Opinion from Andrew Ryan, Director at Halo

When John Pemberton invented Coca-Cola in 1886, not even their catchy positioning of “Delicious! Refreshing! Exhilarating! Invigorating!” could persuade consumers to try it over all the other carbonated wonder tonics and elixirs already on the market.

So, to help increase sales his bookkeeper started giving away tickets for free tastes of Coke, but Pemberton chastised him for extravagance. Fast forward a few years when tycoon Asa Griggs Candler bought the company in 1888, he revisited the bookkeeper’s idea, and distributed thousands of bits of paper like the ones above, and so the coupon as we know it was born.

By 1913, Coca-Cola had redeemed over 8.5 million free drink coupons.

Thankfully the humble coupon itself has made a smooth transition to the 21st century and the new dawn of digital coupons will soon be the norm. If you want to boost your sales and attract more consumers, couponing is still a solid marketing tool to use. Coupons can help you create a sense of urgency, reward loyal consumers and increase brand awareness.

This is especially true in the cost-of-living crisis when consumers are even more value conscious. The tightening of consumer purse strings is placing an even greater demand on the need to deliver value where it matters. This is being born out from our findings across the UK, Europe, Africa and the US that there is a noticeable increase in response and uptake on any promotion that delivers real consumer value. Free and Save messages are currently outperforming all other mechanics.

However, unknown performance can place greater demands on budgets which is where Fixed Fee comes in to provide much needed cost certainty. Fixed Fee is perfect for when costs are variable and the final outcome is unknown. It allows a campaign to be budgeted for regardless of the final performance, protecting the variable costs under a one off completely covered​ Fixed Fee with the backing of re-insurance.

By combining the powerful mechanic of couponing with the cost certainty benefits of Fixed Fee, brands can better navigate these tough trading conditions.​

Why coupons?

1. Couponing creates a sense of urgency. When consumers see that a coupon has an expiration date, they are more likely to act fast and make a purchase before they miss out on a good deal.
2. Couponing appeals to the masses, everyone loves saving money, and couponing allows consumers to feel like they are getting more value for their money.
3. Couponing encourages repeat purchases. By offering coupons that can be redeemed on future purchases, you can increase consumer retention and loyalty. You can also use coupons to cross-sell or upsell other products or services that complement your main offer.
4. Couponing generates word-of-mouth. Social sharing. When consumers are happy with purchases, they’re more likely to share their positive experiences with friends and family. You can also incentivize referrals by offering coupons to both the referrer and the referee.

  Quick couponing checklist                                         

• Set clear goals and objectives for your coupon campaign. What do you want to achieve? Who do you want to target? How will you measure your success?
• Choose the right type of coupon for your offer. There are different types of coupons, such as percentage off, £1 off, buy one get one free, free delivery. Choose the one that best suits your product or service and your target audience.

Tracking, ROI and first party data

• Analyse and optimise your coupon campaign. You can monitor and evaluate the results of your coupon campaign regularly. You can use metrics such as redemption rate, conversion rate, average order value, consumer acquisition cost, consumer lifetime value. You can also collect feedback from your consumers to improve your offer and consumer experience.
• Coupons can help you collect valuable consumer data and feedback. You can use coupons to ask consumers for their email addresses, phone numbers, or opinions. This can help you build your consumer database and improve your marketing strategies.

The humble coupon might not get the recognition it deserves, especially at awards events, but you clients will thank you for the direct impact it can have on driving trade.

Couponing is certainly not broken, far from it, but they might need fixing in which case we’d be delighted to help.

The post Isn’t It Time We Fixed Couponing? appeared first on IPM Bitesize.

Mando are delighted to share details of the latest campaign they have worked on for the Infamous Treasury Wine Estates brand, 19 Crimes.  TWE have launched the ultimate treasure hunt, giving customers the chance to win a share of £100,000 in the UK and €2,500 in ROI.  The campaign challenges the nation to find one of four hundred limited-edition ‘19^th corks’ worth £250 each in the UK and one of ten limited-edition corks worth €250 in ROI.

Mando have worked closely alongside independent marketing agency Make Lemonade Limited to aid in the promotional concept, route of entry planning and implementation of the campaign with a key focus being the security of the winning corks, the digital claim route and covering the financial risk of the campaign with a Fixed Fee.

The winning corks are concealed within Promotional 750ml bottles of 19 Crimes Red Wine, Uprising, Chard, Sauv Block and Revolutionary Rose and can be found in supermarkets and impulse channels.  Promotional bottles feature an innovative sticker wrap neck-collar with a QR code to direct consumers to the campaign microsite, the19thcork.com, built by the team at The Digital Maze.

