PARTY CENTRAL RACE DIGITAL MARKETING PLAN

Digital marketing plan

Wow Accessories – Party Central

January – December 2017

To: All Directors

From: Digital Marketing Manager

AN EXAMPLE DIGITAL MARKETING PLAN FOR SMART INSIGHTS EXPERT MEMBERS

About this example

This is a long-form digital plan for senior managers who are not experienced in digital marketing or
“digital natives”, so context, explanation and justification of the plan is needed to obtain buy-in and
future investment. In other organisations with managers with improved understanding of digital
marketing or a culture requiring shorter plans, the one page summary tables will be sufficient to
communicate the digital strategy with a presentation to explain it.

Blank templates for the tables for the most important parts of this plan are available in our Digital
marketing workbook download.

Last updated: June 2016

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1. SUMMARY OF INTEGRATED DIGITAL STRATEGY................................................................................. 3

1.1 One page summary of our insight-driven digital strategy ............................................................ 3

1.2 Business background for context to case ..................................................................................... 4

Internal analysis summary of marketing mix .................................................................................. 5

2. OPPORTUNITY FROM DIGITAL MARKETING ....................................................................................... 6

2.1 SITUATION ANALYSIS – Where are we now? .................................................................................... 6

2.1.1 Current performance ................................................................................................................. 6

2.12 Promotion ................................................................................................................................... 7

2.1.3 Target audience personas .......................................................................................................... 7

2.1.4 Digital channel specific SWOT analysis and strategy summary ................................................. 9

2.1.5 Key issues summary ................................................................................................................. 10

3. STRATEGY TO ACHIEVE OBJECTIVES ................................................................................................. 12

3.1 OBJECTIVE 1: TO INCREASE THE REACH OF OUR CURRENT WEBSITE FROM 250,000 UNIQUE
VISITORS PER MONTH TO 400,000 OVER 12 MONTHS USING EARNED MEDIA ............................... 12

3.2 OBJECTIVE 2. TO INCREASE THE NUMBER OF SOCIAL SHARE ACTIONS FROM 0.5% TO 1%
WITHIN 12 MONTHS ......................................................................................................................... 15

3.3 OBJECTIVE 3. TO INCREASE OUR WEB CONVERSION RATE FROM 2.1% TO 2.6%. ..................... 16

3.4 OBJECTIVE 4: TO INCREASE AVERAGE ORDER VALUE FROM £58 TO £75 WITHIN 12 MONTHS 16

3.5 OBJECTIVE 5. TO ENGAGE OUR CUSTOMERS SO 2% RECOMMEND US TO THEIR FRIENDS ....... 17

3.6 OBJECTIVE 6. TO IMPROVE REPEAT CUSTOMER CONVERSION FROM 8% TO 12% .................... 17

4. ACTIONS TO IMPLEMENT DIGITAL STRATEGY .................................................................................. 18

4.1 Summary of actions a budget for our 6 month plan to mid 2017 .............................................. 18

4.2 Control and continuous improvement ....................................................................................... 18

4.3. Longer-term digital investment roadmap.................................................................................. 19

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1. SUMMARY OF INTEGRATED DIGITAL STRATEGY

1.1 One page summary of our insight-driven digital strategy

Objectives Substantiation Strategies to achieve KPIs

goals (Critical Success
Factors)
 OBJECTIVE 1:  This is a +60%  Proactive SEO Increase volume/% of
REACH - to increase. We  Social media  Natural search
increase the reach increased by +80% amplification visits – monthly
of our current the previous year  Remarketing on increments
website from without SEO, but AdWords,  Brand mentions
250,000 unique volume of search Facebook and via social media
visitors per month demand is limited Twitter
to 400,000 over 12  With improved  Partnering with
months focusing content quality we complementary
on earned media. can increase social sites
sharing
 OBJECTIVE 2: ACT -  Based on  Branded content  Number and % of
to increase the improving quality campaigns Social share
number of social of content scheduled monthly actions
share actions from  Creation of  Conversion to sale
0.5% to 1% within cornerstone (multichannel
12 months. content funnels in Google
 Regular Analytics)
daily/weekly
features
 OBJECTIVE 3: Based on  Implement mobile  Bounce rate
CONVERT - to  Current low mobile responsive site  Add-to-basket
increase our web Conversion rate (a  Regular CRO conversion
conversion rate quarter of desktop programme of site  Overall conversion
from 2.1% to on smartphone) page templates rate
2.6%1.  Average including testing of  Revenue per visit
conversion rate brand
low messaging/OVP
 OBJECTIVE 4:  Based on review of  Smarter  CTR on cross/up-
CONVERT - to analytics in each Merchandising on sell
increase average product category home, category recommendation
order value from site section with  Personalised  Overall conversion
£58 to £75 within limited recommendations rate
12 months. merchandising of  Improved  Revenue per visit
value products copywriting /
imagery on higher-
end products.

