The outset of the COVID-19 pandemic is expected to bring about a slump in the global retail industry, which is expected to decline from $21,821.4 billion in 2019 to $21,622.6 billion in 2020.
However, the good news is that the economic recovery seen in different parts of the world in the last few months will again boost the retail market, which would then grow at a CAGR of 5% to reach $25,122.2 billion in 2023.
The much-awaited boost in the market would provide industry players with the impetus to resume their operations to fully capitalize on the imminent market boom. But the presence of such a plethora of retail brands makes it imperative for retailers to come up with new marketing tactics to get their brands noticed by their target audience.
Experimenting with new marketing channels can open new avenues for brands for lead generation and overall sales, which these three retail brands discovered after joining hands with Pinterest to drive their brand awareness campaigns.
1. Gravity Blankets
Gravity wanted to expand its digital advertising in the lead up to the 2018 festive season.
Their Objectives
They sought to boost their brand awareness efforts, which would help them scale customer acquisition efforts and drive sales for a lower cost. Also, they wanted to show their commitment to mental health.
Approach & Solution
Gravity worked with its digital performance agency, Agency Within, to kickstart a new campaign on Pinterest as they believed that the Pinterest demographic aligned with their target audience.
The combined team of Gravity and Agency Within used Pinterest’s latest new conversion optimization feature to get the maximum return on their ad spend. Owing to this fine-tuning, Gravity managed to send their ads across to the right audience and appear in relevant searches.
They lowered their cost per acquisition significantly and increased scale by adopting a phased approach. While they used keyword and interest targeting at the start of the campaign, they focused on keywords related to Christmas, relief, anxiety, and sleep to optimize their ad spend.
As their ultimate goals were to boost sales and acquire new clients, they used the Traffic objective to measure CPA effectively. After the early results, Agency Within launched more ad groups with heightened targeting that included act-alike audiences.
They used the best-performing Pinterest ads that they had already run for their creative. These top performers fit into many of Pinterest’s creative practices, which included eye-catching imagery, a vertical layout, and a text overlay that provided context.
The Result
The Pinterest campaign was highly successful for Gravity Blankets and outperformed internal benchmarks. The conversion optimization feature led to a 2x increase in the conversion volume and a 58% decrease in CPA.
2. New Balance
Boston-based sportswear company, New Balance, wanted to drive brand awareness for their new line, the Fresh Foam Collection, for running and training shoes.
Their Objectives
New Balance sought to run a brand awareness campaign that would boost purchase consideration and online sales through their wholesale partners and website among their target audience of active females.
New Balance teamed up with creative agency HYFN for the campaign and with them formulated a strategy that was based on the customer journey. Since people find products through multiple channels, devices, and platforms, their strategy followed a three-pronged approach.
They used Promoted Pins to create awareness and product consideration for Fresh Foam Collection.
They created Pins that felt native to Pinterest and appealed to their target demographic of active females.
They got in touch with their target audience at different points of their purchase journey, from discovery to consideration to sale.
The team leveraged Pinterest API along with interest, keyword, and act-alike targeting to reach out to the right audience. Also, they used both Promoted Pins, as well as, promoted Video Pins to get their creative right. While some Pins featured shoes from the collection in up-close product shots, others showed women wearing the shoes in casual lifestyle setups.
The Result
The Pinterest campaign for Fresh Foam Collection directed a large number of people to New Balance’s site and drove sales for both their online and offline channels, along with those of their wholesale partners.
A Kantar study found that there was a 7-point increase in message association and a 13-point increase in purchase consideration in people above the age of 35.
3. Wayfair
A long-time Pinterest advertiser and popular home decor brand, Wayfair, wanted to experiment with something new with their Promoted Video.
Their Objectives
While Wayfair wanted to tell their story through their Promoted Video, they also sought to build their collection of customer email addresses on a massive scale.
Approach & Solution
Promoted Video Pins create deeper engagement with Pinners, which is why Pinterest users are 54% more likely to purchase a product after seeing a video. While Wayfair found the idea of driving their email acquisitions impressive, they also saw substance in the idea from an analytical and creative standpoint.
Wayfair used Pinterest’s platform to promote a few of its multi-functional furniture pieces. The Pins showed a coffee table with storage, a cabinet hiding a guest bed, and a folding shelf unit that could convert to a table.
This way, Wayfair tracked the performance of individual Pins by testing a new creative concept.
The Result
The Pinterest campaign delivered decent results for Wayfair. The Promoted Video Pins achieved a 50% lower cost per click with optimized bidding and a 50% higher click-through rate than Wayfair’s internal benchmarks.
Wrapping Up
Brands can try different formats and creative and experiment with audience and keyword targeting to figure out what works for their business. Also, they can hone their campaign objectives with Traffic as their goal in Ads Manager and switch to conversion optimization whenever they want to push scale. Moreover, they need not shy away from shaking up their ongoing campaigns.