Leonie Walker, MD of Mando Promotions, says “It’s been fascinating seeing this campaign develop over the months to what we see on shelf today.  From the initial brief from Make Lemonade, to the mechanic design, the factory visits and microsite development.  It’s been a pleasure working with the wider team of suppliers on this exciting and much loved campaign.”

Maria Sze, Founder Make Lemonade Limited: “The 19th Cork is almost legendary amongst 19 Crimes consumers. We needed a team who could work with TWE supply chain to ensure the ultimate brand treasure hunt was executed fairly and securely. Having worked with Mando numerous times in the past, we knew they’d be a great partner to help us deliver the campaign.”

Ben Blake, Marketing Director at Treasury Wine Estates, says: “Through the winning 19th cork campaign, we are striving to provide our customers with memorable and engaging experiences that push the boundaries of the wine category and encourage our consumers to discover more. The 19th cork campaign is unique and we are confident it will drive visibility of the 19 crimes brand.”

If you’d like more information on this campaign, or would like to find out how Mando or the wider team can help bring your campaign concept to life, please get in touch with Leonie Walker leonie.walker@mando.co.uk.

The post 9 CRIMES UNCORKS THE ULTIMATE TREASURE HUNT THIS SPRING WITH THEIR ‘FIND THE 19th CORK’ CAMPAIGN appeared first on IPM Bitesize.

Partnerships based on advanced sports analytics can lower costs and open up creative sales promotions opportunities around major sporting events, says Martin Bailey of Opia

Data analytics now dominate the coverage of sport, as broadcasters and journalists gain access to detailed performance statistics used by coaches and bookmakers.

The ever-growing sophistication of sports analytics conducted by powerful algorithms and machine-learning provides instantaneous breakdowns of almost every useful match or career detail, from passes completed, to their direction, length and recipients. Goal-scoring opportunities, yardage covered, cautions incurred on a wet Tuesday – all the data is there along with its analysis.

There are massive benefits for marketers, too: tapping into this data offers brands and agencies the opportunity to run bespoke sports-based promotional campaigns around specific events.

The biggest opportunity in the world

With the FIFA World Cup, the world’s biggest single-sport tournament, looming, retailers and manufacturers will use the unmatched pulling-power of football to boost sales promotions for everything from consumer electronics to cars, fuel and furniture, with cash-for-goals or cashback campaigns relating to wins by the UK home nations.

Sports marketing has been around for decades; but developments in technology and social media have revolutionised opportunities for creativity.

One example is the English Sports Council’s 2015 #ThisGirlCan campaign, which addressed health issues such as obesity after research showed that two million more men than women participated in sports in the UK. In this case, the use of sports analytics was backed up by showing positive, normal women as role models. The resulting video content was viewed and shared over eight million times. Two years later the hashtag is still going strong and women across the country have been inspired to be more active.

Real Madrid recently cemented its position as one of the biggest international football brands by launching its own Snapchat account. In just three months, the club gained almost half a million subscribers.

These sporting organisations used insights derived from data analysis to enable them to engage with fans effectively. They used analytics to segment their fans, estimate customer lifetime values (CLV), generate leads, predict retention of existing fans, and measure performance of marketing activities. All to great effect.

Big sports data is the difference

Until now, the approach used to calculate insurance rates involved in a sports cashback promotion has been based largely on assumptions, loss ratios and subjective form, with bookmaker odds often acting as a base point. This means rates have been historically impacted by cognitive bias (for example the expectation that England will do better than they are actually likely to do in the World Cup) and influenced by a herd mentality on how the rest of the market acts.

As more bets are placed on the home nations the cost to place the bet increases, simply because more bets have been placed. In reality, the underlying conditions have not changed.

Accurate sports data can remove this bias and ensure the most accurate promotional pricing.

Disrupting sport risk promotion market

More recently, we have seen new partnerships disrupt the status quo, for example between consultancies designing customer-grabbing, bold, creative sales promotions and incentives, and the companies supplying the data to the sport and betting industries. Sales promotion strategies are now crafted from these advanced data-sets, reflecting the reality on the pitch and not the sudden enthusiasms or group-think of the betting market.

Now, insurance underwriters can see that the consultancy has designed a sports risk promotion based on hard, detailed and thoroughly-analysed data from sports risk companies.

The significant advantage to retailers and manufacturers in all this is that premiums become lower. It means that far more companies can undertake the kind of creative promotions they have hitherto only considered as fantasy football items on a wish-list marketing plan.

Creativity and expertise in promotion-design

Promotions can be quirky and distinctive, but they need to be easily understood so that the ordinary consumer feels included. It would be too easy to use the wealth of big data analysis to come up with a promotion that appeals to a relatively narrow band of devoted fans.

