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| DATE | 2013-10-18 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
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| SUBJECT | Subject: [NYLXS - HANGOUT] Tagged and stamped
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http://rssbroadcast.com/?p=19468
Advertising: For CVS Regulars, Ads Tailored Just to Them
ONCE, the letters in the name of the CVS drugstore chain stood for
Consumer Value Store. Now, they could also stand for Customized Virtual
Shopping.
CVS Pharmacy is taking a big step forward in the increasingly popular
realm of personalizing and selecting products for shoppers. The effort
will offer customers who belong to the chain’s ExtraCare loyalty
program tailored versions of the weekly print circulars distributed
through newspapers and in stores to an estimated 45 million people.
The initiative, under the rubric of myWeekly Ad, will use the data
gathered by CVS from ExtraCare members’ purchases to do things like
suggest sale items based on previous purchases and make available in one
place all ExtraCare savings and rewards offers.
Users will also be able to build digital shopping lists that can be
personalized based on the CVS store at which they shop most often —
down to the aisle in which each product can be found.
The myWeekly Ad platform will be available on desktop and laptop
computers, tablets and mobile devices. A campaign, with an estimated
budget of $7 million, will carry the theme “What’s your
deal?” and encourage customers to sign up online at
cvs.com/myweeklyad.
MyWeekly Ad is emblematic of a trend as brick-and-mortar retailers seek
to fend off growing competition from online retailers. That was
underlined on Thursday as Amazon introduced the Luxury Beauty Store, a
section of its Web site devoted to premium-price products in categories
like hair care and fragrance.
For decades, “CVS and other retailers have distributed billions of
circulars,” said Rob Price, chief marketing officer for the CVS
Pharmacy division of CVS Caremark in Woonsocket, R.I., because
“that’s the best thinking on what we believed would excite and
motivate customers.”
Today, technology enables retailers to customize offers to meet
“customers’ passion for relevance,” he added, “making
shopping easier.”
The myWeekly Ad platform is bigger than previous efforts by CVS to
personalize communications, Mr. Price said. “We think the advantages
are dramatic from top to bottom in the customer experience and are going
to speak for themselves.”
Also, personalized aspects of the ExtraCare program like custom coupons
sent by e-mail and printed on sales receipts have conditioned members
“to highly relevant offers coming to them,” he added.
Mr. Price said he was aware of a recent Internet meme about how multiple
coupons can extend the receipts received by some ExtraCare members to
Brobdingnagian lengths of five or six feet. Introducing a program that
capitalizes on customization can be unpredictable, he acknowledged, and
if there is an online reaction, CVS will respond “on Internet time;
every week we’ll refine and improve it.”
Prashant Malaviya, associate professor of marketing at the McDonough
School of Business at Georgetown, said, “Making recommendations to
consumers sometimes comes across as being intrusive, and it has to be
done with careful thought.”
In reaction to the myWeekly Ad campaign, Mr. Malaviya said: “My
initial reaction is this sounds like a great idea. Customizing deals and
promotions to your needs and your past behavior is something consumers
have wanted.”
Most coupons and offers “are designed to get consumers to switch
from one brand to another; if you buy Coke, you get a coupon for
Pepsi,” he said, adding: “For me to be able to get a coupon to
buy more Coke is a lot more relevant. I value more getting coupons for
products I like, not for products I don’t care for, which is wasting
my time.”
The “What’s your deal?” campaign, created by the agency
Standard Time in Los Angeles, includes ads on television, in print,
online and in social media. A commercial features three celebrities
— Nick Cannon, George Hamilton and Joan Rivers — shopping among
everyday customers at a CVS store.
Ads in print and on Facebook present consumer archetypes like a mother
of two mischievous children who needs items like cleaning wipes and
Excedrin Migraine pain reliever, and a lovelorn guy who needs Altoids,
hair gel and a box of candy.
A goal of the campaign is to reach “a younger demographic that
spends a lot of time online looking for deals,” said Michael Sharp,
creative director at Standard Time, which is reflected by Mr.
Cannon’s role in the commercial.
“We hope people will say ‘What’s your deal?’ a lot to
each other,” he said. “You can have a lot of fun with it, and
the word ‘deal’ seemed to fit nicely.”
“We’re trying to get people to change their behavior,” Mr.
Sharp said, by “going online for a much more personalized
experience” rather than checking weekly circulars.
“The print circular is going to be around for a while, but
eventually it’s going to go away,” he added. “We have to
prepare for the future.”
Mr. Price said paper circulars “still have a very important role,
for reach,” but they were continuing to decline. “It’s
happening before our eyes.”
Other agencies working on the campaign include Mindshare, part of the
GroupM division of WPP, and its social media unit, M80, and Matter
Communications. Internal teams at CVS that handle tasks like creative
work, public relations, social media and marketing also collaborated.
This entry was posted in BUSINESS and tagged Coupons, Customer Loyalty
Programs, CVS Caremark Corporation, Online Advertising on October 11,
2013.
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