Positive domestic marketing campaign results revealed
In the first half of 2023, the levy-funded apples marketing campaign reached new audiences and ‘new to brand’ customers who had not purchased apples in the previous 12 months.
The vision for the FY23 Apple Marketing Plan was to reignite excitement for apples as the go-to healthy snack for all Australians. The category benefit was defined as ‘The refreshing snack that revitalises the senses’.
The latest marketing levy-funded marketing campaign, developed by the Hort Innovations marketing team, ran from February to June 2023 and has produced positive and insightful results for the industry.
The campaign channel mix included radio, YouTube, outdoor, shopper and social media.
Messaging throughout the campaign included ‘deliciousness in high definition’, ‘enjoy every juicy detail’, ‘refreshing to the core’, ‘hit refresh on your senses’ and ‘craving crispy, sweet, bold or zingy?’.
This was optimised creatively, utilising a new modernised logo as well as some fresh audio.
The outdoor campaign performed well across metro and regional markets. Both exceeded campaign goals, reaching 6.5 million consumers.
The radio campaign was heard across four stations – 96FM, NOVA 96.9, KIIS 101.1 and Smooth FM – and successfully reached 5.2 million consumers.
The Woolworths online retail media campaign for apples performed extremely well. During the eight-week period more than 513,000 Everyday Rewards customers purchased apples, of which 26 per cent were ‘new to brand’ customers (had not purchased in the previous 12 months).
A 142 per cent increase in sales was recorded during the campaign compared with the pre-campaign period.
The Coles online retail media activity ran over 12 weeks in four separate bursts and during this period more than 132,000 new to brand customers purchased apples.
The YouTube video activity delivered 100 per cent on the reach goal of 11.5 million people. Video completion rate (the rate at which a video is watched to its completion) was 92 per cent, well above the benchmark rate of 80 per cent.
Paid social media activity on the Meta and TikTok channels delivered more than 26.3 million ‘impressions’. Impressions are a metric to quantify the number of times an advertisement has been viewed digitally.
Four influencers were engaged as part of the overall campaign.
The influencers reached more than 540,000 people and their posts generated more than 604,000 impressions. Influencers are an important part of the marketing mix as they add to the credibility of Aussie Apples and allow us to unlock new audiences.
For information about apple and pear marketing activity contact:
Lynda Pallone – Marketing Manager (apples and pears), Hort Innovation
This article was first published in the Summer 2023/4 edition of AFG.