A cashback offer that rewards a consumer buying a high-value washing machine for every goal scored by a high-profile team or player is more likely to hit the right demographic than one related to the number of bookings achieved by players with poor disciplinary records. This is an obvious example, but it is all too easy to get it wrong and end up with a costly flop or a promotion that over-achieves and leads to higher-than-expected levels of redemption and very high costs. This is where access to consultancies with the creativity and long experience of running such campaigns, is a pre-requisite.

Retailers and OEMs must launch their promotions now

In fact, the science of promotions has been operational for a decade, using predictive analytics and specialist underwriting guarantees to ensure that the promotion hits the back of the net without the retailer or manufacturer ending up out-of-pocket. Ordinarily, the downside of not being able to predict how many customers will take up the offer would be the risk of the promotion lingering on a firm’s balance sheet, as well as the potential financial risks if the promotion was more popular than anticipated.

Now, however, end-to-end management of risk-managed promotions with a sports hook has been taken to the next level of performance through the application of big data sports analytics. This heightened level of big data insight, combined with the creative expertise and flair of a risk-backed sales promotion consultancy is an unbeatable pairing. It will enable any retailer or manufacturer to stand out from the crowd and achieve far greater revenues than competitors when the World Cup comes round. The tournament is however, approaching fast and organisations need to grasp the opportunity now. It should be a great summer.

Martin Bailey is an Account Director with creative sales promotion consultancy Opia. Opia has recently partnered exclusively with sports risk experts Siepe Sports, who specialise in the provision of sports analytics data to the insurance industry, to enhance the assessment of risk levels in sports-related promotions.

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There’s been a lot of negative comment about the Winning Moments mechanic now being used in many prize promotions. But is the problem with the mechanic, or how promotions are being explained to consumers, asks Steve Berry of Emirat

Following some negative press about the overall odds of winning and the number of actual winners in some recent prize promotions, frozen food company McCain has become the latest brand to announce that they won’t be running any more Winning Moments-style prize promotions in the future.

The complaints about Winning Moments, and the strategic reaction by many promoters to them, lead many to ask if this reflects how all consumers feel. Is everyone losing faith in Winning Moments? I would argue not.

The average consumer would more than likely take a promotion in the spirit it was created – as a bit of fun. I am certain that McCain in no way set out to do anything other than inspire and delight their consumers with a fun and attractive promotion.

I don’t, in truth, know the facts – I didn’t work on this promotion – but I would guess McCain, working within a set budget, used fixed fee or promotional insurance to stretch that budget and provide the opportunity to win as many prizes as possible. Their intent ultimately would have been to make it more exciting, more appealing and to get a better response.

Compliance with the CAP Code

If this promotion was set up and implemented in accordance with the Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP) codes, the rules which govern all marketing activity in the UK, which I imagine it was, then all the prizes which the public were told could be won were in fact available to be won.

Therefore, the fact remains, had more people played, more prizes would have been won.

Let’s not forget, the whole idea of a promotion is as an enticement to purchase, the end goal being that you purchase the product, not enter a promotion. Furthermore, not all promotions guarantee a reward in exchange for this purchase, and they are not intended to. It’s a bonus, an add-on, a supplement to the product which is, most importantly, what you are actually buying!

The bag of chips cost no more than usual, therefore it hasn’t cost anything to enter this promotion. What then is there to feel disgruntled about? It’s not like buying a lottery ticket where you are actually paying to enter a competition. But again, with this too, you are only given a chance to win and no guarantees are given.

So why then, in the context of a promotion, which you are not paying to enter, does the idea that someone ‘could’ win seem to be an alienating concept all of a sudden?

I have read a lot of criticism and cries for promotional prizes to be ‘guaranteed’; but before promoters react, I would ask that they put this into context. While a promotion might guarantee prizes and therefore winners, it doesn’t dictate any differential in the ultimate appeal or number of participants that engage in a promotion. More winners, yes. More entries? Sadly, no.

Having a small number of guaranteed prizes can actually harm your promotion and objectives. This is due to the fact that the average consumer will perceive that, with only a few prizes to be won, they have very little chance of winning and so won’t bother to take part.

Worse still, they may not even buy the product, or in the frequency you are looking for, which is the whole reasoning for running the promotion in the first place!

The prizes are then only won by those that bother to take part, who perhaps aren’t the target audience that the promotion is aimed at.

I have seen for myself the same pool of participants winning prizes repeatedly during a promotion and in lots of cases, across a variety of promotions. These people are naturally the first to criticise a promotion with longer odds and no guaranteed winners because, frankly, they aren’t winning.

Your average consumer probably wouldn’t have the same view and it’s a shame for any brand to shy away from a Winning Moments promotion because of the view of a minority.

Winning Moments – indeed, all prize promotions with a ‘chance’ element – have their benefits. They allow for more inspiring and exciting promotions, which we all know have a far greater marketing impact, reach and ROI than your average free prize draw. They can help facilitate the creative, fun and fabulous promotions that we love to see on the shelves, by making them affordable and exciting at the same time. I don’t want to see promotional marketing like this disappear, especially when it really doesn’t have to.

