Digital Dilemmas
Published: 29 June, 2009
The advent of the internet bought with it a plethora of new communication and marketing tools that shopping centres can take advantage of.
Marketing has changed for good: the dawn of the internet has put paid to that. No longer are outdoor, TV or radio advertising considered the single or most cost-effective channels through which shopping centres can tout their wares to the public. Digital marketing – use of the internet, mobile and other interactive technologies to promote a brand or a product – presents marketers with a plethora of opportunities and channels they can take advantage of.
Digital and online marketing has experienced unprecedented growth over the past five years, overtaking many forms of media. Constant technological innovation has resulted in an industry which continues to change at a rapid pace. It can be hard for even the most advanced digital marketers to keep up with this change, but for shopping centres with few resources it can seem overwhelming.
Shopping centres have not traditionally been at the forefront of innovation when it comes to technology and the internet; indeed, many did not even have a website until the past three or four years. This was the case at Hempstead Valley shopping centre says marketing executive Su Button: “We didn’t have a website until March 2006,” she admits. Stephen Fox, co-founder and managing director of marketing agency Fox Kalomaski, says digital marketing hasn’t been at the top of shopping centres’ to-do lists. “In the last five years, shopping centres have started to show interest in having a website. Up until then, they paid pure lip service.”
For schemes which do have a website, these have been typically been purely information-driven. The most commonly accessed information on a shopping centre’s website is likely to be details such as opening hours, location, store directory and pages pertaining to job vacancies. But while this information remains relevant, it does not encourage customers to spend time on the site. The introduction of other features and articles will help increase ‘stickiness’ and encourage users to spend longer browsing the content. It is just a case of deciding what content and features are relevant to a specific centre’s core customer demographic. In many cases, this is easier said than done.
Success story
One of the success stories is Birmingham’s Bullring. The marketing team here recognised that while they wanted to give customers a more comprehensive online offering, it was also important to retain the general information-led main site. The answer: one central site and one which reflects its loyalty magazine, Browse Bullring. “The main site is information and service-based, whereas the Browse Bullring site is all about fashion, music, events and latest brands,” explains Louise Hamer-Brown, the centre’s marketing controller.
The Browse site has been running for three years and in its current incarnation since April, where customers have to sign up to gain access to certain content and also in order to take advantage of a personalisation feature which allows users to select the content they want to appear in their stream. “We have seen a 100 per cent increase in registration since the relaunch,” says Hamer-Brown. “The articles are now more relevant. For example, a guy wouldn’t necessarily want to see an article on women’s bangles. So they don’t see that content any more; they only see it on the things they are interested in.” An additional benefit is that sign-ups to the website means vital information about customers can be garnered ensuring they can be targeted with e-marketing campaigns.
Luckily, tenants at the Birmingham centre were keen to get involved and regularly pass information, including press releases and details of special offers, to the marketing team in order to directly target the local demographic. “It’s the retailers’ content,” explains Hamer-Brown. “We change it very slightly to give it a Bullring tone of voice, and then push it out on their behalf. It’s harder for the retailer to be able to market to a specific catchment for a specific store than it is for us.”
Creating a dialogue
Alongside upgrades to its members’ site, Bullring is also leveraging social networks including Twitter and Facebook, to create ‘a path’ of Bullring-related pages around the internet. “There are people who spend a lot of money on search engine optimisation [to ensure their sites are easily spotted by Google and other search engines] but if you start creating this pathway, it’s free because your actual shoppers are doing it for you.”
This inevitably creates a ‘dialogue’ approach to marketing: having a conversation with customers is a far more effective way of communicating with them, rather than spamming them with unwanted, untargeted content, says Simon Davies, creative director at Fuse Digital, Bullring’s partner in its digital campaigns. “Whereas traditional marketing channels have a tendency to ‘shout’ at their audience, digital channels can encourage a two-way conversation.”
