Digital Marketing Campaigns for REISS

A Literature Review on Digital Marketing

Definition: Digital marketing is defined as a form of marketing that employs the use of electronic devices as a platform for the promotional activities of a particular product in the market. The electronic devices include laptop computers, mobile phones, tablet computers, videogame consoles and any other device with some connectivity to the internet (Wind and Mahajan, 2002).

Marketing on these devices can take on a host of different formats such as videos, images, online games, product placement in films, pop ups, audio, blogs, media articles, marketing on websites, text messages and many other formats that will support the marketing efforts.

A shift in marketers’ priority

Because of the limitless possibilities that are offered by digital marketing, the process seems to have taken a paradigm shift. Prior to the industry-wide adoption of digital advertising, promotional activities for the different products were done according to the available media. With digital advertising, the entire product development process is carried out with the intention of tailoring the product to fit in snugly into the digital advertising options (Snyder et al, 2011).

Forms of Digital Advertising

There are two forms of digital advertising; on one side there is pull while on the other there is push advertising. With push digital advertising, promotional content is delivered to the target audience without any consent being sought from the end-user. In email, this is known as ‘spam’, pop-up pages in the internet are another manifestation of this type of advertising. The same can be said of promotional materials that are embedded on you tube videos. This method is believed to be a more expensive endeavor due to the efforts involved in almost ‘forcibly’ making the audience view the adverts or other form of promotion.

Pull digital advertising on the other hand is one that is delivered and presented with the permission and deliberate action of the audience. This can be a YouTube video showing a film’s trailer or a company website where the latest products have been catalogued. Pull advertising is believed to be cheaper since it is believed that the audience will somehow find the material (e.g. intentionally clicking on a link)

Multi – Channel advertising is a combination of both push and pull and this makes its distinction as a unique form of digital advertising debatable. In this third form of digital advertising, the two approaches are used in such a manner that they complement each other. The push marketing could be a subtle message that is meant to compel the audience to seek further information by following a link to the detailed marketing material.

Emerging trends in Digital Marketing

There is an increasing shift towards a multi-channel approach to digital advertising and this is being manifested through mobile application advertising. This primarily targets portable devices that are dependent on the internet for their functionality. This works through the provision of a wide range of free mobile applications. Because they are free, users waive their right to dictate the content they receive. This is the loophole that is taken advantage of by marketers to deliver promotional materials relevant to internet usage patterns of the clients (Dwyer and Priluk, 2012).

Potential for Controversy

The fact that newer forms of advertising are meant to be tailored for the target audiences is a controversial issue because of the supposed privacy infringements. This makes a section of the population wary of such advertising (Chaffey and Smith, 2013).

Outline of the Marketing Planning Process Model

source: http://www.venturepartner.ca/images/TheMarketingPlanningProcesscopy.gif

The above model breaks down the marketing planning process into its four major components. The first stage is the situational analysis and this is an analytical look at the product’s position in the market. This requires multiple perspectives that also provide information on where the product has come from (historical) as well as where the marketers intend it to be in at the end of the marketing exercise (projections). Part of the situational analysis is looking at the competitors and this at times calls for a competitor analysis and SWOT analysis so as to provide a logical guide for the marketing initiative.

Marketing Objectives: At this stage, the goals of the marketing process are formulated, outlined and clearly elaborated upon. The content of information that is generated at this stage is highly dependent on what was done in the previous stage. The objectives can be to generate interest in a brand, increase sales levels, beating the competition or any other way of improving the product’s performance in the market.

Marketing Strategy: Based on the objectives that have been set, it the marketing team can decide upon the most appropriate approach to use in marketing. This can be price based, product based or customer oriented. The strategy that is selected depends on the composition of the targeted market and the performance of other firms in the industry. The strategy selected also depends on the previous marketing efforts that have been conducted by the organization.

Marketing Tactics: This stage is characterized by the selection of specific marketing activities that will be carried out and the manner in which they will be conducted. The media to be used for marketing is also chosen at this stage. If the intention is to have a wide reach, radio, television or newspapers will be selected. If the marketing is targeting a smaller group that is confined to a particular area, posters and flyers may be chosen for the marketing.