1 We report and set targets for conversion rate consistent with Google Analytics reporting which defines conversion rates
as the number of sales transactions divided by the number of visitor sessions in a period expressed as a percentage. Some
believe conversion should be expressed as percentage of unique visitors. We use a more detailed conversion-based model
on which to base revenue by audience type and channel also.

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 OBJECTIVE 5.  Recommendations  New member-get-  % of email

ENGAGE - to based on MGM member forwards – general
engage our programme and programme  5% of new friends
customers so that organic sharing subscribing to or
2% recommend us through social sharing our on-
to their friends. media and page fashion tips
forwarding  Increase in social
sharing / brand
mentions
 Net promoter
score
 OBJECTIVE 6.  Based on  Improved  % customer email
ENGAGE - improve modelling email marketing list active –
repeat customer response from automation for different cohorts
conversion from customers customer emails  % site visits 6
8% to 12%.  Also new  Improved social months
personalisation selling via emails  Customer
enables specific  Personalisation satisfaction using
customer messages to our new Net
messages signed-in/cookied Promoter Score
customers

1.2 Business background for context to case

As a long-established accessories manufacturer, in 2009 Party Central Ltd, trading as ‘Wow
Accessories’ made the decision to move to direct sales under its own name, in addition to the
traditional ‘white label’ goods provided for three decades to wholesalers. It produces Jewelry, Gifts,
Bags and other women’s accessories.

Initially there was concern that the existing customer base would be cannibalised, but the transition
was managed so that the existing customers achieved a lower price point than Wow Accessories
selling direct.

In the last five years, Wow Accessories has

 Gained recognition as a women’s accessories brand

 Won a Queen’s Award for export sales
 Won ‘Business Woman of the Year’ award for our MD

In the next five years the business needs to

 Defend our market position; more competitors are appearing and are copying product lines
(join Anti Copying in Design (ACID) - see http://www.acid.uk.com)
 Create a product development plan; so that a stream of new products are planned and in
the pipeline
 Better define our customer base; create personas to maximise the marketing budget
 Understand omnichannel marketing and what this means to our customers
 Create a digital marketing plan to manage and monitor our online strategy

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Internal analysis summary of marketing mix

This marketing mix is summarised for context for the case. It wouldn’t normally feature in a Digital
marketing plan unless you were looking to highlight changes to the marketing mix.

Product offer Pricing

•Range of accessories: Jewelery, •Premium pricing as the brand is
Gifts, Bags and Seasonal well-known

Place (Access to Physical evidence

products) •All packaging has been created, in
standard colours
•We sell online via our own website
•Mini brochures to promote other
•We sell via third parties under
products, added to all orders
their brands (white label)

People Processes
•Web developers, content creators, •Standard delivery is free
photographers, product sourcing •Next day is available at a cost

This document is the digital marketing plan and whilst it covers some of the above areas, more work
is needed. This will be scheduled in Q2 with the resources identified to undertake the work.

This plan combines use of two recognised methods of structuring digital marketing plans used
throughout the Digital Strategy Toolkit – Smart Insights’ RACE Digital Marketing Planning™ and PR
Smith’s SOSTAC®.

RACE Digital Marketing Planning™ See post Introducing RACE = A practical framework to improve your
digital marketing.

SOSTAC® first appeared in PR Smith’s Marketing Communications books where it is still used. Further
details available from PR Smith’s site (www.prsmith.org).

Smith, P. (2012) Marketing Communications: Integrating offline and online with social media, 5th edn.
Kogan Page, London.

