Welcome to September’s edition of Impression Picks! This digital marketing roundup serves as some food for thought for you from Impression’s experts and the wider marketing community. Each month, we will highlight an interesting article, insight and campaign of the month.
This month features thoughts from our strategy team, including; Head of PPC Performance, Nick Handley, Senior Digital Strategist, Laura Arens, and Head of Digital Strategy, Isabella Smith. As always, we hope you enjoy the content and insights we provide as a part of our monthly roundups.
Truth in Advertising: The emotional promise
Marketing a product doesn’t have to be difficult, but the complexity of choice makes it so. Capturing emotion has always been a salient part of marketing a product to consumers and is becoming more prevalent in modern marketing with users showing higher intent markers when viewing Brand advertising.
This month’s article follows Drew Hodges’ Ted Talk on the Emotional Promise in marketing Theatre productions.
Emotional promises are rife throughout our lives and Drew touches on how this transcends into media, from print to digital and his experience of using emotional promises to capture an emotional angle of theatre productions and avoid the dreaded, ‘no-show’.
The emotional promise is exactly that, it’s to capture the emotional angle of an audience and plays on thought-evoking points that run salient throughout theatre production – everyone wants to feel whimsy now and again.
But how does this apply to online advertising:
We’ve seen a change and a blend in the last 5 years of Brand and performance advertising merging closer with changing consumer habits, as brands move focus on creative and emotion-driven marketing. Ad platforms are mirroring this too, we’ve seen the introduction of Search on TikTok and larger and more video and display formats appearing on Google, showing what our future is, at least for the immediate.
We’ve seen a huge shift in Gen X in particular, opting to find out about brands and products through social vs. search. This change has pushed brands to invest time and money into showing their product in a meaningful way. Gone are the days of bottom-of-the-funnel marketing reigning king.
So, how do we apply this to advertising in practice:
- Brands can measure sentiment markers through 3rd party tools such as Sprout Social. By understanding the sentiment of their ads, can help feed back into marketing strategies.
- We now need to think about the emotional impact of advertising across all facets of media activity; what problem does it solve, what does the brand elicit in emotion and how can these points be tied together
- Brand marketing and assets in performance marketing need to be thought about. The idea of storytelling across our digital journey is paramount now more than ever. Ensuring you include brand and performance in joint campaign planning is key to success
Whilst it’s a bit of fun, digital marketing can always pull from other forms of advertising and Drew allows you to draw parallels between in your own way.
Watch the video here
Reviewed by: Nick Handley
37% of U.K. consumers will start their holiday shopping earlier this year
“It’s the most wonderful time of the year” is likely not what we marketers will be singing over the next couple of months.
Just kidding! But, the holiday season is upon us, and it’s starting earlier than ever this year, with 37% of U.K. consumers stating that they want to start searching for gifts earlier than usual. According to Google, further changes for peak season 2023 can be found within the way that U.K. consumers are searching, making increasing use of phrases such as “ideas for”, “compare”, “reviews” and “ratings”. This indicates that consumers are looking for further information throughout their buying journey and are shopping around more.
What does this mean for you?
1. This peak season will be more competitive than ever, especially with consumers’ willingness to compare and test new brands. We should lean into this and highlight the unique selling points.
2. As marketers, we need to ensure that we are present throughout the buying journey and provide consumers with relevant information about products and services. Answering possible questions about products/services within our ads.
3. Understanding the market and consumers is key within this peak season. Leveraging our insights, such as FAQs within the industry, will allow us to create highly relevant advertising.
Insight by: Laura Arens
“It’s OK. I’m with the AA!”
The AA’s latest brand ad celebrates the confidence their drivers feel, having built up this reputation since they were established in 1905. However, the evolution of their “Always On” brand platform shows a new direction for the brand.
Promoting their broad range of services, from selling second-hand cars to vehicle insurance and breakdown cover, The AA’s campaign looks to showcase their aim of providing confidence across all their products and whatever situation they find themselves in across the day. This is executed in funny, exaggerated scenes of extreme real-life scenarios in which the AA is there to make sure everything will be okay.
In addition, The AA has targeted a younger audience with their partnership with LadBible, promoting their “People Do Nothing” campaign starring Chabuddy G. This involves support from Instagram, TikTok and Facebook, centred around a sitcom-style series of activations.
We liked the campaign because it both celebrates the heritage of the brand, whilst exploring a new direction and audience, produced through eye-catching executions.
Campaign reviewed by: Isabella Smith
Look out for our next Impression Picks in October for more digital marketing articles, insights and campaigns to inspire your digital strategy. Have any further questions? Get in touch!
