by Mimi Nicklin (@MimiNicklin) I recently had a debate with a colleague of mine who works in the global ad world. Her opinion was that content marketing — social, online, blogs etc — were firmly in the ‘consumer’ camp when it comes to the ‘consumer vs shopper’ debate. Strictly the business of “the content agencies and digital shops…” As you might guess, I disagreed.
I did, however, need to throw around various pieces of evidence to prove the link between content and shopping, and the brands that are getting it right. Given I did eventually win the debate (and the champagne that was up for grabs!), I thought I would share my winning examples.
Top ‘shoppable content’ strategies that are making people buy, and not just browse:
1. My first choice is John Lewis: a UK retailer that has quite literally transformed its brand in the last five years with a consistent campaign that had generated over £400m in extra profit by November 2013 alone.
John Lewis’s approach to content begins in its TVC, where it tells a touching and compelling story that reaches the masses. It then spans the content of that story across the store, seeing £5 profit for every £1 spent. The shoppers can shop everything, from the soundtrack to soft toys of the characters in the ad to the products spotted within the story.
At a 5: 1 return, and when so many UK retailers are struggling to sell even their core ranges, this surely is my first piece of evidence that content really can convert consumers into shoppers.
2. Secondly, I choose Kate Spade — this time a pure fashion brand, and a brand that is brilliant when it comes to converting content into purchase. Proven by its growth in store foot print alone — the retailer recently announced it has grown its square footage 42% worldwide in the latest quarter — its content is a huge part of the brand it has become.
I challenge anyone to consume its stories on any of its social platforms in under 15 minutes — and to not rush into a store immediately, wallet in hand!
With an all-encompassing array of accessible yet aspirational pieces, every content story screams “look at me, buy me!” Colour, pattern and inspiration splash across every page but, critically, this is a brand that is not scared to show the content of others, as well as its own, in driving purchase intent. Retail merchandising (not for sale) is seamlessly replicated in the store, including the books, props or accessories seen online, and, before you know it, you are walking and shopping the exact feeling you had on Instagram this morning.
By bravely including non-branded content, it has successfully built a Kate Spade ‘existence’, not just a retail outlet, and its content becomes ever further shoppable as you buy into the ‘Kate’ lifestyle.
3. Finally, I choose Land Rover Range Rover, not just because it is my own personal love mark, but because it is every owner’s love mark!
In a market where the competition for premium cars is beyond fierce, the associated lifestyle of the brand you are buying into is surely 70% of the barrier (my own unfounded guess.)
Of course, there are shoppers out there who spend hours understanding the rationale — the engine, the wheel set, the off-road capability — but converting the emotionally driven content to a sale is the harder of the marketing objectives.
The Range Rover has the superior function (I did admit to being a fan, right?) but that alone won’t drive consumers’ feet through dealership doors. The link between social video, storytelling and consumer-generated content, and the propensity to test-drive and buy, is leveraged exquisitely. It furthers build this content strategy into the offline world via dealership windows (Brazil) and the Land Rover Experience Centres (South Africa), where it allows consumers to literally experience the video they saw online in ‘real life’.
I’ve been hard-pressed to find a brand that strategically plans its content as a purchase conversion tactic as well as Land Rover Range Rover does.
Feel free to challenge anyone
How to execute your content across the path to purchase is a column for another day, but in the meantime feel free to challenge anyone nearby to the question at hand. Is there a role for branded content in the shopper journey to turn browsers into buyers?
As the affordable smartphone makes its way to Africa and shoppers hold content in their hands as they walk into stores, I say yes.
But then I’ve already won my champagne. Over to you…
Mimi Nicklin (@MimiNicklin) followed her passion and experience in the consumer, retail and shopper space from regional roles in Europe and Asia, to South African shores in 2010. Having led global brands through the line for Procter & Gamble, and two of London and Hong Kong’s top agencies, her background gives her an international perspective to add to her depth of SA understanding. She serves as strategic director and a partner at 34 Group. Mimi contributes the monthly “The Sell” column concerning shopper marketing to MarkLives.
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