Digital Marketing Campaign Model

As seen above, different circumstances determine the choice of digital marketing as push marketing or pull marketing. In a digital marketing campaign, it is essential to appreciate the fact that not all people who will come across promotional material will proceed to read further and even those who get access to literature pertaining to a product are never guaranteed to actually make purchases. The potential client can go through five possible stages namely attention, interest, desire, action and finally loyalty. Attention is generated by the potential customer coming across the marketing information. They may either proceed or ignore. At this stage, push marketing is advisable. If the person shows interest, then the push marketing worked. The customer’s interest is expressed by him/her clicking on a link. If he or she is pleased with what is on offer, an effort will be made to contact a retail outlet. If the contacts are working and adequate information is provided, the person will make a purchase. If the product satisfies the customer, he or she becomes loyal and will make another purchase. The intensity of the marketing efforts therefore decreases as a person moves through these stages and provisions for all of these situations need to be made.

Source: http://emerging-advertising-media.wikispaces.com/file/view/aida.gif/181068507/408×242/aida.gif

Digital Marketing Campaigns for REISS

Introduction

Digital marketing has become increasingly popular in many organisations willing to reach out to their consumers. This method of marketing involves the use of internet, through computers or mobile phones, to inform people about the products and services offered by a company. Organisations will only succeed if they are able to sell their products to the consumers as that will lead to profit maximization. This paper will discuss how digital marketing campaigns are used by Reiss Company in the process of informing consumers on the products sold by the company. A brief history of the company will be given, followed by the early introduction of digital marketing in Reiss. Moreover, the paper will analyse the current digital marketing campaigns at Reiss and provide some recommendations to improve the digital marketing at Reiss.

Reiss was started in London in 1971 by David Reiss with the first store was mainly dealing with men’s suits. In 80s and 90s, more stores were opened and Reiss became successful brand in the UK market. With more stores opened throughout the country, Reiss introduced womenswear in September 2000. This made Reiss to be recognised as a brand for both men and women. With the continued expansion programme, the company was already well established in the UK by 2005 (Reiss, 2013). In the same year, more stores were opened in New York and Dubai, making Reiss brand to have a more international outlook. In 2007, the company launched its UK website and opened more stores in Los Angeles and Barrett Street, London. Barrett Street office eventually became the company’s head office where the coordination of other stores was conducted from. With more international stores being opened, Reiss introduced the luxury brand by launching the UK Personal Tailoring Service. It was also in 2010 that the company received a marketing boost when Kate Middleton (currently the Duchess of Cambridge) wore a Reiss dress during her engagement.

A management review in 2001 decided to channel marketing resources on store windows and campaign graphics. The marketing campaigns at Reiss are designed to promote both the menswear and womenswear as a way of representing Reiss as a combined brand. More emphasis has also been placed on imagery in order to match the brand statement of being stylish and sexy (Rowley, 2009). All the fashion shoots for the marketing campaigns are done artistically to reflect the brand identity and are done in serene locations such as Blackpool and Zanzibar.

The introduction of digital marketing at Reiss was done after the company’s management realized that it could no longer rely on its value proposition concept only, to drive the business agenda. This approach initially included provisions of attractive products to customers at an affordable price that was neither too expensive nor too low (Reiss, 2013).There was need to have digital marketing as marketing managers believed this would create more emotional connections with consumers. As the company prepared to enter into more countries globally, it was necessary to have a marketing approach that would appeal to people with different tastes and preferences. In fact, digital marketing was believed to catapult the company to other external markets instead of relying too much on UK as the main market.

In support of the new idea of digital marketing, Mr. Reiss said the company had been toying with the idea of making use of internet to reach out to the millions of consumers in the global market. He emphasized the importance of embracing the digital marketing concept (Reiss, 2013). In addition, he highlighted the financial challenges the company was facing to enable it to engage in massive digital marketing campaigns as the ones being launched by the mega fashion companies.

In 2007, Reiss had tried to venture into digital marketing by designing an online T-shirt competition. Indeed, the results were overwhelming to the management with the project receiving more than 200,000 page views and more than 700 entries (Chartered Institute of Marketing, 2008). What emerged from this online completion is that the company was not ready to introduce innovative ways of reaching out to consumers. It was therefore not fully prepared to deal what was brought by such a short stint in online marketing.

