A digital marketing campaign by Asda has shown how retailers can attract shoppers to their stores by advertising on multiple devices. The cross-device campaign between August and October last year led to a significant increase in people visiting their local Asda.
The supermarket group’s media agency Carat North worked on the trial campaign with cross-device marketing technology company Tapad and location data specialist Statiq. According to Tapad, it marked the first time a UK company has measured the impact of a unified, cross-screen campaign on in-store visits.
During the campaign, Carat North provided display and video ads to Asda shoppers, and Tapad used Statiq’s audience data to measure which users visited a store during, or within one month of, being exposed to the ads on multiple devices.
Results showed that people exposed to one ad were 248% more likely to visit a store than those who did not see any ads. Those who saw an ad on three devices were 59% more likely to visit a store than those who only saw an ad on one device. Overall, ads seen on mobile devices achieved the highest success rate.
Nadia Callaghan, digital media manager at Asda, told Marketing Magazine that the trial was aimed at establishing what frequency and device mix was most effective in delivering consistent footfall.
“The reason we decided to do this now is because we know cross-device usage is growing, so we wanted to understand this trend and how cross-device targeting can be used to increase the effectiveness of our campaigns,” she added.
“This campaign is a perfect example of the capabilities of cross-device advertising,” commented Are Traasdahl, founder and chief executive of Tapad. “In addition to reaching users across devices, we’re able to analyse campaign results and determine how different combinations of ad exposure, creative type or view frequency affected their decision to visit a location.”
“Cross-device identification is a hot area at the moment, not just for targeting but also for things like managing ad frequency,” commented Nick Johnson, head of advertising law at Osborne Clarke. “But there are some regulatory risks that advertisers need to navigate. Meeting transparency requirements under data protection law can be a challenge – and issues can also arise when inferred data results in misidentification.” Nick Johnson, Partner
