The Sauce – 21/05/2024

Welcome to ‘The Sauce’ – your weekly dollop of marketing news.

By Ashleigh Morris, our Content and Comms Lead.

Welcome to ‘The Sauce’ – your dollop of marketing news from the past week.

This week we’re talking about B&Q’s video flop, Homebase’s new out-of-home campaign, and the latest news on marketing budgets.

Check out the Awesomesauce Marketing LinkedIn page to get The Sauce straight to your inbox every week.

How NOT To Do It, When You B&Q It!

How can brands demonstrate responsibly sourced materials in an engaging way?

That’s a question we were left discussing in the Awesomesauce office after watching B&Q’s latest video…

I was looking forward to seeing how the brand had used video content to demonstrate the journey of its responsibly sourced decking from Finland to customers’ gardens. But sadly, the video was a bit of an anti-climax…

At over 3 and a half minutes in length, it’s too long, too corporate, and, if we’re being honest, a little boring! The video feels like a corporate tick-box exercise rather than an engaging piece of content aimed at customers and prospects.

When I checked it also had just 29 views on YouTube in the 6 days since it launched – and that’s from a brand with 238,000 subscribers!

So what can you do to promote your sustainability credentials while also ensuring your brand doesn’t fall into the same trap?

I spoke to our social media guru Sapna to get her thoughts:

“B&Q had a great opportunity here to promote their admirable responsible sourcing in a way that’s unique and creative, but I just don’t think this campaign is engaging enough (especially the first few seconds). Here’s what I’d recommend to make sure your content stands out from the crowd:

Firstly, consider your platform before making decisions on format and length. We all have short attention spans so short and snappy works best, as does ensuring your content is optimised for mobile.

Remember the 3-second rule! You need to catch attention from the start or people will keep scrolling.

A lot of people watch content on silent so make sure your important messages are captioned on-screen.

Consider your audience – is someone from head office in a suit really the best person to resonate with them? Retail staff, customers, or micro influencers can often provide a more dynamic performance and better fit your customer base”.

All things considered… come on B&Q – you can do it!

Remember the 3-second rule! You need to catch attention from the start or people will keep scrolling.

Homebase Launches New OOH Campaign

Homebase has revealed its latest out-of-home campaign promoting its gardening range.

The clever ads are designed to appeal to the less knowledgeable gardener (like myself), and promote plants best-suited to north or south-facing gardens, dependent on the direction the poster faces.

The ads are part of the retailer’s existing ‘All Your Home Needs’ campaign. Timed well to coincide with the long-awaited return of better weather, the campaign identifies a gap in customer knowledge and demonstrates that Homebase can meet that need.

As someone who doesn’t know an allium from an aster (and had to Google to come up with these), I can definitely relate!

It’s creative and thinks outside the box with the tailored ads, without being gimmicky.

The ads featured outside Shortlands Railway Station in Bromley, and were complemented by the offer of free seeds for commuters and the chance to win prizes to use in-store.

In light of reduced marketing spend in many businesses, we’re seeing more companies consider how they can maximise impact with localised multi-platform (no pun intended) campaigns like we’ve seen with Homebase here.

Now, where’s my trowel?

It’s creative and thinks outside the box, without being gimmicky.

Average Marketing Spend Drops By 15%

How does your marketing spend compare with the latest industry trends?

Industry research from Gartner’s Annual CMO spend survey indicates that marketing budgets have dropped to 7.7% of overall company revenue – a fall of 15% YOY.

The figure has dropped for the last two years, from 9.1% last year, and 9.5% in 2022. It also takes spend further from the pre-pandemic 10.5% from 2019. The research is based on a global survey of 395 CMOs.

I asked our strategy expert James what this could mean for businesses. He said:

“Marketing budgets can be the first thing to take a hit when the economy takes a downturn or a business is struggling – frustrating for marketing teams who are often the ones to turn things around!

“The positive thing here is that everyone is in the same boat, so if your business has cut your spend you’re not alone! It can even be an opportunity to re-think your strategy, be creative, and think about what you could be doing differently to stand out from your competitors.

“We’re currently seeing many brands look at more efficient ways of increasing sales and profits, by focusing on customer loyalty and generating growth through higher spend from existing customers, rather than the generally higher cost of acquiring new customers.”

We’ve also seen significant investment in cost-effective channels such as social, paid search and digital display – have you considered incorporating these into your marketing strategy?

————————————————————–

Contact us on hello@awesomesaucemarketing.co.uk to find out how we can support your business with a client-centred marketing approach – building trust and loyalty.

You can check out previous editions of ‘The Sauce’ here.

Brought to you by Awesomesauce Marketing – a full-service marketing agency serving UK and international clients.