The company made a grand entry into digital advertising by working with a known filmmaker and photographer, Jamie Morgan. The reason for this was because it was easier to track the film than the traditional media houses. When the digital advertising was done in a form of film, the company was certain to have a feedback of the film from the audience by simply keeping a record of the response rate. Unlike most of other fashion films, this one showcased how the brand was becoming known through the men’s tailoring and women dresses. Short moving graphical images were also used to show the popular products from Reiss and letting consumers connect with the company’s website using mobile phones.

Digital Marketing

One method of digital marketing approach that is used by Reiss is the internet or online advertising. In an effort to reach out to the global market, Reiss has been involved in a lot of restructuring and development of its website as one way of digital marketing. When Kate Middleton appeared in public wearing the Reiss ‘Shola’ dress there was a lot of traffic on the website (Fox, 2011). This was mainly from the fashion lovers who wanted to purchase their own version of the dress through the online shopping. As a result, the site crashed two times and was down for several days. Clearly, this was quite frustrating for the fashion retailer as it did not take full advantage of the attention the dress had attracted to the many customers, mostly based in UK where Kate is a public figure.

Reiss provides digital marketing for its fashion products through the social media. This has mainly been designed to attract the millions of people who have access to the internet all over the world. For instance, the company has a facebook page where customers are provided with an interactive forum for sharing their views on the various fashion products offered by Reiss (Reiss, 2013). Its facebook page has attracted thousands of people who are either customers or potential customers. The company posts a lot of photographs and video concerning some of its popular brands as a way of informing people about their existence.

In order to make the social interaction interesting to the users, the marketing department from the company goes through most of the postings done by the page members and acts accordingly. In most cases, members suggest changes to improve brands of Reiss or give their opinions on the existing brands. It becomes even more interesting as the facebook fans post photos or videos of occasions when they had won some Reiss brands. This acts as a marketing strategy where users are convinced by their friends to start using the Reiss brands. A closer look at the Reiss facebook page, one realizes the page has more than 106,000 likes (Reiss, 2013). The company uses this page to advertise to social media users most of its popular brands from shoes to clothes. In addition, the page provides direct links that people can use to access the Reiss fashion products if they need more information. Most of the photos and videos posted on the social page have models putting on the Reiss brands as they attract more audience.

Most of the digital marketing campaigns at Reiss are done by threepipe advertising agency that organizes marketing campaigns in the UK market. The digital advertising involves display advertising, video advertising, social media advertising, mobile marketing, affiliate marketing, attribution modeling and analysis, SEO, and web analytics (Threepipe, 2012). By outsourcing the management of the digital marketing campaigns, Reiss hopes to avoid involving most of its employees in these campaigns. However, Laura Ashley remains the marketing manager incharge of online marketing at Reiss and hence she is responsible for supervising the activities of the threepipe agency.

In the affiliate marketing, the company uses other websites to promote the products from the Reiss Company. What threepipe advertising agency does is to scout for the popular websites from the internet by checking their traffic rates and then contacting the owners of the websites that have many visitors per day (Miller, 2012). As a result, the owners of such websites are requested to place adverts for the Reiss products. Actually, this reaches to the people who are not aware of what Reiss is or others who might not be following the company through the social media. This form of digital marketing has become quite popular in most organizations since it is easier to estimate the number of people who saw the advertisement.

Threepipe also coordinates with the mobile service providers in UK for a possibility to engage in digital marketing campaigns. All the mobile marketing campaigns from Reiss are directed to the many mobile users in the UK market. This method of digital marketing is effective because it reaches out to a lot of consumers who can access the advertisements even at the comfort of their homes. If this method is fully explored, it might be the best among all other digital methods due to its convenience. It is however fundamental to note that Reiss has not been aggressive in using this form of digital marketing.

Reiss has also embraced display advertising as a form of digital marketing. In this type of advertising, Reiss places graphical images or texts on content web pages and emails. These ads also contain logos and rich media that is more interactive (Rowley, 2009). It is critical to note that Reiss prefers to use the rich media because it allows the combination of images, audio, video, and sometimes animation. This is done to promote active participation from the users accessing the ads due to the use of display advertising,

The performance of the marketing campaigns can be tracked through metric measurements that disclose the number of people viewing the advertisements. In return, Reiss uses the data to determine the Return on Investment (ROI) which enables the company to know whether the money used for digital marketing has brought any returns or it has been wasted. The results from the analysis are used by the company to determine the best websites.

