The advertising industry is hitting a milestone this year. For the first time, digital advertising spend is set to surpass spend on print and TV – with Facebook holding onto its place as the second-leading digital ad channel.
This is a direct reflection of where consumers are focusing attention.
Many retailers still see the benefit in print circulars (think grocery stores, drugstores, department stores, or apparel retailers announcing a new line). It’s an ideal way to target specific markets with localized offers and deals. But, there are downsides: The cost of print is increasing, the channel is less relevant than ever before, and creating circulars requires week-over-week creative development.
For consumers that prefer the digital experience, retailers can work with partners like Liquidus to repurpose print circulars onto their websites. But transforming print/digital circulars into interactive Facebook & Instagram ads? There just hasn’t been a way to scalably create that experience ...
Until now.
StitcherAds has unlocked the ability for retailers to transform localized print circulars into evergreen Instant Experiences on Facebook & Instagram.
We’ve already worked with nationwide retailers to help them achieve this, and results have been encouraging. Advertisers are seeing that digital circulars on Facebook & Instagram drive incremental in-store sales.
Want to learn how it works? Read on.
1. Featuring week-over-week promotions.
StitcherAds has enabled Facebook advertisers to automatically pause old offers and activate new ones with zero downtime.
The key is our product feed manipulation and merging technology, which allows us to seamlessly feature week-over-week promotions while staying compatible with Facebook’s requirements. Using our rules automation technology, we can do this whenever new deals are ready to go live – whether that’s weekly, daily, or even hourly. This avoids cumbersome work for brand digital teams.
2. Overlaying product-specific promos on images.
With a print circular, it’s no problem to automatically overlay product-specific deals over images. If handsoap is being offered as a “buy one, get one” deal, you can easily highlight it with an icon. If oranges are half off, you can illustrate that as well.
To reflect these types of deals on Facebook & Instagram, we create custom dynamic overlays using the brand’s unique colors and icons. We’ve even helped retailers display item-specific fine print over product images. (This could be used for items with limitations per household, loyalty program stipulations, etc.) The benefit? The application of customized dynamic overlays maintains the brand narrative as print transforms into digital.
3. Tracking promotions down to the product-level.
Retailers have always had the ability to track interactions with their Facebook & Instagram campaigns. But tracking interactions down to the product level in multi-product ads is no easy task.
To solve for this in digital circular ads, StitcherAds automatically appends unique identifiers to product URLs – allowing retailers to easily track item-specific interactions. Once the campaign is over, brands can effectively track campaign performance. (This is especially handy for retailers who report back to brands on co-op spend and performance.)
4. Dynamically serve relevant products tailored to each customer.
One-size-fits-all is a thing of the past. Print circulars only account for distribution; not for targeted reach.
Because of Facebook’s product algorithm in Tabbed Collection ad units, the digital circular experience can be personalized to each user. They will be shown products from the circular based on what Facebook deems most relevant to them.
Using Facebook’s targeting options and StitcherAds’ ability to quickly segment products, retailers can further personalize who sees their digital circulars. For example, you could create regional, gender-specific, or age-targeted versions of the ads. If makeup products are on sale in Kansas City, you could set up your ads so women who reside in that market see those products before the other items on sale.
To build even more targeted audience segments, advertisers have the ability to leverage their own first-party data. For example, you could segment out your loyalty customers (as opposed to casual shoppers) and target that group with tailored offers. StitcherAds can also leverage third-party audience segmentation tech, like Oracle Data Cloud, to further enrich targeting options.
5. Measuring in-store transactions.
How do we know digital circulars on Facebook & Instagram actually work? There are multiple ways to measure how effective they are:
- Store Visits Reporting. This is an estimated metric based on data from users who have location services enabled. Facebook reports this data in real-time.
- Facebook Offline Conversions. This technology allows you to track which in-store transactions occur as a result of your Facebook campaigns. When leveraging Offline Conversions, you're able to optimize campaigns based on what consumers are actually purchasing in-store rather than optimizing your campaigns for reach.
- A third-party partner like Oracle Data Cloud. Using reported data, they can map campaign exposure back to in-store sales.
Socialize your print circulars
Advertising is all about meeting consumers where they are. Print is increasingly growing in cost and still requires significant manual effort. As Facebook & Instagram continue as the second-leading digital ad platform, it makes sense to replicate print experiences there.
