2011 marked the year that many FMCG brands went social. For some it was small-scale exploratory activity. For others the creation of a Facebook Fan Page or Twitter profile was a social land grab to directly counter the plethora of unofficial pages/profiles that have emerged. However for some of the more forward thinking brands it was the start of a proactive marketing strategy seeking to engage consumers in the social space and then influence their path to purchase through various promotional marketing activities.
“As FMCG brands continue to respond to the two-fold challenge of a customer base demanding ever more value and marketing budgets mandating a tangible return on investment, the use of coupon promotions across social media is set to increase rapidly in 2012,” explains Oliver Felstead, Sales & Marketing Director of Coupons.com.
He continues, “To help brands build on the lessons learned during 2011, Coupons.com has compiled our five top tips for running high-performing and impactful coupon promotions on Facebook.”
1.Feasibility Assessment
When planning your campaign, speak to a specialist digital coupon service provider who can assess whether couponing via Facebook is suitable for your brand and will deliver your objectives. Such a provider will be able to advise if and where any of the minimum essential criteria for a successful coupon promotion are lacking. For example, the product may have insufficient distribution across the retail trade, meaning customers have little chance of being able to easily redeem the offer and the promotion is flawed before it starts. Alternatively, if the brand personality, values or campaign messaging do not translate well across social media, then a different approach may be more appropriate.
2. Controlled Coupon Distribution
The sheer scale of Facebook’s audience is a major draw for brands looking at running marketing promotions. However, this same audience, when combined with speed of social communication presents inherent challenges for brands that have limited coupon budgets to adhere to. To avoid potentially unwelcome overspend, it’s imperative that brands distribute coupon offers in a secure and controlled manner and limit their redemption exposure in line with their ROI projections and available budget. Without sophisticated distribution controls, brands may also be subject to the wider ramifications of unsecure coupon distribution, such as unsecure coupons being returned, customers being rejected and badly executed promotions being flagged to head office buyers. A well-known household food brand recently distributed a limited quantity of coupons through its Facebook Fan Page. Initially the promotion was intended to run for one month, however the coupon actually achieved 50% of its print target after just one week. Coupons.com was able modify the mechanic and restrict the available prints over the remaining three weeks of the promotion to ensure the promotion was live for the full intended 1 month duration. Had the coupon had not been issued securely, the coupons issued and subsequently redeemed would have undoubtedly outstripped the brand’s redemption budget!
3. Make sure your promotion is inclusive
There are more than 350 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices, accounting for 44% of all users. Mobile users are also twice as active on Facebook as non-mobile users[1]. In addition to this, some consumers do not have printers rendering it impossible for them to easily print coupons. If you want to distribute coupons online, don’t fall into the trap of excluding these individuals and thus potentially inviting negative posts. To overcome this Coupons.com recommends that our clients’ Facebook coupon campaigns should provide consumers with the option to receive the coupon by post if requested, or in the case of mobile users to have the coupon emailed. It comes down to good old customer service and with the natural tendency for consumers to vent their grievances publicly when using social media, in many instances going the extra mile pays off.
4. Evaluating Performance
Ensure your Facebook coupon promotion has clear methods in place to accurately track the total coupons printed (different to consumers given the opportunity to print) all the way through to coupons redeemed in-store. This level of transparency is essential for controlling your campaign as well appraising its performance. Sounds basic; yet a quick scan of some poorly executed coupon promotions currently being run on Facebook shows that some FMCG brands have neither of these areas covered. For example, a PDF coupon can be saved, printed and redeemed as many times as a consumer desires, not to mention being shared online and posted to forums such as freebies websites. Often the first the brand will be aware of this is when the redemption statement arrives from the clearing house. Don’t get caught out, track every coupon issued.
5. Engaging & Creative Promotions
Whilst it’s often the most simply executed Facebook promotions that perform the best, brands are getting increasingly more ambitious and sophisticated when coming up with new and creative ways to engage consumers across social media platforms and influencing their path to purchase through the use of coupons and vouchers. For example, a recent Innocent Veg Pots promotion on Twitter “Tweet & Eat” rewarded advocacy by offering customers the chance to increase the value of their coupon if they re-tweeted a message. As FMCG brands continue to test and learn from social media coupon promotions in 2012, creativity within coupon promotion is to be sought and indeed advocated, as long as this is not to the detriment of getting the basics right.
Felstead concludes, “Brands learnt some tough lessons in 2011 – coupon campaigns were not uniformly well managed and understandably some failed to either meet expectations or deliver consumer value. But they also scored some genuinely great results. The key for 2012 will be not only to innovate and become more sophisticated but also to ensure that the central coupon component is securely managed properly in accordance with the promotional marketing industry’s guidelines and best practices.”
Source: www.Coupons.com