The digital marketing campaigns benefits Reiss if they attract more customers to buy the company products. For this reason, Reiss has contracted threepipe advertising agency to conduct attribution modeling and analysis (Threepipe, 2012). Through this analysis, Reiss is able to identify the specific digital advertisement that influenced customers to make some purchases from the company stores. For this to be done, threepipe conducts some form of survey where the first time customers are requested to provide the sources of information that informed them about Reiss. This may be done through customer response forms or through ‘suggestion boxes’.

In order to have effective digital marketing campaigns for Reiss, Threepipe agency conducts search engine optimization (SEO) to find out the rankings of information from the web based on what the search engine considers to be relevant to the readers or the internet users (Threepipe, 2012). Similarly, web analytics involves ranking of websites in terms of the number of users a accessing them, the number of times the web is visited, the speed of the site, and sometimes the net value of the website. This information is used by the Reiss Company to decide the webs where it can place its online advertisements. Without the web analysis, the company may end up running the online marketing using sites that are not popular or sites that will not attract the target customers.

A process model for Digital Marketing as applied by Reiss

The following model has been prepared based on the threepipes Search Engine Optimization approach because of the strict scientific process used in analysis and decision making for the online marketing campaign. It will follow a model of Observe>Orient>Decide>Act in a cyclical manner.

Recommendations for Improving Digital Marketing at Reiss

The management at Reiss needs to realize the value of social media as one way of digital marketing. Today, many organizations especially in the fashion industry are using social media to sell their brand to the millions of fans. Indeed, the number of people following Reiss’ facebook and twitter pages is still too low for a company that has an international presence. One way of achieving this will be by rebranding the outlook of the social pages with more colourful display of the Reiss products. Additionally, the company can also ensure that it encourages its current members of the social pages to recommend the pages to their friends (Miller, 2012).This can actually be done by introducing some form of competition where the members are rewarded if they introduce as many friends as possible to like the social pages. In order to ensure the company benefits fully from such a competition, the rewards should be in a form of Reiss products. As a result, the company can introduce some of its new products to the market through those rewards. Although this might be costly to the company, the benefits of having more potential consumers will far outweigh the cost disadvantage.

It is necessary for the company to understand that consumers buy brands due to the ideals they attach to them and not just because they have been advertised. When consumers purchase the Reiss brand, they are making a decision to be part of the Reiss image. With this in mind, the company should encourage more famous personalities to become their brand ambassador. The approach in this should be different from the traditional approaches of using famous models in the society. Instead, the brand ambassadors should be chosen on the basis of their ethics and the sense of social responsibility. It will be critical to use people who have international appeal due to their involvement in humanitarian activities such as positive response to natural calamities or helping the needy. Every digital marketing campaign should be having at least one such individual being the center of attraction.

For any organisation wishing to make it big in the digital marketing, internet use among product consumers must be considered. Despite the previous episodes where Reiss experienced a huge traffic flow on its website that resulted into a crash, the company has not done much to improve the services on its website (Hines & Bruce, 2001). This has slowed down the marketing campaign via the internet because many people would rather avoid the company’s website because it is relatively slow. Although there are many products that are showcased on the website, the experience of scrolling through the list is not interesting due to the amount of time it takes to load. To solve this problem, the company should consider re-launching its website and include more features that would enable the site to handle many users at the same time. Improving the website will also prevent a scenario where people are unable to make purchases online when celebrities, such as Kate Middleton, are spotted wearing Reiss products.

In order to boost digital marketing, Reiss should invest more in organising main events that would bring consumers together. These may include fashion shows that are sponsored by the company and where many people are invited. The company can also use such events to get the attention of its followers in the social media. Of course invitations can be placed on the company’s social pages and make the entry for the social fans affordable or free in order to attract as many fans as possible (Ryan & Jones, 2011). After the event is over, the many photographs and videos taken during the event should be posted on the social media. Thereafter, the fans should be given a chance to share their views on the social pages and give suggestions on what ought to be improved. Eventually, such events will introduce a culture where consumers interact and talk about Reiss, and the company will have achieved one of the objectives of marketing; to reach out to the potential consumers.

