Using Internet for Brand Engagement & Activation

FMCG Marketers in Indian have generally used Internet like traditional media doing high impact and high visibility advertising akin to television advertising with almost negligible measurability or accountability.

With the onset of Global slowdown there is an increased accountability on brand advertising spends. Brands now are actively looking for more cost efficient ways of fulfilling their marketing objectives. This is where Internet can be used as it is the only medium that is completely measurable right from time of a user seeing an advertisement online to evincing of interest by clicking on it, to measuring of action post the click of the user. This throws open opportunities for advertisers that can go beyond using Internet just as a conventional media into the realm of what is called as “performance advertising”.

The basic currency for buying media on the Internet is CPM (Cost per Thousand ad impressions served). Since internet is completely trackable, there are other interesting payment models available on some inventories that charge on CPC (Cost per click done by a user on the ad) and even CPA (Cost per Action). Action is defined as what the Advertiser wants user to do post clicking on their advertisement, it could be a Registration, Sale, Enquiry/ Lead, Intent for information etc.

A question that is discussed frequently is “under what circumstances would FMCG advertisers need to go for performance based advertising metrics”? The answer lies in the distinct qualities of Internet as a medium. Internet can be actually used & measured for different points in the consumer’s path to purchase / consideration.
Of particular interest to FMCG Advertisers will be the fact that out of the various media options available nothing comes close to Internet when a marketer wants to engage with consumers. This is possible due to the Interactive properties of Internet Medium. Internet can also be used very effectively for Brand Activation campaigns. Further what is most interesting is that Brand Engagement / Activation can be done at very attractive costs and is totally measurable, thereby an Advertiser can actually measure Brand Engagement done in terms of “Cost per User engaged” or “Cost per user Activated”. On the internet, the advertiser can buy online inventory with a defined cost per brand engagement / activation clearly laid down.

Brand Engagement can be done in different ways. Depending on the Advertiser’s communication objectives - It could be creating an application / puzzle / game for a user online where the user can engage with this application / puzzle/ game and in the process soak herself into the core of the Brand communication. A few examples of Brand Engagement & Activation done by Indian FMCG advertisers are given below:


Lipton – Stay Sharp

Concept: Lipton wanted to communicate that the leaves picked for Lipton Yellow Label Tea are a natural source of Theanine, which along with the other goodness of tea can help drinkers relax and be alert throughout the day. For this they an online application where users were encouraged to solve various jigsaw puzzles online with an on ground event that culminated to solving world’s largest Jigsaw Puzzle.

URL: http://www.stay-sharp.in/staysharp/liptonLogin.aspx






Outcome: Lipton’s website states that close to 175,000 users engaged with their brand online by participating and solving various puzzles.

Quaker Oats

Concept: To position Quaker Oats as a healthy cereal, launched a web based initiative called Good Morning Heart.com, the users are encouraged to register on the website and take a test online that shows health of the user’s heart and also gave tips on maintaining a healthy heart.

URL: http://www.goodmorningheart.com




Outcome: The Quaker websites states that more than 120,000 tests have been taken in the past 2 months.


Olay

Concept: Olay wanted to do sampling of Olay Total effects. For this they used Internet marketing very effectively by getting users to come and register on their website to receive their free sample. These requests were followed by a confirmation call and the samples were then couriered to the users.

URL: http://www.olaysampling.com/lms0509/Olay07Oct2009/landingpage.asp#




Peers

Concept: Peers launched an Internet initiative around their Brand proposition of ‘Masoom Pears’. The users (mothers) were encouraged to sign up on their website and upload their Masoom moment, a picture with their child on the website. The reward for doing this was that a selected mother-child pair will be featured in their print advertisement.

URL: www.MasoomPears.com







In the above examples, the most interesting part was that bulk of online media buys were done by the Advertisers on a CPA (Cost per Action) basis. In case of Lipton this meant buying online media on a cost per Puzzle play and in case of Olay on a Cost per registration for request of free sample. Such media buys eliminate any risk for the Advertisers of not meeting their marketing objectives vis-à-vis the budgets laid down.

However till now only a handful of Indian FMCG advertisers have made use of the power of Internet & Online Marketing for achieving Brand Engagement & Activations. There is a tremendous opportunity that still lies unexploited.