At the Bullring, research has shown that the bulk of spending power, as well as the bulk of the website users, lies among shoppers who want to be engaged in a fashion-oriented dialogue. Shopping centres need to spend time getting to know and understand their core customer, in order to best target content, explains Hamer-Brown. “I spent a lot of time analysing the market, analysing the trends and understanding what our shoppers want from us.”
Likewise, the marketing team at the Harlequin centre in Watford conducted research in the early days of the credit crunch which revealed that those least likely to be reining in their spending were those in the 18-24 age group. “We identified that this target audience had a disposable income – in general, they haven’t got the commitments of a mortgage and dependents,” explains Chrissy Dawson, marketing manager at the Harlequin.
Dawson subsequently developed the Harlequin’s Brand Union website – an online portal that only members can access, offering access to offers, promotions and competitions and information on new brands entering the Harlequin. Targeting this audience with a digital marketing campaign proved fruitful: “We increased the percentage of shoppers who were in the 16-24 age group from 23 per cent in 2007 to 29 per cent in 2008,” Dawson reports.
Varying audiences
However, what works for the Harlequin or Bullring may not work so well at another centre. While these premier league centres have reaped the rewards a digital marketing campaign proffers, for smaller, local centres, it may not be so easy to justify, regardless of how cost-effective it may be. “Very many local shopping centres literally survive on their local community, and there are many of them who probably don’t see the importance of it and neither does the customer,” argues Fox.
However, there does seems to be a common misconception that the only people who use the internet are those in their teenage years and early to mid twenties, yet this opinion is rapidly becoming outmoded, says Hamer-Brown. “A couple of years ago it was more the high achiever, business professional or the young teenage market who would use digital channels; now everybody uses digital, but they use them in different ways.” The Harlequin’s Dawson agrees. “It’s increasingly a way to target all audiences and groups – it is how you use it that counts.” This is where creating a pathway between different websites and portals proves vital says Hamer-Brown, citing an example of wanting to communicate with young families: “For example, when using Facebook, you would become a fan of mother and baby groups in your particular catchment area so you begin getting those associations.”
GOING SOCIAL
The use of social networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, is rising inexorably. Many people were initially sceptical of Twitter and had doubts about how the latest, trendiest social networking tool could benefit their business. It transpires that one of the most powerful features it offers is its search engine, through which companies can see, in real time, what is being said about their brand. “The good thing about doing these searches online is that at least you know what people think of your brand: you’re informed,” says Hamer-Brown. “Then you know if you have to do something to counteract that.”
While Twitter and Facebook are useful tools to track the success of a marketing campaign, there are other more data-driven methods to consider. Google Analytics is a free tool which can enable users to track information such as how many visitors there are to their site, where they’re coming from, where they go afterwards and can also provide vital information on e-marketing campaigns such as click-through and open rates. It will also inform users on bounce rates – the percentage of initial visitors to a website who leave immediately after landing – which is a key indicator of how visitors perceive the relevance of content. “If you get a 60 per cent bounce rate, it’s usually because the link is wrong or because the content isn’t relevant,” guides Hamer-Brown.
Garnering advice and guidance on how to get a digital marketing strategy right, whether it’s planning and execution of the campaign or tracking ROI or studying analytics, is key. The close working relationship between Bullring and its chosen partner Fuse Digital, and aligned goals and ambitions, has been absolutely vital in its success, says Hamer-Brown. “You need a really good agency to support you in your online campaign. Out of all the agencies we spoke to, there was a really obvious connection with Fuse – they understood our business and they know the local area very well.”
While the digital campaigns launched at the Bullring and the Harlequin are both excellent examples of well planned and executed digital marketing campaigns, this may not be applicable for all shopping centres: there can be no one size fits all approach. What works for a large regional centre with a fashion-oriented core customer may not work for a smaller, local, community-focused scheme. But with the right technology partners and the aid of a specialist agency, there will be elements of digital marketing that can be exploited by any centre, of any size, in any location.