With the introduction of smartphones in the market, Reiss has not done enough to tap into this opportunity. The company needs to target many mobile users by introducing applications that will support the digital marketing of the Reiss products. One way of doing this would be to make arrangements with some of the mobile manufacturers for special applications to be installed. Such applications should allow immediate response from consumers on certain issues concerning the Reiss products. With such applications, pop up windows can appear in various websites used by consumers reminding them the benefits of using Reiss products.

Reiss should design its digital marketing with a purpose of not only attracting new customers but also to focus in retaining them. For customers to remain loyal to the Reiss brand, the company must come up with new strategies of entertaining and enhancing their satisfaction. During digital promotions, the company can introduce some online games where customers can get some rewards if they win. According to some studies, 54 percent of the social gamers are women and hence the company can target women in such promotions. The trend for online gamers is growing at a high rate and is expected to reach 75 million by 2014 (Ryan & Jones, 2011). It is high time, that the company takes advantage of this growth.

Videos boost e-commerce and hence Reiss needs to invest towards introducing more videos on its website. In a situation where a video fails to influence consumers to buy the company products immediately, it brings them closer to using the products even in future. Although stories can be used to influence customers into buying the company products, it is significant to take advantage of the growth in technology. For instance, Reiss should introduce videos on its website where customers can buy the company products from a video window without even interrupting the video playback. This gives consumers a memorable feeling of doing shopping from the Reiss stores.

Most of the online conversations influence customers to make shopping decisions. In this regard, more than 80 percent of the online shoppers seek advice from their friends before making the decision to buy. On the other hand, 70 percent of the online shoppers use reviews from other to make a decision (Quinn, Hines, & Bennison, 2007). With such statistics, it is clear that Reiss is missing out on its digital marketing strategy because its website does not allow users to interact well. For this reason, the company should strive to improve the website so as to allow users to hold free conversations. In addition, the company needs to allow more reviews for its main brands and for the online customers to compare other people’s views before purchasing. This can be made possible through the introduction of the chat service on its main website.

Equally important, is for Reiss to consider establishing reliable blog writing website where customers can be expressing themselves freely about their likes and dislikes. In order to cut on the cost of hosting another website, the company can use its main website to include a more detailed blogs sections for consumers’ feedbacks (Miller, 2012). For this to be helpful, Reiss should employ some employees to be reviewing all the blogs and give feedback to the management. If there is any information or complaint from the customers, the management can post a response immediately just to assure the consumers that issues are being addressed.

In order to trigger the curiosity of the internet users who visit Reiss website, the company can arrange for some weekly quizzes to be directed to the internet users. The quizzes should contain specific Reiss products that are ether new in the market or the products that are popular. This will be done to create awareness about the company products and to let customers understand those products before they even buy them. As a result, this will improve the customers’ confidence and trust towards the company and its products.

Most customers using the products from Reiss belong to different age groups that range from children, teenagers, middle-aged, and the older customers. Considering this, it is necessary for the company to evaluate their different needs and address them accordingly. Actually, all the digital marketing campaign should be arranged to address specific types of consumers. For instance, Reiss should consider establishing more social network pages that target specific age groups (Quinn, Hines, & Bennison, 2007). This will also promote the culture where users will be able to share their unique tastes and preferences without necessarily being formal. When this is done, clients will be ready to share their ideas without the fear of feeling sidelined.

To act towards the interests of customers, all the digital marketing campaigns should address specific customer concerns. In this perspective, the management at Reiss should consider putting elaborate directions on how customers can get their products and have a clear policy on how customers can return products to be exchanged if they do not fit them (Romano, 2009). This is likely to encourage more online shoppers to place their orders with the hope to return the clothes for exchange if they fail to fit them. Failure to have a clear policy on this, will lead to decreased online sales as customers will only be ready to purchase their products personally from the stores.

For the Marketing Strategy to be truly beneficial, it will be necessary to ensure it is a proactive one that ensures the specific strategies being implemented are right for the situation. A cycle of Observation, Orientation, Decision and then Action can ensure the firm’s digital marketing initiatives are effective.