Smith, P.R. (2012) The SOSTAC® Guide - to writing the perfect plan V1.1 [Kindle Edition]

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2. OPPORTUNITY FROM DIGITAL MARKETING

We have defined the opportunity for digital marketing to contribute more to the business in future
through reviewing current performance based on sales reporting, review of KPIs on our analytics
performance control dashboard and marketplace review of customer demand as part of situation
analysis.

OVERALL GOAL: To increase digital channel sales from £5.8 million to £9 million within 12 months.

VISION: To increase visibility of the Party Central Brand and our products across owned, earned and
paid media such that we are the most searched for destination brand in our category. Improve the
overall customer experience so that we have the highest customer satisfaction rating in our
category.

The specific objectives to achieve this goal and vision are

 OBJECTIVE 1: REACH: increase the reach of our current website from 250,000 unique visitors per
month to 400,000 over 12 months focusing on earned media.
 OBJECTIVE 2: ACT - increase the number of social share actions from 0.5% to 1% within 12
months.
 OBJECTIVE 3: CONVERT: increase our web conversion rate from 2.1% to 2.6%.
 OBJECTIVE 4: CONVERT: increase average order value from £58 to £75 within 12 months.
 OBJECTIVE 5. ENGAGE: engage our customers so that 2% encourage a friend to buy from us.
 OBJECTIVE 6. ENGAGE: improve repeat customer conversion from 8% to 12%.

This opportunity from digital marketing is based on our current performance shown through
analytics and marketplace analysis including market estimates for customer demand levels for online
services and competitor use.

2.1 SITUATION ANALYSIS – Where are we now?

2.1.1 Current performance
Here is a summary of our current performance showing Volume-Quality-Value based KPIs based on
performance control dashboard / factbase used for analytics reporting.

Volume Quality Value Additional KPIs

REACH 250,000 monthly 28% Revenue per visit 43% organic visits
Awareness and unique visitors Average bounce £1.22
site visits (400,000 visits rate
and 4 million
pageviews)
ACT 16,800 monthly 4.2% visit to Revenue per 10 page views
Interaction and shopping basket shopping basket basket session per visit
leads sessions conversion £29
CONVERT 8,400 orders per 50% basket to £487,200 sales Average order
Sales and profit month sale conversion per month value: £58
2.1% overall
conversion
ENGAGE 12% of customer 8% repeat 20% sales from 1.5m social
Loyalty and 6 months active customer existing mentions
advocacy conversion customers Email list

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30% active

2.12 Promotion

Medium Offline Online

Search N/A SEO via Google – active content
marketing development for SEO has lapsed, this
needs improving through strategic
content marketing. AdWords limited to
Remarketing.
PR Work with 3 key titles and issue Outreach cultivating various bloggers to
monthly press releases and repurpose our content, talk about the
imagery. brand positively.
Advertising Support new collections with one-
off ads.
Exhibitions Have exhibited at Spirit of One-off landing pages based on specific
Christmas fairs around the UK, but offers.
issues staffing and managing the
web business too.
Social media Links to social media on all sales Have established Facebook, Pinterest
literature. and Twitter pages. No use of SM ads.
Mailing N/A Have email list via MailChimp. Send
infrequent emails.

2.1.3 Target audience personas

Name Description Online behaviour Content wanted Functionality

from our website expected from
our website
Emma Female, aged 34 – 41 Orders in the Likes to look at One click
(Primary with two children evening, after 9pm ‘new’ and ordering.
persona) under 10. from her iPad. ‘suggestions for Keen on next day
Has returned to part- you’. delivery.
time work and is busy Image hungry.
juggling home and
work.
Laura Female, aged 28 to 33 Typically places Information; hints Gift wrapping,
with first child, not in orders around and tips. gift delivery.
paid employment. 11.00am and 3pm Checklists, PDFs to
Likes lunches, coffee via laptop. download.
mornings, parties.
Focused on
presentation and loves
matching accessory
sets.
Lisa Female, aged 45 to 55 Orders placed via ‘How to’ videos. 90 Mobile /
looking for statement mobile between second videos on responsive

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pieces to dress-up 7am to 8am on YouTube. website to make

existing wardrobe. Tuesdays and it easy to view on
Commutes to work, on Wednesday, via any device.
train. laptop or iPad
between 8pm to
10pm towards the
end of the week.

