We're looking for the best in digital marketing
To support the Digital Training Academy we look for examples of best practice digital marketing from a wide variety of industry sectors. Any agency, advertiser or media owner can submit a case study for our consideration, and on this page you'll find some of the case studies we're currently using to support training in Europe, Asia and North America. Remember that as a training provider we're not directly endorsing the brands or the teams, but we have been impressed with their work and hope you enjoy them. If you'd like to submit examples of your work then email them into TheTeam@DigitalStrategyConsulting.com and after an initial review we'll be in touch if we feel they can be used to support learning goals.
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When the UK government’s Central Office of Information commissioned the online elements of their health education campaigns to teach children about the dangers of drugs, they used a sophisticated mix of web formats to encourage interaction and solicit greater involvement. The ‘Talk to Frank’ campaign integrates the web, television, leaflets and face-to-face marketing activities to provide young people with access to detailed information about the specific risks of different drugs. This multi award-winning campaign included placements of banners and skyscrapers that encouraged viewers to take icons from one to the other in order to trigger an action: they could take the image of a drug from the banner to the brand character in the skyscraper and then see how it affected him. The activity delivered the message of the campaign without demanding a click through and as well as the visible skyscraper and banner formats included a rich media layer over the page.
Internet marketing has the scope to be more powerful, vibrant, engaging and impactful than any other media. In Digital's case study library we've collected just a few of the thousands of great campaigns that really impressed us, but it's worth remembering that somewhere out there, in the depths of an un-targeted run-of-site campaign, the bottom-dwellers of the direct marketing industry are still subjecting internet users to ads like this one.
There was a time when the web was still a minor ‘add-on’ to a car launch campaign, but with most new cars being researched online before a decision is made about the brand (let alone the purchase), every motor manufacturer has had to refocus their efforts to the web. Five years ago BMWFilms.com set a new standard in web content, fusing together the genres of entertainment films, product placement and video demonstrations. They raised the bar so high that few motoring brands have come close since. However, this month’s launch of the Fiat 500 from digital specialists AKQA is a worthy contender. They’ve built 21 short movies with a personality that’s on brand and production quality that would stand up in cinema.
Search marketing works for every type of firm and every size of business. We’ve worked with the team at Google to select these case studies to help marketers see just a few of the ways that pay-per-click search engine advertising can drive traffic to your site. 
Classified advertising firm gave its disruptive technology a boost today with a new generation release that promises a whole new way to shop classifieds. With a new suite of tools and a complete site redesign, Oodle radically improves the way consumers use classifieds, but it does this by delivering a very different model to the conventional print titles. Oodle positions itself as a whole new way to shop classifieds, bringing together more than 30 million listings from over 80,000 classified sites. Oodle sets out to improve the way people buy and sell locally by offering a more comprehensive search, supported by convenient email alerts and relevant information that gives consumers the bigger picture, helping them to make better buying decisions.
When the Army planned their assault on the West Ridge of Everest in 2006, there was an opportunity to engage young potential recruits by letting that story be told. Climbed only once in 30 years, only one group had ever made it to the top. PCIFitch were supplying the raw materials from the field back into the mainstream media as well as the web. The intention was to touch audiences through streams on the web, podcast downloads, iTunes and the broadest range of touchpoints. Over a million viewers enjoyed streamed content, blogs were posted to the site from the mountain and to feed into the recruitment processes, schools were targeted with lesson plans created for teachers and games for their students. Integration included downloadable posters and images, text alerts and more than a dozen different channels. The campaign went on to win the “Best digital campaign of 2006” at the Campaign awards. When we interviewed Peter Cowie, Managing partner at FitchLive who were behind the work, said “great work comes from the chemistry of the teams working together. The effect of the campaign included attracting 1m people, 30,000 of whom claimed they were ‘interested’ in joining the army. 3,500 are likely to be recruited as a direct result of the campaign”. For Peter it’s clear that “the future of advertising is about using all of these new channels together”.
The digital networked society is a great leveller. The relationship between brands and consumers has shifted. The structure of communications has undergone this massive leap. While the smart thinking in marketing is leaping to embrace a whole new way of doing things, much of the practice in marketing still clings to the past. That's why it wasn't just gutsy, but a strategically brilliant move for Microsoft to use a television-style commercial to make the point for them.