Observation is all about real-time statistics of product performance as the marketing strategy is implemented. Orientation happens when the decision makers have analyzed the product performance and are now considering the different solutions that can be taken. Decision stage involves the actual process of a specific way forward being chosen. At the ‘Action’ stage, the decision that was made gets implemented and this is the making of adjustments to the present marketing strategy in play.

The Marketing Strategy Model

Source: detouragency.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Internet-Marketing-Strategy.png

Conclusion

Fashion is one of the most challenging industries due to the many fashion companies in the world today. The business becomes particularly risky to conduct if enough market research is not conducted. For an investor to be successful in the fashion industry, it is significant to reach out to more customers through extensive marketing. Although there are many methods of marketing, digital marketing has become quite popular due to the emergence of technology development. This type of marketing is mainly done through the internet which can be from a computer or smartphones. Reiss has been successful over the years due to the effective marketing strategies applied by the company. When the company was started in London, marketing was not very extensive. It was however realized that serious marketing should be done especially for the stores outside UK. The company has been successful in using models in the marketing of the various brands. These models are however selected on the basis of their physical appearance while others are contracted through modeling agencies. It is recommended for the company to make use of different personalities to market their clothes. These people do not necessarily have to be models but can come from other recognized humanitarian or non-profit organisations. This is likely to bring some change in the fashion industry and probably would have a positive impact in attracting customers. Moreover, close attention has been on the social media where the company targets the people who operate social accounts. However, the company’s website needs to be developed to allow people to access it without causing some congestion in the site. In addition, it requires improvement because it is quite slow for digital marketing. In order to make the digital marketing campaigns better, Reiss needs to develop its main website to make it more appealing to the users. It is also fundamental to develop its social pages by making them more attractive to the users. This can also be improved by introducing more interactive sessions where people can chat online with the administrators at Reiss. Rewarding the people who introduce their friends to the Reiss’ social pages will also be instrumental in increasing the number of followers. If all this is achieved, Reiss will be certain that its digital marketing campaigns can be accessed by many potential consumers of its brands which might eventually lead to increased sales and profits.

References

Chartered Insitute of Marketing. (2008). Case Study 2003: Strategic Management, Analysis and Decision. London: Routledge.

Fox, G. (2011). Kate Middleton: putting the regal into Reiss. Retrieved from http://fashion.telegraph.co.uk/news-features/TMG8547995/Kate-Middleton-putting-the- regal- into-Reiss.html on 17^th April, 2013.

Hines, T. & Bruce, M. (2001). Fashion Marketing: Contemporary Issues. Boston: Routledge.

Miller, M. (2012). B2B Digital Marketing: Using the Web to Market Directly to Business. New York: Que.

Quinn, L., Hines, T. & Bennison, D. (2007). Making Sense of Market Segmentation: a fashion retailing case. European Journal of Marketing, 41 (5): 439-465.

Reiss. (2013). Fashion. Retrieved from http://www.reiss.com/ on 17^th April, 2013.

Romano, F. (2009). The Digital Revolution: The World at The Click of Button. International Trade Forum, 5 (3): 22.

Rowley, J. (2009). Online Branding Strategies of UK Fashion Retailers. Internet Research, 19 (3): 348-369.

Ryan, D. & Jones, C. (2011). The Best Digital Marketing Campaigns in the World: Mastering the Art of Customer Engagement. London: Kogan.

Threepipe. (2012). REISS-Rich Media. Retrieved from http://threepipe.co.uk/work/reiss-rich- media/ on 17^th April, 2013.

Wind, J., & Mahajan, V. (2002). Digital marketing: global strategies from the world’s leading experts. Wiley.

Chaffey, D., & Smith, P. R. (2013). eMarketing eXcellence: Planning and optimizing your digital marketing. Routledge.

Dwyer, C., & Priluck, R. (2012). Digital Imperatives in Marketing: The Integration of Communications and Technology to Target Consumers While Protecting Privacy.

Snyder, I., Jevons, C., Henderson, M., Gabbott, M., & Beale, D. (2011). More than chatting online: children, marketing, and the use of digital media| Macquarie University ResearchOnline.