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PARTY CENTRAL
2.1.4 Digital channel specific SWOT analysis and strategy summary
This TOWS analysis shows the main challenges and opportunities we face with integrating digital
marketing activities into our business and summarises the options we have for strategic initiatives.
Digital marketing
specific SWOT/TOWS
matrix for Wow
Accessories
Note: Strengths and weaknesses
are for the business.
Opportunities and threats apply
across all competitors, e.g.
• New business model
• New technology
• Government Legal changes
Opportunities
• R: Partnering with
complementary sites
• R: Advertising on mobile
platforms
• AC: Research and purchase via
apps, smartphones and tablets
• C: Apply conversion rate
optimisation (CRO)
• C: New Marketing Automation
and Retargeting technology
Threats:
• B: Copying of product lines
• B: Competitors increase use of
discounting through online
marketplaces i.e. Amazon, eBay
• R: Competitors improve
content marketing / lifestyle
publishing
• R: Competitors improve SEO
• G: New GDPR privacy law
Strengths:
• B: Effective brand proposition
and personality
• R: Social media drives significant
visits and sales
• R: Established affiliate
programme
• AC: Responsive mobile site live
• E: Email list is 30% 6 months
active and programme of
lifecycle/behavioural emails except
Basket abandons
• E: 6 month active shoppers
better than sector average
SO Strategies
• RE: SMO (Social media
optimisation)
• ACE: Improve Basket abandon
emails, create mobile templates
• BR: Develop strategic media
partnerships
ST Strategies
• B: Defend market position by
developing product branding to
reduce impact of counterfeits
• BR: Extend use of Amazon
marketplace and advertising
• BR: Review implications of GDPR
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RACE DIGITAL MARKETING PLAN
Weaknesses:
• R: SEO, not proactive, low % of
visits, poor AdWords reach and ROI
• A: Content marketing limited – blog,
but no cornerstone content (OVP)
• C: Conversion below sector average
for well-known brands
• E: No personalisation for returning
shoppers
• G: Limited digital resource (1
dedicated, over-dependent on
agencies)
WT Strategies
• C: CRO including mobile CRO
• ACE: Implement personalised
recommendations
• G: Make case for Digital Marketing
Exec
WT Strategies
• R: Continuous SEO programme
• RA: Editorial calendar for regular
content marketing with
daily/weekly/monthly features (see
ASOS.com)
• BR: Increase use of celebrities and
Gossip content to increase sharing
PARTY CENTRAL RACE DIGITAL MARKETING PLAN

limits targeting

Each evaluation or activity is coded based on its focus:

P: Plan, R: Reach, A: Interact, C: Conversion, E: Long-term engagement, B: Brand, G: Governance,

T: Technology.

2.1.5 Key issues summary

Strategy focus Key issues (SWOT) Strategies to manage

these issues
Plan – Brand  Reach and content marketing  Develop strategic media
Proposition issues, e.g. limited partners
7Ps, Segmentation,  Brand personality limited and  Use celebrities to develop
Targeting, Positioning undifferentiated brand personality

Plan – Governance  Copying of brand assets  Defend brand from copying

Management and  Content marketing limits RACE  Implement content marketing
resourcing programme
Reach  Missed opportunities from  SEO programme
Increase audience SEO and social media  Social media amplification and
 Potential from Amazon advertising
marketplace  Amazon marketplace initiative

Act  Content doesn’t support lead  Implement editorial calendar

Increase leads generation  Apply CRO to lead landing pages

Convert  No structured approach to  CRO programme

Increase online or offline increase conversion  Implement mobile optimised
sales  Mobile visits have increased, site
but no mobile experience 

Engage  Repeat customer conversion  Implement Retention plan

Increase customer neglected based on RFM and improving
loyalty  Advocacy and satisfaction drivers
recommendations not tapped  Improve advocacy and social
into media sharing

 Brand: Develop strategic media partners, defend brand from copying

 Governance: Make case for digital marketing exec/blogger to support in-house content
developer with Digital Marketing Manager to focus on strategic activities/partner management.
 Reach: Opportunities to improve SEO and social media amplification with investment in
structured content marketing
 Act: Develop content marketing approach
 Conversion: Continuous CRO programme

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 Engagement: Improve repeat customer conversion rate by evaluation of customer loyalty and
customer satisfaction drivers

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3. STRATEGY TO ACHIEVE OBJECTIVES

Goal: To increase sales from £17 million to £25 million within 12 months.