In all fairness, though, there are perhaps two sides to this argument. You could argue that if you usually buy a different brand and made a buying choice solely based on the ‘chance’ to win something, do you deserve better odds? Maybe a guaranteed reward? I can certainly see the point to this argument.

Striking a happy medium

Perhaps, then, there has to be a balance with these things, a way to offer a fantastic promotion and keep the odds reasonable; by being just that.

Here, in my humble opinion, is how to go about striking that balance:

• Create a good ratio of packs to wins – 100m packs and a few prizes that ‘could’ be won isn’t a good ratio to go on. Decide what would be reasonable for your customers, what you’d expect to see as a consumer and go with that.
• Guarantee some of the prizes – put aside some of the budget to ensure you have winners.
• Use the other part of the budget to cover additional prizes and have ‘winning opportunities’. This will allow for the budget to go further and the promotion be as exciting as you’d like it to be!
• Mop Up – have a prize draw after the close of the promotion to compensate for late entries and entrants who’ve entered during the promotion and not won.
• Limit the number of winning individuals – so that the same people don’t get all the prizes and it’s fair for everyone.
• Don’t scrimp! The promotional website shouldn’t cost more than the promotional prizes! If it does, you probably need to look at it again.
• Be upfront. If you’re clear about the prizes and the odds, the choice for consumers is easy – buy and take part or don’t. It’s not about misleading anyone, ever!
• Choose your words carefully. Transparency is key; ‘’to be won’’ isn’t the same as ‘’could be won’’. Make sure you’re using language that can’t be misunderstood.

Steve Berry is managing director of fixed fee and promotional risk management company EMIRAT.

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Fixed-fee company Mando has launched a new partnerships agency, Mando-Connect, which uses a data-fuelled approach to leverage a range of different data-sets to develop partnerships based on science.

Mando is part of global marketing services group WPP, and Sir Martin Sorrell, WPP’s Chief Executive, says: “Mando-Connect makes smart use of over 40 years’ hard-won knowledge of people’s response to promotions. Their clients should love it”.

Mando-Connect will design partnerships and rewards based on the smart use of cutting-edge data and insight. Its custom-built Partnership Engine leverages three extensive data sets, including WPP and YouGov data, Mando’s own ProNet database, covering 20 data points from over 3,000 promotions, and the Connect PartnerBank, which covers 2,000 audited brand partners.

Mando-Connect will specialise in partnerships for customer acquisition and awareness, loyalty, promotions and brand perception shift.

It is already working with Merlin Entertainments, MoveGB, Readly and breast cancer awareness charity Coppafeel!.

Charlie Hills, Managing Director of Mando-Connect and also its Head of Strategy, says that smart use of data can create more impactful partnerships, with higher ROI for clients. She observes: “Our unique data-fuelled insights enable us to know which partnerships will meet our client’s expectations, and which will exceed them. Did you know, for example, that by including an element of personalisation in your approach, a brand can see up to seven times more impact from a promotional partnership?”

The Mando-Connect senior leadership team includes Becky Munday (Mando CEO and former Chairman of UK marketing industry trade body, the IPM), Charlie Hills and Jo Ashdown, Head of Partnerships. The three bring decades of experience in partnerships across sectors including media, leisure, sport, travel, telecommunications, financial services, restaurants, FMCG and retail.

Becky Munday is excited to make the step-change: “Mando’s unique promotional and rewards data is the fuel that will enable us at Mando-Connect to propel partnerships to the next level. By working together and leveraging our unique data, brands can achieve far more together than they can alone, creating purposeful and cost-effective relationships.”

The picture show (left to right) Jo Ashdown, Becky Munday and Charlie Hills.

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No matter what new technological invention or innovation in promotion you choose, the challenge of standing out in a crowded marketplace remains, says Chris Baldwin of Sodexo. PROMOTIONAL FEATURE

Brands risk devaluing their campaign products by discounting too frequently, and with tight margins to meet it just isn’t economical.

This is where adding value is key. Marketers would be better not lopping pennies off in store for a meagre splash but instead adding value or being creative with ‘discount’ for a big eye catching impact.

Adding value is the easy bit – promotions, prizes, trade-ins and guarantees can help brands stand out for all the right reasons. But with so many different promotional mechanics, how do marketers choose which is best for their campaign?

Looking at what they want to achieve is a pretty good start…

Promoting value

Snipping coupons is old school, right? Wrong! This mechanic’s popularity shows no sign of dwindling. The use of money-off coupons is as popular as ever. Even truly old school methods like cutting out vouchers in newspapers still draws a crowd.

