On the eve of the deadline for the Warc Media Awards, Lucy Aitken, Case Study Editor, Warc, considers how moment marketing could make an impact on this year's entries
The deadline for entries for the Warc Media Awards approaches and entries are starting to arrive. Already, there's a body of evidence showing how smarter comms planning helps campaigns be more effective, from a car brand that successfully used CRM data to help convert online forms into test drives to an IT brand that boosted lead generation through an effective partnership.
Magic moments
I've been talking with judges over the past few months in a series of interviews published on this blog. One of the areas which I've been asking about is micro-moments. This was a key theme in Warc's annual Strategy Toolkit, published in December 2015.
Micro-moments are when brands seek to identify brief opportunities to put the right message in front of the right consumer. The interest in moments is driven by a number of factors, including more sophisticated consumer behaviour data and targeting opportunities. If brands can identify micro-moments, programmatic buying and location-based targeting offer opportunities to serve online ads so that consumers see them at that moment.
It's clear from talking to judges that this is a real opportunity in comms planning and, at Warc, we are interested to see if any Media Awards entries will demonstrate how effective micro moment planning has been. I asked Ron Amram, VP Media, Heineken USA and chair of the Effective Partnerships & Sponsorships panel at this year's Warc Media Awards about moment marketing and how it changes the nature of comms planning. He told me: 'It hones into what's powerful. It's boiling down connection ideas to moments and it's a proven way to communicate because it accentuates what really works.'
Heineken is an excellent position to judge, having used Twitter extensively for a wide range of effective campaigns around the world. Where Next, a Twitter-based app helped users find city hotspots, while Share The Sofa saw football legends responding to questions put to them by fans via Twitter. Share the Sofa brought about a 7% rise in purchase intent for the beer brand.
Keep it agile
'Agile' is a word you hear a lot when you talk about moment marketing. Paul Davies, UK CMO at Microsoft and a judge on Effective Use of Tech panel at this year's Warc Media Awards told me: 'It doesn't change comms planning it creates another layer to consider. We need to be agile in the moment and read to respond and change.' Meanwhile Sarah Mansfield, VP Global Media of Unilever, Europe, Latam and Global Media Operations and chair of the Effective Channel Integration judging panel at the Warc Media Awards, said: “It's about being more agile and flexible… moment marketing drives brand relevance, It's identifying opportunities with events where a brand can play.'
Play the long game
One of my favourite answers to the question 'how does moment marketing change the nature of comms planning?' came from Jim DeLash, Director, Multi-Channel Marketing Execution at GlaxoSmithLine US and a judge on Effective Channel Integration panel at the Warc Media Awards. He compared comms planning to stock market investments in terms of playing the long game. In an era where so much talk is of being swift and agile, DeLash reminded that sometimes acting too fast can work against you. He said: 'Sometimes the best success is riding it out… in media, if you over-react too quickly to a day of bad response you won't learn anything.'
I'm intrigued to see how entries to this year's Media Awards reflect the 'moment marketing' trend, and even more intrigued to see how effective they have been.
If you haven't yet entered the Media Awards, please send in your entry as soon as you can. All you need to enter is here: www.warc.com/MediaAwards
Good luck!