Our sales goal has been agreed and these marketing objectives show how this will be achieved.

Our objectives are shown here, with the rationale so we are clear on the targets.

3.1 OBJECTIVE 1: TO INCREASE THE REACH OF OUR CURRENT

WEBSITE FROM 250,000 UNIQUE VISITORS PER MONTH TO 400,000
OVER 12 MONTHS USING EARNED MEDIA

 Our current website generates 250,000 unique visitors per month who make 400,000 visits.
 There is an average 2.1% conversion rate from visit (session) to sale.
 There are uplifts at specific times of year, the greatest towards December
 Turnover for the current full year is forecast to be £5.8 million.

Social
Web visits
visits

Products
views

Sales
What is our segmentation and targeting strategy?

This table reviews and prioritises all the potential opportunities for delivering more relevant
messaging to increase response and sale from prospects and customers.

Targeting Summary of method Current capability / Priority for future P1-P3

approaches Future relevance (of 5)
1. Classic profile- Media targeting or personalised We use this for email P3: Add personalisation
based messaging on site and email marketing feature
demographic based on characteristics
segmentation
2. Search Target consumer behaviour Not maximising category P2: See SEO
behaviour grouped: SEO+PPC or long-tail targeting improvements
through SEO

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3. Content Using ad networks including GDN We are not using this P1: This is a missed
consumption and remarketing technique opportunity. Implement
remarketing.
4. SN interest- E.G. Facebook, LinkedIn and We are not using this P2: Trial Twitter and
based targeting Twitter interests technique Facebook custom
audiences targeting
5. Web personas Combine other characteristics We use this technique – P3: Need to prioritise
and behaviours but targeting each
equally.
6. Customer Target Email and Web messages We have a welcome P3: Develop reactivation
lifecycle according to length of time using strategy, but that’s it for
online services automated. However
good levels of customer
activity.
7. Customer Review current and future We need to improve this P2: Evaluate and target
value potential for existing customers technique. customers by current and
future predicted value

8. Campaign Use “sense and respond” Not using sufficiently – Likely to be following year
message behavioural targeting based on need to get value-based
response and RFM (Recency, Frequency and targeting right first.
behaviour Monetary value)
9. Buying Evaluation method and Not to be used for N/A
motivations sensitivity to pricing against targeting
and features, benefits, brand value
behaviours
10. Channel Communicate with customer in We should target P1: Reduce direct mail
preference their preferred media e.g. Email customers who are most volumes by reviewing
vs Print and Phone (and responsive by direct mail who responds to email
according to value) preferentially. marketing and site
personalisation

Where will the increased traffic come from?

Natural (organic) search currently accounts for 43% of visits and 54% of sales (Last click)
Given the current importance of SEO and analysis that shows that some product categories gain far
fewer visitors, we aim to invest more in SEO focusing on these techniques:

 Improve natural search visits for poorly performing categories

 Apply a more structured approach to target long tail visits, e.g. when people are looking for a
product type by style, occasion of use or product review
 Improve blog to link directly to relevant product pages automatically after each post
 Create cornerstone content based on the latest accessories trends for ranking and sharing
through social media

Our Facebook site has 90,000 likes.

We have a ‘People Talking About Us (PTAT – a form of engagement metric) score of 0.9% which
seems low, but is about the same as similar businesses and better than some major brands. This
means around 8,000 of our ‘fans’ are mentioning our name, liking us and sharing this with their
friends or posting information to our page at any one time. NB This includes negative as well as
positive comments!

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The Facebook page includes a ‘new products’ section and our Google Analytics shows us that
this drives an average of 1,000 new sales to our website each month (1%). Whilst this is low,
these are higher spending visitors with an average spend of £150. They particularly buy the
‘colour sets’ (e.g. coral earrings, matching necklace and bangles) and 30% opt for the express
delivery service.

For ads, we’re estimating a £1.12 cost per click and a 0.5% clickthrough rate and a lower average
basket of £40.

Media Budget Estimated Click Potential Visits Revenue Sales

cost per through reach per visit * generated
click rate
Facebook £ 25,000 1.12 0.5 4,464,286 22321 £1 £ 22,321

Revenue per visit is based on a lower than average £40 Average Order Value and 2.5%
conversion rate to sale. Conversion rates are higher than average since these are targeted
products ads based on intent.