Sodexo, part of the Sodexo family, worked with John Smith’s to create a coupon in the Mirror that saw readers receiving £1 off their next purchase. Creating a robust alignment between The Mirror and the brewery – and putting savings in consumers’ hands. With Sodexo covering all the possible redemptions, remaining financing liable and providing campaign analysis, John Smith’s were able to reach an offline audience and inspire a purchase.

Another ‘discount’ mechanic on the block, cashback, has the potential to increase sell out while enabling marketers to reduce the profit sacrificed by a true, flat discount. By highlighting the ‘discount’ (savings made once cashback is paid) rather than the reduced price, marketers can create a greater sense of urgency and give consumers a reason to ‘buy now’.

Plus, cashback allows marketers to sell a product at full price, increasing basket spend for the retailer, while knowing that, once the offer has finished, they’re not left with the damaging effects of price erosion.

Instant gratification

Before AR, VR, QR and the rest, scratch cards were literally the most interactive way to promotionally market to consumers en masse. Odds on scratch cards tend to be greater than in other mechanics, and the compulsion of finding out if you’re an instant winner is hard to shake.

An instant win promotion requires a relatively large prize pool which can put agencies and manufacturers off. But instant wins need not blow the budget – with the right risk management in place, marketers really can afford to reward everyone and reap all the excitement in their follow up collateral.

Gift with purchase is a great example of instant gratification. From the high tech to the cuddly, a gift with purchase rewards impulse buys as well as repeat customers. We can enlist the help of risk management agencies to help calculate levels of participation, expected reward claims and cover the promotion with a fixed-fee to protect their budget.

Inspiring confidence

Marketers that are looking to develop consumer trust through their offering need to drive forward campaigns that inspire confidence and conviction in their products and services. And there are a number of different mechanics that help build relationships in this way.

Whether inspiring consumers to switch brands or try a product for the first time, Try Me Free promotions are a great idea to help encourage confidence in potential customers and inspire repeat purchase and new-found loyalty. Brands look like they are so sure of their product that they will give it away for free, knowing that consumers won’t be able to resist a repeat purchase. And with the help of some agency expertise, brands can work work out how many product samples are likely to be claimed so they don’t spend a penny over budget.

Another confidence-inspiring mechanic with consumers is the product guarantee. How much more can a brand do to prove it has 100% faith in its product than literally give dissatisfied consumer their money back? The problem is, product guarantees can strike fear into brands who worry that a flood of claims will see them hit financial ruin. But it doesn’t have to be that way. By understanding the risk, and calculating the likely number of claims a balanced budget can be achieved.

Buy and Try de-risks the purchase process for consumers – often related to high value purchases. It removes purchase barriers for nervous or thrifty customers, as they can buy what they really want, safe in the knowledge that they have up to 90 days to return it, no questions asked!

Building anticipation

The Advertising Standards Authority describes prize draws as when ‘Prizes are only awarded to those who return the winning code or symbol to the promoter within the promotional period.’

By running a prize draw campaign, marketers can build anticipation – and brand awareness – by offering amazing prizes (think cars, holidays, one of a kind experiences) but limit the opportunity to win and avoid any substantial risk. The most important thing is offering something spectacular that’s worth entering for – and being clear in the terms and conditions.

Driving loyalty

When customers feel like they get something extra from a brand they will bring their custom back time and time again – why would they look elsewhere for less? Marketers can reap the benefits of loyal consumers by rewarding a purchase with points or offers that they can’t get anywhere else. Points and offers which drive consumers back to spend again, attracted by the idea that they’re getting something for nothing thanks to a previous purchase.

Collector schemes are another great way for brands to drive loyalty. Sales are increased as shoppers collect tokens etc. and the customer is enticed to buy more and more in order to fulfill the gift or prize requirement.  Again, a smart promotional agency can protect brands’ budgets – and ensure all consumers get the rewards they’ve been promised.

Removing barriers to purchase

In a crowded marketplace where prices fluctuate and competition is fierce, consumers hold onto their purchases for longer than ever before. No matter how loyal a consumer is to a brand, once they have a household product (for example), they just don’t need to get another similar version.

So, how do marketers get consumers interested in upgrading to the latest and greatest models when they already have the old one in full working order stacked up in their broom cupboard?  This is where trade ins come in – by offering the customer something tangible for their old product, marketers are removing the barriers to purchase.

In our latest Case Study we explore how popular cleaning brand Kärcher ran a trade in campaign to encourage existing customers to upgrade to their latest model. The July 2016 promotion was focused on current window vac owners and offered them a cash incentive to move on to a better machine – if they bought the new Kärcher WV5, with an RRP of £89.99, and traded in their old machine they could receive up to £30 in cashback.