Since 2000, the Dove brand has been an online pioneer. Their work with the IAB and MSN in North America created landmark research in cross media campaign budget optimisation, and this more recent video was a great example of how the web could be used by a consumer brand to build community, debate and discussion. It’s also creating challenges for regulators who are considering how online advertising works.
Campaigns - Lebron 23:23 for Sprite
Cross-Media Case study: Dear Visa
New campaign: Palm Treo 680 Launch
The "State of Mind" campaign for army recruitment in the UK is an excellent example of the impact video advertising can have. Developed by creative agency glue London, this campaign ran at the end of 2007 to promote recruitment into the Royal Marines. Strong production values, clever placement, and a simple idea proved that video formats can work well within banner spaces and not simply the 16:9 or 4:3 formats most directors gravitate to. The development of the campaign included shooting video especially for the web and allowing the online environment to dictate production needs and values.
Through the BA.com website customers could enter their mobile numbers to receive up-to-the minute flight and contact information. During disruption caused by terrorist activity in August 2006 over 20,000 SMS messages were sent to BA passengers and cabin crew in 87 countries over a four-day period, which was 18 times more traffic than the previous highest. This campaign combined direct response mechanics of search with the awareness building properties of graphical formats. 
McDonald’s added interactive advertising to the media mix, which also included radio, print, and TV. By increasing online advertising's reach by 60%, McDonald's boosted product awareness by 8.3% among the 18-49 media target. This lift resulted in 6m more consumers becoming aware of the product. Online makes a real contribution to multichannel campaigns by reaching the same consumers in another complementary environment. It also reaches people other media can't. Among McDonald's target market, the 20% who are not heavy television users are reachable online. 
Online advertising campaign for Kimberly-Clark complemented offline marketing and delivered the 42% of the audience that was only lightly reached or not reached at all by television. The synergy of magazine and online advertising was the most effective combination for reaching this audience and boosting major key metrics including aided brand awareness, brand image, bundled trail intent and purchase intent.
Dove’s interactive advertising campaign contributed significantly to brand impact. By increasing the online spend within the same total ad budget from 2% to 15%, Unilever produced an 8% increase in overall branding metrics and a 14% increase in purchase intent.
Colgate ran their advertising campaign in print, television and online. The results showed that it cost 23% more to encourage consumer purchase using TV alone compared to using TV in combination with online. For their multichannel campaign, reallocating marketing dollars to online advertising was significantly more cost-effective at driving purchase intent and enhancing key branding metrics. Simply by allocating 7% of media dollars to online, purchase intent increased 3.8%.
The campaign ran in several business and technology magazines, including Forbes, CIO, Computer World and Network Computing, as well as targeting a B2B technology audience via online sites. The magazine ran one-page and two-page ads of striking black-and-white photos of large building projects, emphasising by analogy the reliability of VeriSign's infrastructure. Online, the ads were graphically similar but simpler, presented in leaderboard, large rectangle and skyscraper formats, with the copy emphasising security services. When readers saw both the magazine and online ads, their awareness, association and purchase intent for the security and directory services raised slightly (3-4 points), as did their impression of the brand as innovative (4 points). As for the white paper downloads, which was half of the measure of the online ads' success, the interactive ads were highly effective in doing so, generating more than 2,000 downloads, which exceeded the campaign's goal, compared to only 16 downloads attributable to the magazine ads.
The vast majority of Universal Studios advertising budget is spent on TV. Around 6% of the budget was spent on banner ads and less than 1% on rich media ads which floated animations on top of web pages. The results of the online advertising proved to be significantly better than the TV commercials. The most successful format was rich media. 
The objective of the XMOS study is to help marketers and their agencies answer the question: what is the optimal mix of advertising vehicles across different media, in terms of frequency, reach and budget allocation, for given campaign to achieve its marketing goals? This particular campaign for ING ran for six months and included advertising on television, magazines and online. The budgetary proportions of the campaign were 68% for television, 17% for magazines and 15% for the internet. The media mix proved to be more effective than advertising would have been in any single medium. The 15% share of budget that ING assigned to interactive demonstrated itself to be ideal in this campaign.
This online campaign featured broad-reach page takeovers on high traffic areas of major portals, including the home pages and email sections. The online ads had a significant lift on sales. In total, 6% of the sales of the vehicle could be directly attributed to the online advertising (without click through) during the period studied. Click-through tracked sales were responsible for a significant number of additional sales beyond the 6%.