This will cover the cost of the campaign and generate additional likes, which will in turn,
generate further sales.
ACTION: We will start a Facebook ad campaign, to promote specific products, driving more traffic
to the website.

Twitter
We have a total of 42,000 Twitter followers across two pages but we do not know how many
duplicates may exist. We have two Twitter pages for historical reasons:

 Page 1 Party Central - has 7,000 likes and was aimed at our wholesale customers
 Page 2 Wow Accessories - has 35,000 likes and was created when we started to market
the business direct to end customers

At this point in time Twitter will not allow us to merge the pages.

It is not ideal having these two pages and at some point we need to think about how we manage
these going forward. At the moment, we duplicate content on both and the overall impact is
diluted.

We use our Wow Accessories Twitter page for ‘flash sales’, to promote seasonal party packs and
to communicate with journalists. Since our MD won the Business Woman of the Year award, we
have been inundated with interview requests via both Twitter pages.

Google Analytics shows us that Twitter drives an average of 10% new visitors to our website
each month. So 35,000 fans deliver 3,500 visitors a month, with a higher conversion rate of 1%
(they will be shown an image before clicking) and a higher spend rate (£72 per basket).

Our campaign will focus on promoted tweets, selected by Twitter. This is our estimate of
returns.

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Media Budget Estimated Clickthrough Potential Site visits Revenue Sales

cost per rate % reach per visit generated
click
Twitter £15,000 £ 0.85 3.0 588,235 17,647 £1.0 17,647

Revenue per click is based on an average £40 Average Order Value and 2.5% conversion rate to
sale. Conversion rates are higher than average since these are targeted products ads based on
intent.
ACTION: We will start a Twitter ad campaign, promoting specific products to the shopping cart
direct page, driving more traffic to the website.

3.2 OBJECTIVE 2. TO INCREASE THE NUMBER OF SOCIAL SHARE

ACTIONS FROM 0.5% TO 1% WITHIN 12 MONTHS

Our website includes a space where our visitors can share their purchase with friends. Less than
0.5% do so. Earlier customer research revealed this was because customers did not want to admit to
“having spent only £15 on a knockout necklace”. Our way around this is rather than including shares
of purchases, to get customers to share images; on the website, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.

We know that when images are shared, sales are generated. Our Google Analytics isn’t totally
configured as needed, but the stats we do get show that clickthrough to sale from an image is 0.5%.
Therefore the more images are available and the more that the images are shared, the more sales
increase.

Pinterest
Note to directors

Pinterest is an online image sharing site, where the images are added to pinboards. This social
media site is popular in the USA and the UK with women and especially those organising events,
parties, weddings. The benefit of Pinterest is when we pin an image to a board, we can embed
the URL of the actual product page, taking customers direct to ‘add to cart’. People adding pins
are called ‘pinners’.
Our Pinterest page includes 120 pinboards with over 1,100 images.

The metrics are a little different to Facebook and Twitter, so we have 6,000+ likes for various images
and yet only 1,000 followers

The Pinterest boards include products by season, colour, theme as well as other images that we
have included. For example in the Halloween party section, we’ve added pumpkins, winter soup
recipes from other pinners.

Our Google Analytics shows us that Pinterest drives an average of 500 new sales to our website
each month. Whilst this is low, these are higher spending visitors with an average spend of
£180. They particularly buy the ‘party packs’ and 25% opt for the express delivery service.

Advertising with Pinterest is more complicated at the moment. We will therefore focus on
pinning images (and video) using internal resources.

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We are stretched with marketing resources at the moment, but we will need to consider Instagram
at some stage. This is an image sharing website – similar to Pinterest, but often shows ‘behind the
scenes’ and it’s popular with people aged 16 to 24, especially students.

ACTION: Seek intern for summer months to build up images on our Pinterest page.

3.3 OBJECTIVE 3. TO INCREASE OUR WEB CONVERSION RATE FROM

2.1% TO 2.6%.
There is wide variation in conversion rate depending on landing page and product category. Through
running a conversion optimisation programme we will be able to improve conversion for different
points in the customer journey. Each quarter we will complete research to find problems and
opportunities to improve different page types, e.g. category pages, product pages and then make
improvements.

There is much research about ‘social proof’ which means people seeing the number who like our
page andseeing that genuine buyers have reviewed our products. At the moment we do not have a
‘review product’ facility.

