand managers prepared to work with market innovators, that is delivering real competitive advantage.