The campaign involved a number of different parties to ensure a seamless delivery to the consumer, from the receipt validation to the cashback payment Sodexo sourced and handled every element meticulously. Sodexo also built the microsite which looked to consumers as simply an extension of the Kärcher website – the site housed the claim area, all the promotion information including contact details, where and what to buy, how to claim and the FAQs. With hundreds of stores involved and a relatively complex offer to make simple, the campaign had the potential to be challenging but was pulled off expertly and with plenty of lessons learned.

Clearly, campaign mechanics aren’t ‘one size fits all’ and each, however old or new, serves a purpose in today’s busy marketplace. The challenge for marketers is choosing the right one for their needs, measuring its success and being reflective as the embark on the next one.

Chris Baldwin is Director of Consumer Promotions and Loyalty at Sodexo. 

Sodexo has published a new eBook,  How new technology is driving the promotional marketing industry, taking a closer look at the digital revolution and how it can help marketers influence shoppers. For a free copy, click here.

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Opia, the international risk-managed sales promotions consultancy, has appointed Darryl Postelnick, former Microsoft Vice President of US Retail Sales as Sales Director for the North American market.

Postelnick has been recruited by Opia after a 15-year career at Microsoft, which he joined after eight years as Director of Sales at Disney’s Buena Vista Home Entertainment division.

At Microsoft, Postelnick was given the brief to assemble the team that would successfully launch the Xbox console, functioning as Director of Sales within the Xbox division for two years before moving into general management of all Microsoft consumer goods over a 10-year period. Most recently, Postelnick functioned as Vice President of US Retail Sales, managing a team of 80 employees and a $6 billion budget.

As Opia’s Sales Director, North America, Postelnick will bolster the fixed fee and risk management expert’s position in the US markets, leading sales efforts and scaling business through partner relationships, as well as identifying and developing key verticals to aid Opia’s growth in the US.

“Retailers are so used to running the same promotions all the time. Opia’s promotions are creative and accomplish the priorities of their partners,” Postelnick said. “Opia has the unique ability to address each client’s priorities in a way that is exciting and from outside the box.”

He added: “I think that Opia will become a turnkey solution in the electronic retailers’ toolkit. Opia provides solutions that solve the problems for a lot reputable global electronics brands, especially when it comes to addressing the refresh cycle. Being able to provide great sales promotions to give people the incentives to upgrade earlier is what attracted me to the company.”

Opia Managing Director Andrew Marwick observed: “Darryl is a proven industry leader who brings with him a wealth of experience and expertise that will prove instrumental in expanding our operations in the US. We’ve already collaborated with Darryl on a consultancy level and now we’re delighted to welcome him on board to head up our sales strategy in this incredible market. This is another great milestone for Opia.”

Opia is an industry expert in risk managed sales promotions, with a proven track record in results-driven business and consumer campaigns for brand owners in the hi-tech, telecoms, FMCG, retail and automotive sectors.

Supported by a 24/7 customer service team fluent in 18 languages, Opia’s global reach enables it to offer multilingual redemption campaigns in over 60 countries, including EMEA, North and South America and Asia-Pacific.

Opia was acquired by Australian media and entertainment company Village Roadshow Ltd (VRL) in December 2015. VRL bought 80% of the business for approximately £24 million. Opia Managing Director Andrew Marwick and Sales Director Steve Gales retained a 20% holding in the company and continue to run the business on a day-to-day basis. Opia became part of Village Roadshow’s Digital Division, together with Edge Loyalty Systems Pty Ltd, which VRL acquired in 2012.

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Price cuts are short term responses which can damage brand values, says Chris Baldwin of Sodexo. Instead, brands should build value with intelligent promotional activities. PROMOTIONAL FEATURE

With a fluctuating pound and ongoing political uncertainty, the pressure is on for UK brands who are facing potentially higher import and export costs to still offer customers value while protecting both their margins and their reputations.

Manufacturers who have already tried to compensate for the additional costs caused by the falling post-Brexit pound have faced criticism in the media and resistance from retailers happy to position themselves as the consumers’ champions. Tesco and Unilever’s row over Marmite and other iconic brands was put to bed at record speed but the issue itself looks set to run and run.

Cutting price is often seen as simple ‘quick-fix’ when trying to appear good value; but the problem with price cuts is that, unless they are part of a long term strategy aligned with the budget sector of the market, in the medium to long term, they damage a brand’s reputation and cheapen the identity as a whole. Put simply, the long-term consequence of price cuts is devaluing the brand.

Brands and manufacturers need to think instead of their long-term goals. A quick fix is very rarely the answer and will more likely create further problems down the line.

The price of loyalty

With a longer term strategy, such as a focus on loyalty, brands can instead start building up consumer engagement and retention. According to forbes.com, just a 5% increase in customer retention can boost a company’s profitability by a staggering 75%. This impressive statistic highlights just how important consumer loyalty is – and the huge value in repeat customers.