Ford has launched a cross media advertising campaign both on English and Spanish TV, radio, print, outdoor and via direct mail and online. The online ads that ran on auto-related pages proved to be the most cost effective at raising purchase intention: the portal roadblock ads and magazine ads were more expensive at raising purchase intention than in-market interactive ads, but they were both a great value in terms of cost-per-impact compared to television.
The TV Licensing website was a crucial channel for its customer communication. RedEye was hired to tell how many, when and why customers visit the website, and also how many hits a website receives and when. It can also track the journey customers take through the webpages. RedEye data can also tell how many new customers are coming to the site, allowing understanding of growth and also how many are making a repeat visit. This information will feed back into improvements in customer retention.
Schroders has historically focussed on direct marketing and trade press advertising in order to promote their funds to institutional investors. In order to test the effectiveness of online advertising, Taglab was briefed to adapt a series of fund campaigns into online treatments. They built a series of campaigns to promote fund launches and high performing funds to independent financial advisors. Whilst Schroders traditionally focusses on promoting funds to institutional investors, online advertising provides a cost effective means of reaching a wider IFA and retail audience.
Interactive Flash presentation aids used by financial planners at Norwich & Peterborough Financial Advice Service to inform and educate customers on a variety of topics including attitude to risk, the cost of delay in starting a pension and how the stock market works. In order to provide high quality, impartial advise to an audience who tend to be financially unsophisticated, N&P’s advisors require presentation aids that help them to discuss complex financial concepts such as attitude to risk in a clear and accessible manner. Taglab developed a range of interactive Flash presentation tools that could be integrated into N&P’s electronic financial advise system.
Lycos has evolved from an early leader in search to the content portal that it is today. With a large registered user-base for services such as Lycos Mail, Lycos aims to monetise its audience by extending into new content areas, such as XY. XY is a new channel on Lycos, targeting a similar audience to magazines such as Zoo and Nuts. Taglab was developed PR-able content and Viral game featuring user generated content to promote the launch of Lycos UK’s new “XY” men’s channel. The campaign features a Flash photofit style application enabling users to combine the features of celebrity females to design the perfect woman. The images can then be sent to friends or published in an online gallery.
Taglab brought British Gas’ site in line with the new brand and accessibility guidelines. Before the site was redeveloped, most British Gas Business customers tended to make contact via the call centre, rather than using the website. Moving just a small proportion of customers online would result in a large saving in customer support costs. The British Gas Business site targets both SMEs and larger industrial and commercial customers. Offering a combination of gas, electricity, telecoms and other business services, the site provides a combination of marketing and customer service information.
Fit for the Future, the national campaign for best practice, offered a lot of content online. However, their site was hard to navigate, making this content difficult to access. A new site design was required that made more effective use of the content. Fit for the Future campaign website was developed for the CBI and DTI to promote the adoption and exchange of best practice in British industry. The site features hundreds of regularly updated articles on best practice. The new site generated substantially higher page views per unique visit. It also helped to address the perception that the campaign had a region bias to the South East.
The Big Picture is a research agency with a difference – they specialise in design. Clients include some of the world’s leading brand owners. Their website needed to appeal to a wide audience, from research buyers at major multinationals, to designers at exclusive creative agencies. Taglab developed a trio of stickmen characters, adapted from the new Big Picture logo. The site presents a series of tableau featuring these stickmen to illustrate various key aspects of the way in which consumers interact with design. As the stickmen encounter brands in everyday situations, typographic symbols appear in their heads to illustrate this interaction.
Originally launched in 2004, Betfair Poker has grown rapidly to become one of the busiest poker rooms in Europe. The site was originally hosted on the main Betfair platform. Whilst this allowed for tight integration with user account functionality, there was limited scope for content management. The current site targets both existing customers and prospects. Content is regularly updated and features dynamic, flexible templates, supporting rich media and timesensitive content. The new site now performs substantially better that its predecessor.
Betfair is the world's leading online betting exchange. Taglab designs and produces their monthly "In-Play" newsletter. The contents include opinion pieces, event previews, community content, analysis, competitions, hints and tips. The newsletter combines an email and microsite, achieving consistently high clickthrough rates. In a recent issue, 36% of those opening the email clicked through to the microsite.
