Online response mechanism

Online response mechanism 

The required response mechanisms should be specified in the digital campaign plan and the number of responses from each model. Suggests the typical options of out comes to online campaign media. 

From the creative shown using media such as a display ad, pay-per-click ad or rented email newsletter, there are five main options.

1 Home page

In the majority of cases, investment in online media will be wasted if visitors are driven from the media site to the home page of the destination website. Typically it is appealing to many audiences and offering too much choice it won’t effectively reinforce the message of the online creative or convert to further action.

2 Microsite/landing page

A focussed landing page or specially created microsite can more effectively convert visitors to the action to help gain a return on the online campaign investment. Shows an example of a landing page giving a range of response mechanisms, although offline is omitted.

A URL strategy is used to make the page easy to label in offline creative. This specifies how different types of content on a site will be placed in different folders or directories of a website (this can also help with search engine optimisation). For example, if you visit the BBC site (www.bbc.co.uk), look at how the web address details vary as you move from one section to another such as News or Sport.

An individual destination page on a website may be labelled, for example, www.company.com/products/insurance/car-insurance.

A further example is where site owners have to make a decision how to refer to content in different countries, either in the form:

http://<country-name>.<company-name>.com or the more common http://www <companyname.com>.com/<country-name> Campaign URLs or CURLs are less widely used today, the idea being that they will be more memorable than the standard company address and blend in with the campaign concept.

For example, an insurer used the CURL www.quotemehappy.com, which represents memorable elements of the campaign. Also memorable is www.subservientchicken.com a viral hit from ten years ago for Burger King and reinvigorated for 2015 under the hashtag #ChickenRedemption.

3 Personal (chat or call-back)

In this case the creative or landing page encourages campaign respondents to ‘talk’ directly with a human operator. It is usually referred to as a call-back service and integrates web and phone. Buttons or hyperlinks encourage a call-back from a telephone operator or an online chat.

The advantage of this approach is that it engages the customer more and will typically lead to a higher conversion-to-sale rate since the customer’s questions and objection are more likely to be answered and the personal engagement is more likely to encourage a favourable impression.

4 Offline: phone, post or store

Because part of a campaign is run online does not mean that offline responses should be excluded.

Offline response mechanisms should not be discarded unless the cost of managing them cannot be justified, which is rarely the case.

Offline response goals for multichannel integration

We also need to include the right response mechanism for the offline media element of the campaigns such as TV ads, print ads or direct-mail pieces.

The permission-based web response model is one that is frequently used today in direct marketing (Chapter 6). For example, this process could start with a direct mail drop or offline advert. The website is used as the direct response mechanism, hence ‘web response’. Ideally, this approach will use targeting of different segments.

For example, a Netherlands bank devised a campaign targeting six different segments based on age and income. The initial letter was delivered by post and contained a PIN (personal identification number) which had to be typed inwhen the customer visited the site.

The PIN had the dual benefit that it could be used to track responses to the campaign, while at the same time personalising the message to the consumer. When the PIN was typed in, a ‘personal page’ was delivered for the customer with an offer that was appropriate to their particular circumstances.