February 2008

Driving sales by integrating your print
and online retail campaign
Here’s how retailers can mix traditional print
media with online strategies. By Nathalie Szuszkiewicz

Online advertising has now been part of retailers’ lives for the past decade. During that time, we witnessed rampant growth of the Internet. It quickly became a new touch point to reach out to customers and is now included in the marketing mix. Internet use changed consumers’ habits and new trends emerged. With online advertising, customers were able to interact when they felt the need.

At the same time, printed flyers and direct marketing collateral still remained. But now they were being compared and measured against the Internet, a medium that presented another channel that was delivering results. Some retailers went as far as cutting their print program altogether, only to reinstate it after sales dropped. Others decided to further manage their print program by using analytics and were able to generate a better return on investment.

What many came to understand is the need to put together more fluid campaigns to reduce the gap between print and online advertising. It’s about leveraging the use of these channels in a more unified manner to reach marketing objectives. How to complement these two channels should be the focus of any retailer. This will demand streamlining marketing initiatives across multiple channels to finely target audiences with a consistent brand message. It also means taking traditional print vehicles such as catalogues, flyers, and coupons to create versions that will:

• shorten campaign planning and production cycle times
• direct traffic to the Internet site
• direct traffic to the stores
• reduce postal, print, and production costs
• increase the response rate
• increase the return on investment
• increase the average basket price

A retail campaign needs to be managed from many angles to achieve these key elements of success. Here’s a list of action items to consider:

Shorten cycle times with content management
There has been a wide range of initiatives to reuse print content for the Internet such as posting a PDF or Flash version of a flyer or magazine online. Some of these attempts were more targeted offerings using tools such as coupons. What many of these approaches lacked, however, was the ability to access content in an efficient manner. All was not lost though, because once the need was recognized, we saw the advent of campaign managers. At first, they were costly and it was time consuming to manipulate content so as to ensure it was adapted for and relevant across multiple channels.

Digital solutions to manage content have subsequently evolved just as fast as the Internet grew. Today, accessing content adapted for print and Internet usage in a centralized database is available and affordable. The benefits are tremendous, as accurate information can be processed rapidly and closer to the publication date. Content can be re-purposed, while maintaining a unique point of access.

For retailers whose offering demands detailed data management of their customer base and product lines, it has been easier–particularly if they have the means to integrate expensive off-the-shelf campaign management solutions. Others may have a bigger challenge due to having collected customer and product data that wasn’t prioritized for marketing purposes.

Retailers should look for solutions that can be adapted to their needs. Data analysis and even data mining capabilities are now essential.

Direct traffic to the Web site or store by using customization
This is all about taking advantage of microtrends and flexible niche marketing. Printed vehicles should be able to be personalized for each individual customer to allow targeting in an impactful way. Retailers hold a great amount of customer data from different sources such as POS (point of sale) and loyalty programs that can translate into behavioural segmentation based on transaction history. This segmentation enables the use of intelligent data from marketing databases to create personalized inkjet messaging that can direct attention to products that meet a customer’s needs. Highlights can be given to seasonal buying habits or recent purchasing behaviour. By marrying personalization with regional trend information, a retailer can create unique reasons for customers to shop or attend local events.

From a Web perspective, it is about using customer data to create strategic personalized messaging to highlight special promotions of favourite products, or direct customers online to any number of customized microsites - also called landing sites - using personalized PURL (personalized URL) or GURL (Generic URL) addresses. The campaign can then be expanded to include corresponding e-mail, on-line banner advertising and mobile marketing to improve the return on marketing investment.

Reduce postal, print and production costs by using optimized and customized solutions
Formats should be cost effective and selecting less resource-intensive varieties creates the opportunity to increase frequency to maintain top of mind awareness. By using a targeted format, a retailer can provide just enough content to view in a single setting while offering easy opportunities and incentives to see more content on the Web. Nevertheless, using more compact formats than traditional catalogue sizes can still offer ample room for creative expression. Merchandise can still be well displayed by using interesting product groupings or larger feature items.

Testing - identifying the best conversion rate
Testing mailing list and merchandising strategies can be validated by online research by driving customers to more than one Web destination to discover which layout or product assortment gets a better conversion rate. Regional and seasonal price testing can also be accomplished quickly and effectively using highly personalized capabilities. As customers increase their reliance on online comparison shopping, a Web site can be utilized to display the most up-to-date or special pricing. Using messaging and visual tie-ins guides customers to a retailer’s Web site and gives the opportunity to highlight the most competitive pricing.

In fact, eliminating pricing from a printed piece can generate curiosity and encourage immediate Web site viewing.

Coupons - tracking a hot item in the coming year
They could become the best example of using a traditional marketing tool in a new way. In the past, they have been a great traffic generator but are often hard to track. Analyzing coupon response is so important because it gives direction to future retail campaigns. The best way to produce them is by using bar code data linked to the mailing file.

Increase the ROI for the most important activity - driving sales
All printed material, such as catalogues, flyers, and coupons should drive customers to the Web or the point of sale. These pieces should encourage customer involvement and interaction with a brand across multiple channels.

Ten years later, retailers have the opportunity to better combine print and online campaigns to maximize results. Today’s economy creates additional pressure on retailers that already face a tough and competitive environment. Some of them are now pulling away from online selling because it is too expensive to manage and does not generate direct sales. This just shows again the importance and challenge of finding the right mix.

In summary, solutions need to be designed to increase lifetime value, help retailers acquire more customers, reduce time and cost of print and digital production, increase subscribers, and provide strategic resources to fill the void of staff reductions in a retailer’s marketing function. Hopefully, these recommendations will help you achieve just that.

Nathalie Szuszkiewicz is Marketing director for Quebecor World’s Canadian division. She can be reached at Nathalie.Szuszkiewicz@quebecorworld.com. Quebecor World Inc. (TSX: IQW) is a world leader in providing high-value, complete marketing and advertising solutions to leading retailers, cataloguers, branded-goods companies and other businesses with marketing and advertising activities, as well as complete, full-service print solutions for publishers. The Company is a market leader in most of its major product categories, which include advertising inserts and circulars, catalogues, direct mail products, magazines, books, directories, digital pre-media, logistics, mail list technologies and other value-added services. Quebecor World has approximately 23,000 employees working in approximately 100 printing and related facilities in the United States, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru. For more information, please visit www.quebecorworld.com.