Living, Learning, and Buying: Measurement Planning to Guide You through the Mist

At Door4, we perceive marketing through a dual-lens approach: targeting consumers out of the market to generate future demand and engaging in-market consumers as they progress through the category from learning to buying. 

This article is written with my thoughts on how to simplify our world as marketers – marketing is not exacting and therefore an Art not Science – however, Artists even start with plans of what ‘good will look like’, even if they can’t articulate it. Below I try to do the same for marketers…

Future Demand; Living

The foundation of our future demand strategy is inspired by the works of Byron Sharp (“How Brands Grow”) and Jeremy Bullmore (“Posh Spice & Persil”). The goal is to become “famous” among consumers, ensuring our brand is top-of-mind as they go about their daily lives.

Our media planning aims for high-attention placements to make a lasting impression. We achieve this by targeting core audiences through channels known for capturing attention and planning for mass reach. This simple combination increases our memorability.

To gauge how well our brand is resonating, we track this fame through unaided and aided awareness studies conducted quarterly or bi-annually, depending on the budget. This approach helps us understand the extent of our brand’s reach and recognition among the masses.

Trust is largely required here… this is where marketers need to hold strong and persist for long-term results – that a strong brand tracking result will in time draw strong sales results.

Throughout all activities, econometrics (aka Mixed Media Modelling (MMM)) is the tool we lean into to draw this correlation more readily. 

Econometrics allows us to prove the incremental impact of our efforts over time, a drawback to note is that econometrics relies on change-based data to ascertain any deviations – if you always do what you always did the model will largely return a state of channel baselines. 

However, for new activity and drawing up initial non-cookie-reliant models we find it invaluable to lend a different prism to look at the world through – generally year-to-year we’ll see channel levels deviate for our clients, so we typically run a once annual detailed study to help with our planning decisions (used in coordination with our attention planning tools).

Current Demand; Learning 

As consumers enter the market, they begin researching their options. In the context of buying furniture, this might involve browsing YouTube for inspiration, checking Pinterest for design ideas, or searching non-transactional terms on Google. 

Our goal is to interject during this research phase with compelling advertising or informational content.

At this stage, we’re tracking ‘softer’ engagement metrics such as view-through rates, ad engagement, and site traffic to informational areas like buying guides. These metrics help us understand how effectively we’re capturing the attention of our audience and guiding them through the learning process. This primarily is for our day-to-day optimisation of placements or ads, to know we’re getting the most out of every penny. 

Again, in time, with the right campaign design, we expect to see the impact of our “learning” activities reflected in our MMM studies.

Current Demand; Buying

At this stage, consumers are ready to transact. They’ve done their research and are now looking to make a purchase. Our role is to ensure we are present and persuasive at this critical juncture. All we are doing at this stage is capturing consumers well-primed to purchase, so a slick buying process is critical.

Picture guiding a customer through the checkout process in a furniture store, ensuring they find exactly what they need and facilitating a smooth transaction. 

We achieve this digitally through Paid Search, Shopping campaigns, and a strong SEO presence – making it easy to find the products they are finally ready to invest in. 

To further ease this, we ensure we have a well-optimised website through consistent website testing – it’s not enough to get the traffic here we need to keep the process easy through a persuasive and friction-free experience. 

Our focus here is on transaction-based metrics such as CPA (Cost Per Acquisition), ROAS (Return on Ad Spend), website conversion rates, and AOV (Average Order Value). These metrics are crucial for capturing as much of the market as possible and ensuring every penny spent drives effective traffic and conversions.

MMM comes into play once again, helping us demonstrate the incremental value of these activities. It ensures we capture every nuance of our marketing efforts’ effectiveness, providing a comprehensive view of our impact on sales and conversions.

In Summary

We draw inspiration from Byron Sharp and Jeremy Bullmore to achieve brand fame among everyday consumers. We track this through unaided and aided awareness studies, conducted quarterly or bi-annually, to monitor brand recognition. MMM studies provide the hidden support structure, proving the incremental impact of our efforts over time.

As consumers enter the market and begin researching. We measure success with metrics such as view-through rates, ad engagement, and site traffic to informational areas like buying guides. MMM studies reflect the broader impact of these activities.

When consumers are ready to purchase, we guide them smoothly through the buying process. We focus on metrics like CPA, ROAS, website conversion rates, and AOV to capture market share and ensure every penny drives traffic and conversions. 

Our aim is throughout all activity ultimately is to drive sales in the short and long term, a clear measurement plan helps to gather trust and buy-in from all parties and not be drawn into a solus short-term mentality, which is so simple to do in this online “trackable” world (which ultimately has dogged the marketing world as an elusive panacea for 20+ years)

Ready to drive current and future demand simultaneously? Let’s chat