For brick-and-mortar retailers, the marketing outcomes that resonate most are visits and sales, and yet most companies turn to online data to reach these goals.
While this strategy can be incredibly valuable for driving clicks or visits to a website, online data doesn’t always reflect consumer behavior in the real world. You’ve heard us say it before—a consumer might peruse Lamborghinis and Ferraris online, but in reality, they probably drive a Kia.
For this reason, looking exclusively at online data to drive offline conversions is a missed opportunity to reach untapped audiences and generate incremental sales. Data derived from our Blueprints technology enables marketers to harness the power of real-time, visit-based offline behavior in order to capture the true intent of their target audiences.
Furthermore, direct response businesses with aggressive performance goals should be looking to use offline behavior to drive visits and then measure efficiency on a Cost Per Visit basis. Using the metrics available in the Ads Manager platform, you can easily calculate your effective Cost Per Visit by dividing your total ad spend by the number of visits driven by our ads. This paves the way for greater accuracy, transparency, and performance — just what businesses operating in the competitive retail space need.
Here’s how.
Driving Success With Offline Data
With 90% of retail transactions still occurring offline according to KPMG, granular targeting capabilities are extremely valuable. In addition to reaching previously neglected audiences, this allows for reduced waste by empowering marketers to engage only the most qualified audiences in the locations that matter to them.
What does this kind of targeting look like in action? Consider the story of an automotive client that recently came to us with the goal of driving incremental visits to its dealership. We recommended four individual but inter-connected tactics:
- Behavioral Targeting. We targeted consumers who fit the client’s profile of shoppers currently in-market for a car in order to influence the automotive decision-making process.
- Audience Targeting. We reached people who visited the brand’s dealership over the past 90 days to generate awareness and encourage visits.
- Competitive Conquesting. Given this was a local campaign, we built a custom location group for the client consisting of its two main competitor dealerships. This allowed it to persuade consumers who’d visited its competitors to visit the client’s dealership instead.
- Retargeting. This presented an opportunity to build on each individual tactic by retargeting those who had already seen the auto brand’s ad, thus reinforcing the marketing message and driving them farther down the purchase funnel.
After launching its campaign in November of 2018, this automotive retail client quickly established a highly efficient Cost Per Visit ranging from $10 to $12 and has renewed the campaign in each consecutive month. Given the high price of a new automobile, these incremental visits are allowing the client to generate a large return on ad spend while also capitalizing on a new audience of potential customers.
The Cost Per Visit Connection
When it comes right down to it, sophisticated targeting capabilities mean nothing if you can’t determine whether or not they’re generating value.
GroundTruth’s Ads Manager platform puts all of the metrics at your fingertips, allowing you to easily discern your effective Cost Per Visit and develop more efficient campaigns on the fly. Through real-time optimizations on a Cost Per Visit basis, you can actively impact live campaigns by eliminating unnecessary waste, ensuring that you are reaching only the most qualified customers and ultimately getting the most out of your marketing dollars.
Interested in generating more sales by driving more visits to your retail store? Sign up for our self-serve Ads Manager platform today.
