The Sauce – 24/01/24

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

This week’s edition features a garden centre’s segmentation success, the world’s smallest gym, Ocado’s new marketing strategy and last week’s big talking point – that Calvin Klein ad.

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Reap What You Sow – Segmentation Delivers for Dobbies

Garden centre chain Dobbies has tapped into customer behaviour and seen 215% ROI with its new segmentation strategy.

With a goal to improve NPS, grow customer retention and hyper-personalise comms, Dobbies did a deep-dive into customer data. Using Dobbie Club Plus data, they were able to use a multi-targeting model to find the optimum products, offers and content for members. Crucially, Dobbies employed a ‘test and learn’ strategy and went from five versions of its mailings to 53,584!

And the results speak for themselves… a 199% rise in incremental revenue, along with 10% growth in average customer value and a 15% increase in ‘9 out of 10’ NPS scores. Job done!

The stats really underline the importance of understanding your audience, segmenting your customer data and personalising communications (we know, we say it a lot).

Ashleigh Morris, Content and Communications Lead at Awesomesauce Marketing, said, “We see a lot of clients confused around data segmentation and personalised communications, but it’s worth investing the time to get it right, as demonstrated by Dobbies. It’s just as important for B2B companies as it is for B2C businesses and can be a cost-effective way to increase sales and ROI.”

Feeling confused about segmentation? Message ashleigh@awesomesaucemarketing.co.uk to find out how we can help.

It’s just as important for B2B companies as it is for B2C businesses and can be a cost-effective way to increase sales and ROI.

Would You Try the ‘World’s Smallest Gym’?

Meta has launched the ‘world’s smallest gym’ inside Puma stores to promote its new Meta Quest 3 Mixed Reality VR headset. The experience encourages users to work out in a two-metre square space using the headset, giving them the opportunity to train in a space roughly the same size to what most people have available for a home workout.

The ‘gym’ experience features in two of Puma’s Berlin stores and allows people to try 15-20 minute workouts using the Quest 3’s fitness applications, from boxing to Zumba. The experiential campaign is enhanced with out-of-home, social media and editorial partnerships.

The campaign is perfectly timed to tie into people’s new year health kicks, but the twist from the recent influx of gym campaigns makes the campaign really stand out.

January is typically the time when gyms around the country see a surge in membership but not everyone can make it to a gym whether due to cost, lack of time, location or childcare issues. This campaign works as it has looked at consumer needs and taps into these. It also stands out by offering something different amongst the current gym ads, involving some cool tech while it’s at it.

In an increasingly digital environment, thinking differently and giving people the opportunity to trial products or services is a step forward in customer service and increases the chances of people making a purchase. 

Looking to stand out with your marketing this year? Contact us on hello@awesomesaucemarketing.co.uk.

 

Ocado’s Marketing Investment Sees Sales Soar

Online supermarket Ocado has seen active consumers increase by 5.9% in Q4, which it credits to its new focus on acquisition and retention.

The business dramatically cut its marketing budget in the first six months of last year and adapted its marketing strategy to be more efficient and focus on customer retention.

It’s done so with better targeting (yes, that again!) and an improved customer experience for a customer’s first few shops. As a result, the level of ‘mature customers’ (those who have ordered at Ocado at least five times) is the highest it’s ever been, up 9% year on year.

The new strategy saw the brand focus on acquiring new long-term customers rather than offering high discounts on individual shops for those unlikely to return. They have also focused on their ‘Perfect Execution’ strategy to increase retention. The strategy has also paid off in terms of revenue – up 7% year on year.

James Keith, Account & Strategy Director at Awesomesauce Marketing, said, “Ocado has shown you can increase revenue and ROI while reducing marketing spend if you’re clever with your communications across the marketing mix. I predict we’ll see many other businesses looking at retention and how it can lead to cost-effective growth in 2024.”

For help with marketing budgets and strategy, drop James a message on LinkedIn or email james@awesomesaucemarketing.co.uk.

You can increase revenue and ROI while reducing marketing spend if you’re clever with your communications across the marketing mix.

ASA Cancels Calvin Klein Ad

In case you missed it, Calvin Klein’s latest ad campaign caused a stir after receiving several complaints. The ASA reviewed the ads and banned one of the posters featuring singer FKA Twigs, but not another from the same campaign (which also attracted complaints) featuring model Kendall Jenner.

All the ads in the campaign feature the brand’s iconic line “Calvins or nothing”. The FKA Twigs ad features her wearing just a shirt, exposing the side of her body, while the Jenner iterations feature her topless in just a pair of jeans in one, and in underwear in the other.

FKA Twigs blasted the “double standards” while Calvin Klein said the ads are no different to previous ads it has run in the UK for many years. The decision from the ASA comes at a time when Calvin Klein has been grabbing plenty of attention for its ads featuring actor Jeremy Allen White.

The ASA ruling on the ad featuring FKA Twigs stated: “her nudity and facial expression, including a direct gaze and open mouth, gave the image an overall sexual overture. We therefore considered (the ad) was overtly sexual and was not suitable for display in an untargeted medium.”

This campaign is typical of Calvin Klein ads. Since the 1990s they have been pushing boundaries with ads promoting their clothing and lingerie. So, what’s different about this ad? It could be that it was viewed differently by the ASA due to the ad not actually showing the lingerie. While it makes a great brand campaign, not showing the product it’s promoting could have been the factor which pushed it over the edge.

James Keith, Account & Strategy Director at Awesomesauce Marketing, said, “From a marketing perspective, this is a great ad with a bold concept. I suspect Calvin Klein knew they were pushing boundaries and knew that even if the ad was banned it would be a talking point and get the results they wanted. Big brands such as Calvin Klein can afford to take risks, but for our B2B clients I would always advise playing it slightly safer, due to the risk to brand reputation and costs.”

 

You can check out our latest dollop of marketing news next week, and read our previous posts here.

Want to find out more about what we do and how we can help your business? 

Contact our Account & Strategy Director James Keith here >>> james@awesomesaucemarketing.co.uk.