Experts say that it can be six to seven times more expensive to acquire a new customer than to keep an existing one, so the importance of loyalty is clear.

Risk and reputation

Savvy consumers will look always for value – but rarely at the expense of quality. Resorting to price cuts will only serve to cheapen a brand’s identity, creating the impression of poor quality. If a brand wants to be seen as still delivering quality products, and so drive customer interest, while still achieving margin targets, it would be far better to get clever about tapping into the consumer psyche.

Clever brands think of their objectives with every consumer campaign, whether the activity involves creating a buzz with coupons offering the opportunity to ‘try me free’ at launches, or driving repeat purchase and building loyalty with ‘Money Off Next Purchase’ offers or encouraging one-off purchases with well-aligned, inspiring prizes.

Manufacturers need to focus on what their brand associations are and offer something completely complementary to these. Something tangible like a prize or a getaway adds value to a product, balances risk and increases the opportunity to connect with the customer in further marketing and social media communications.

Sodexo’s Savvy Cynics report found that over a third of consumers interviewed were more likely to buy a product that was part of a promotional campaign, which clearly demonstrates that the potential impact of a well-planned campaign is massive.

Just the ticket

For clever brands who have researched and developed their strategy, focused in on their target audiences and settled on their key objectives, the trickiest part can be deciding which prize mechanism works best to excite and reward their customers – should marketers opt for adding value with physical prizes that have great product synergy or should they be exploring something a little more personal, like a tailor-made holiday experience?

Research suggests that the Millennial generation of consumers does find far more value in an experience than in a physical thing, with three in four of them saying they are willing to spend more on events and experiences than ever before.

Events and experiences doesn’t just mean winning exotic holidays, or dream trips to sporting events; cinema offers another tried and trusted option. Brands can partner with the latest blockbuster film via competitions offering tickets as prizes to create a real buzz around a product, while shrewd brands may also consider aligning with film in a more general sense, offering longer-term promotional activations giving people discounts on cinema tickets for example. Linking with individual films or with the cinema in general can be hugely attractive – over 70% of 16-24 year olds cite cost as a reason why they don’t visit the cinema as often as they would like.

Consumer cred: adding value

The key to keeping consumers on side is not offering them something for less, but rather something more. Price cuts and BOGOFs can only go so far before a product starts to lose value. They can also put customers off with confusing price points that seem to fluctuate throughout the year or, worse, make more consumers into promiscuous shoppers.

By keeping prices relatively stable but supporting brands with value-added promotions, marketers can maintain or even increase long term brand value and avoid cheapening brand image.

Added-value promotions also allow marketers to capitalise on a range of opportunities to raise the profile of their products, boost sales and be seen by consumers as offering something a bit extra. Clever promotional marketing campaigns can see help manufacturers align with the latest trends, whether in cinema, travel, music, sports or consumer goods while maintaining a healthy brand image.

Promotional marketing gives a brand the opportunity and environment to display its personality and drive engagement and conversation with their target shopper, or potential shopper, in a way that a BOGOF simply cannot.

Chris Baldwin is Director of Consumer Programs at Sodexo. The Sodexo family, which includes the Promorati brands Protravel, Filmology, Fotorama and Entice, is Headline Sponsor of The IPM Awards 2017.

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Research shows that the key to successful promotions is whether consumers trust a brand, argues Ben Craker of Fotorama PROMOTIONAL FEATURE

Supermarkets these days are like Aladdin’s caves, filled with thousands of different products. The shelves are groaning with promotions, prizes and chances to win. It can be mind boggling enough for a consumer to make the right decision – but for a brand, it’s absolutely crucial.

To try and establish what consumers are thinking during those critical decision making moments, we recently conducted some research which highlighted the existence of a group we have dubbed the Savvy Cynics, which we have explored in a new report.

Our research found that 70% of consumers have entered a free draw as part of an on-pack promotion.  A third of respondents in the Savvy Cynics shopper marketing report stated that promotions were more likely to make them purchase a product.

But the question in every brand manager’s mind is how to make sure their promotion is chosen? Our experience and research suggests it’s about more than having the best prize or even the best product — it’s about trust.

In 2014 the Guardian asked the question what factor influences customers to make a commitment to your brand and keep coming back for more? And the answer was trust.

Trust takes time to build but it can be broken in an instant. Our research revealed that 95% of ‘Savvy Cynic’ participants share their bad experiences with a company or brand.

Based around the research we have identified four ways that brands can build trust in their promotional marketing, so helping cultivate brand loyalty, confidence and campaign success.

1 Simplicity

Is the campaign clear? Is the benefit clear?

Do consumers understand exactly what they’re getting, whether it’s a prize entry or a money-off coupon?

Shopper marketing can be challenging, and it’s a complex balancing act between ensuring that consumers are satisfied while brands see return on their investment. Campaigns need to be simple and fun. Sometimes the easiest, oldest tricks in the book win out. A third of people like to get a money off coupon for their next purchase, on their packaging… could it get any easier than that?