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Note: The above artricle written by me was first published in 4Ps Business & Marketing magazine, issue 22 dated 4th-17th Dec, 2009)

Online Customer Acquisition - Session ID vs Cookie Tracking

The following diagrams illustrate the difference between Session ID & Cookie based tracking

Session based tracking




Cookie based tracking




Most of the advertisers in India use Session based tracking to track performance. This is like evaluating a TV ad by correlating sales within 5 minutes of airing the Ad!! The effect of this tracking is that the Advertiser will allocate the Action /Sale to the LAST referrer. So say if a user sees a banner Ad for a job portal (for discussion sake let us say it is TimesJobs) on monday clicks on it and decides he will fill in the resume over the weekend since there is a lot of information to be provided which will take time. Let us say over the weekend he doesnt remember the exact spelling of the job portal and he goes to Google and types Jobs at Times and finds the link and then clicks and goes on to filling the resume. In this case is it fair to give ALL credit to Google?

See this in context of let us say a Bank that generates leads of credit cards. Online application forms of banks for Credit cards run in 4-5 pages and has information like PAN number etc. Lot of these details may not readily be available with the user or the user may just want to bookmark the page and come back to it later. Should the advertiser not recognise the role of the other referrers in the user journey before buying? It is a pity that Advertisers in India are not making use of wealth of information of a user journey before he finally buys from their site.

Fortunately Internet technology allows us to track all this, however, Advertisers must be willing to make use of superior technologies and must be willing to change their mid sets else they will never be able to fully optimise their online customer acquisition activities.

Online Ad Networks in India

Ad Networks have been operating in the Indian online space for over 2 years. They have now started achieving some scale and it is estimated that they now account for almost 15-20% of the online display advertising in India. Buys on Ad Networks have started figuring in almost 75-80% of the media plans.

The following are the kinds of networks:

Rep Networks

- They represent the publications in their portfolio,
- Provide full transparency for the advertiser about where their ads will run.
- Promote high quality traffic at market prices and are heavily used by brand marketers.
- Pricing model : Generally CPM
- Leading examples of Rep networks operating in Indian space - NDTV repping for MSN's inventory, Publicitas Digital.



Blind Networks

- Low pricing model
- Marketers relinquish control over where their ads will run.
- Achieve their low pricing through large bulk buys of typically remnant inventory combined with campaign optimization and ad targeting technology.
- Pricing model - Generally CPC or CPA
- Most popular players - Ozone, Komli, Tyroo



Targeted Networks

- Focus on specific targeting technologies - behavioral or contextual.
- Specialize in using consumer click stream data to enhance the value of the inventory.
- Pricing model - Generally CPM or CPC in some cases



Affiliate Networks

- Fully transparent network focused on Performance.
- Pricing : CPA
- Indian Affiliate network: DGM India


Advantages of Networks:

Reach at lower costs. 50% of page views happen outside the top 2o sites and users spend more than 60% of their time outside the top 20 sites. These users can be reached at a fraction of cost through networks as compared to reaching them through top 20 sites.

Ease: By using the technology & relationships of networks with publishers, an advertiser can reach literally tens of thousands websites through one single window. They can monitor efficiency of the buys also from one single intrface, making it very simple & convenient for an advertiser.



See the following coverage by DNA of a recently held session on Ad networks in India in an IAMAI session:





Ad networks will grow in prominence with time. I personally feel that there will be 4-5 good networks that will survive & thrive easily in India in times to come.

The future of Indian Web 2.0 brands - will they make money?

There has been a plethora of almost me-too brands that have mushroomed in India all of them inspired by success of brands like Orkut, Facebook etc.

I feel that most of the Web 2.0 brands have ‘technology’ at their core. Take the case of Web2.0 vertical - social networking – which has Orkut & Facebook as the leaders or Global /Generic Search Engines where the best technology offering like Google & Overture are the undisputed leaders in terms of share of mind & wallet. Similar case is of photo sharing & blogging sites.

The biggies can score very easily over small Indian start-ups. I am not sure if an Indian start-up can match tech prowess / capabilities of a Google or a Facebook who may have millions of dollars just to invest in technology & product engineering. I personally feel that Indian companies do not have the capabilities, might or mind-set to compete in offerings that are purely tech led.

Another issue that a Web 2.0 brand will have to constantly face is migration of people to newer offerings as and when a better technology offering with better bells & whistles come in. A case in point is people migrating to Facebook away from Orkut.

On the other hand, where the differentiator is “Compelling localized offering (localized / topical content / local buzz) – there is a huge potential for Indian start ups in the Indian market. Vertical like Local Search Engines, Travel portals, Online Shopping comparison sites, online classifieds, niche community sites, horizontal /local news sites etc. have a huge potential to scale up in India.

However, I see that almost all Indian Web 2.0 companies have not got any really well thought out differentiators that can set them apart on parameters other than technology. In light of this the BIG question is - will the Indian Web2.0 brands make money for their promoters?