When Betfair launched in 2000, they were the world’s first online betting exchange. Since then, they’ve grown rapidly, and today they have 95,000 active users. Each year, Betfair would mail these users a branded diary. As their membership grew, this tradition became increasingly expensive. The time had come to consider an alternative approach. Taglab developed a sophisticated online sporting calendar targeting Betfair’s registered users. The calendar, featuring hundreds of sporting events. Functionality includes the ability to import events into Outlook, TV listing information and deep-links into Betfair’s markets.
A specially developed site to promote the customer benefits of the partnership between Avis and British Airways. The site recognised returning visitors automatically, delivering tailored offers and benefits based upon the user's Executive Club membership status. Taglab Publisher was used to control when offers were presented, and to whom. Taglab developed a microsite with “remember me” cookie functionality, that stores which tier of the Executive Club each passenger belongs to.
William Hill’s core business is the provision of gambling and betting activities. To do this successfully, it is imperative that they constantly acquire new registrations of people wanting to bet via the William Hill web site. In order to maximise the acquisition return on investment (ROI), William Hill used RedEye’s profile and segmentation rules to dynamically generate segments and email cells is a very effective solution to make email marketing timely and highly targeted.
Before anyone can bet online with William Hill they must by law register to prove they are over 18, to provide bank details and to submit name and address details. Of course this information also provides valuable data that can be used to target those who have registered but not converted to purchase, and to enter customers into a relationship management programme. William Hill suspected that the registration process was one of the largest barriers to buy. They wanted to test this, and many other alternative site processes. However they recognised that first they needed a new and accurate way to measure the results. After exhaustive analysis of available tracking systems William Hill choose RedEye who placed their tracking code onto every page of the website. Two alternative registration processes were tested over successive weeks and the results measured until a statistically significantly number of new people had visited the site.
Warner Breaks saw a 2000% increase in its return on investment in email marketing and a 48% increase in open rates when it began working with RedEye. Using RedEye’s segmentation and event-driven email tools, Warner was able to obtain and utilise detailed information about online customer activity and use this data to automatically send timely and highly targeted emails. RedEye also advised Warner Breaks on the most effective creative designs in order to improve deliverability rates.
Thousands of users take out car insurance quotes on the AA website every single day but despite registering online for a quote, only a small proportion of these potential customers immediately purchase. The AA wanted to be able to identify these visitors, and communicate a timely, targeted message to them, encouraging them to return to the site and buy online. The AA saw a dramatic improvement in their online customer conversion rate.
The company needed to improve the quality of its database by purchasing new data, and develop an email marketing programme to target potential customers and to improve communications to existing customers. RedEye advised Kwik-Fit Insurance on the most appropriate data to purchase to improve the quality of its database. Event driven emails sent to the new database resulted in a 44% increase in the number of customers visiting the website, and a 5.5% increase in those obtaining a quote.
easyJet wanted to accurately measure return on investment for its online advertising spend to help it understand and improve its ROI and conversion rates. By identifying and recording each person’s exposure to the brand and their subsequent activity on the site, easyJet could easily rate each campaign not only for click-throughs but also for the quality and loyalty of the customers it was attracting. RedEye helped easyJet to understand the ‘branding effect’ of its advertising, attributing customer spend to advertising campaigns even when customers did not purchase immediately. Measuring customer activity over a period of time gave easyJet a reliable indicator of the long-term profitability of customers acquired from each campaign.
Supermarket chain Asda wanted to check that delivery schedules are equally distributed across their stores to ensure they were maximising ability to deliver and meet their customer’s expectations. There has been a significant rise in the number of households doing their shopping online. Competition for customers is especially fierce in home shopping online. Unlike offline, where a customer often shops at the supermarket most convenient for them, online shopping is more vulnerable and if a supermarket isn’t delivering, they are only one click away from being replaced.
To target older consumers online, Warner Breaks (part of Bourne Leisure Group, which also runs Butlins, Haven and British Holiday) decided to revamp its email marketing. RedEye was employed to manage the email campaigns and agency Sonaa to design the creative. New customers were acquired by competitions and third party promotions, run through the sites such as Cheapflights.co.uk and Teletext holidays. Since Warner began working on the new programme it has seen 2000% return on investment.
The Body Shop wanted to find a way to attract customers to specific Love Your Body events. Using Digital Marketeer The Body Shop was communicating with their customer base on a regular basis. They used this form of communication to invite people to register for the Love Your Body events in people’s local areas. A direct mail piece was sent to all registrants advising them of the upcoming events two weeks before the event. An email was sent to 60,000 people one week before the event and followed by an SMS reminder message on the day of the event.