2 Language

Does the language a brand uses make them more trustworthy? They must be clear and concise about what customers will get by using language carefully throughout their promotional marketing campaign.

Clarity is key. Don’t try and ‘trick’ people with complex language and expressions or complicated offers. That just generates confusion, creates reservations in consumers’ minds about your brand and ultimately may turn them off your product altogether.

Where brands ‘guarantee’ something in a promotion, they must actually ‘guarantee’ it! Be careful what you say: in a prize promotion, you should be offering a chance or an opportunity to, and you should make it clear how many prizes there are in total – so you can mention the big headline prize but qualify it with something like ‘or win 1 of 100,000 other prizes’

3 Clear Instructions

Maybe it’s a gift with purchase or maybe it’s a competition involving tricky questions that test brand loyalty; but whatever form the promotional campaign takes, it must be clear to the consumer what the ‘added value’ for them is and what they have to do to qualify for the chance to enjoy it. Downloading receipts, collecting coupons, entering codes online or aligning with events — whatever the mechanic it needs to be clear to the consumer what steps they need to take.

4 Joined up marketing for brand stability

Brand stability refers to the steadfastness of a brand in the face of social and market changes and influences. It is, of course, important to roll with changes in the big, wide world; but it’s just as important to stay steadfast to who the brand is and what it stands for. From everyday marketing communications to one-off campaigns, messaging needs to be consistent in order for consumers to truly get to grips with who you are.

It’s not rocket science. By breaking down the promotion into its simplest fundamentals you can keep your message clear and deliver against your objectives for each campaign. Think about the basics: audience, objectives, measurement and your brand’s USP.

When the face and future of a brand hangs so precariously on maintaining trust with consumers, it’s imperative that each and every sales promotion is neat, simple and by the book, to ensure no brand value is lost through any ‘dubious’ promotions.

Customers will vote with their money and one iffy campaign lasts long in the memory. The 2016 Walkers ‘Holiday’ campaign was splashed all over the press this year for example.

Deliver on your promises!

As the experts at trustedadvisor.com, who understand well the importance of trust to businesses, explain: “credibility is probably the most commonly thought-of trust component, but it is only one… Believable, credentialed… and having a track record… are traits we most consciously look for when screening vendors.”

A track record is hugely important and every campaign speaks volumes about your brand. Done right, each campaign is a step towards greater trust between brand and consumer. As The Guardian said in the article that accompanied its 2014 research, “for those brands trying to win trust, it is a step-by-step process; but the pillars of credibility – reliability and intimacy – are a good place to start.’

So get personal. Create intimacy with your consumers by targeting their needs and preferences and rewarding their loyalty. Why not develop a campaign around repeat purchases? Or target the likes of particular demographics?  Even as early as the planning phase, brands should think about what part trust plays in their campaign – and how they can improve it at every stage.

Ben Craker is Head of Risk at Fotorama, part of the Sodexo family. Fotorama are Promotional Marketing specialists with over 30 years of experience in planning and launching campaigns that help clients to increase profit, brand awareness and customer engagement. Its dedicated team is equipped with creative talent and industry knowledge which helps them handle everything from mechanic creation and sourcing to winner management, in order to produce spectacular promotions that deliver on budget from brief to purchase. To find out more contact ben.craker@fotorama.co.uk

Fotorama (part of the Sodexo Family) is headline sponsor of the IPM 30 Under 30 Programme 2017.

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HighCo MRM has won the IPM COGS Awards 2016 Grand Prix, for delivering the handling and fulfillment element of the 2015 Sports Relief Campaign on behalf of charity Comic Relief.

The work also won HighCo MRM Gold awards in both the Handling and Fulfilment Category and the Direct Marketing Category in the COGS, the promotional marketing industry’s annual recognition program for companies which provide the best marketing services support work.

The IPM COGS Awards 2016 Company of the Year trophy went to fixed fee agency Mando. Mando also won Silver in the Cross Border Campaign Category for ‘Your Nutella, Your Way’ for Ferrero and Gold in the Risk Management Category for The Very Big E.Leclerc Game.

Other multiple award winners at The IPM COGS Awards 2016, now in its seventh year, included i-movo, Black Tomato Agency, Tomato Source and Hive. The full list of winners, covering 14 industry, channel and specialist categories, plus the two Special Awards, is on the IPM website.

The IPM COGS Awards 2016 celebration lunch was held on Friday September 23^rd 2016 at the St Pancras Renaissance Hotel, Central London. The host for the event was stand up comedian, Lucy Porter.

The COGS Awards were launched by the IPM in 2010 to recognise the huge contribution made by marketing services providers to the success of promotional campaigns.

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