Additionally we need to show delivery charges for overseas orders earlier. When an item is added to
the basket we could suggest ‘add country to calculate delivery’. This will reduce the abandoned
baskets from overseas orders.

ACTION: Implement AB and multivariate testing to deliver more compelling brand messaging for
our Proposition across different page template types

ACTION: Explore review systems and add onto website within 4 months.

ACTION: Show delivery charges as soon as item added to cart.

3.4 OBJECTIVE 4: TO INCREASE AVERAGE ORDER VALUE FROM £58

TO £75 WITHIN 12 MONTHS

Our average order value is £58 and in December this increases to £98. The easiest way to increase
average order value is to offer free shipping for orders of £75 and over. We would need to specify
this as ‘standard shipping’ for UK mainland orders only.

Additionally we may consider ‘added value’ and offering a ‘free gift’ with orders over £70. We have
significant stock of small make-up bags and this would be a great way to move the stock, give
something back to the customers and increase order value.

30% of our orders are from overseas: Ireland, Australia, Denmark and Sweden are the main export
destinations. We could offer free shipping to Ireland for orders over €100, especially if we can
organise a courier service that collects twice a week, so we have two weekly deliveries and can gain
a better rate.

ACTION: Organise free shipping to Ireland within 6 months.

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3.5 OBJECTIVE 5. TO ENGAGE OUR CUSTOMERS SO 2% RECOMMEND

US TO THEIR FRIENDS

We know our accessories are very shareable. Our images are popular on Facebook and our
‘transform your dress’ pages gain many views. This is all valuable content with which we could do
more.

This creates several actions. First we don’t yet have a newsletter. Our content strategy to date has
been tactical with images shared with customers as they become available. Occasional email blasts
have taken place, normally towards the end of a season to make way for new stock, however we
have never adopted the newsletter route.

We use Mailchimp at the moment but we’re not sure whether there are better options.

The second action is about personalising the newsletters and we understand with the new CRM
system we will be able to better harness those who abandon carts, make a purchase at a specific
time. This will involve creating ‘recipes’ so those that purchased this, might like that – along the lines
of an Amazon product suggestion.

ACTION: Organise newsletter content and sending mechanism within 3 months.

3.6 OBJECTIVE 6. TO IMPROVE REPEAT CUSTOMER CONVERSION

FROM 8% TO 12%

We have many tips buried on different pages of the website. These need to be better curated and
organised so that they are found, the user journey improves and to enable us to do more with the
content.

ACTION: Extract and curate content from our site to maximise relevant on-page content

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PARTY CENTRAL RACE DIGITAL MARKETING PLAN

4. ACTIONS TO IMPLEMENT DIGITAL STRATEGY

This section is brief since the actions needed to implement the strategy have been described in the
strategy section. The actions are summarised here.

4.1 Summary of actions a budget for our 6 month plan to mid 2017

Action Detail Who When Budget

Facebook ad Sign up for Facebook ads, select Digital Month 1 £50,000
campaign specific products to use for promoted Marketing
stories and trial for one month Manager
Twitter ad Sign up for Twitter ads, select specific Digital Month 2 £15,000
campaign products to use for promoted tweets Marketing
and trial for one month Manager
Pinterest page Seek intern for summer months Digital Month 2 £5,000
Marketing
Manager
Delivery charges Show delivery charges on the website Web team Month 3 £850
as soon as item added to cart
Pinterest page Build up images on our Pinterest Intern Month 3
page.
Newsletter Organise newsletter content; create Digital Month 4 £25,000
editorial calendar, develop themes Marketing
and outsource writing Manager
Web content Extract and curate content from our Digital Month 5
site to maximise relevant on-page Marketing
content Manager
Online customer Explore online customer review Digital Month 5 £5,000
review systems systems and add onto website Marketing
Assistant
Newsletter Organise newsletter sending Digital Month 6
mechanism Marketing
Assistant
Free shipping to Offer free shipping to Ireland for Digital Month 6 TBC
Ireland orders over €100 Marketing
Assistant

Total budget required: £100,850

4.2 Control and continuous improvement

To measure our results we will use existing reporting materials:

 Sales figures from accounting system

 Google Analytics – some adjustments will be needed to use Google’s new Enhanced
Ecommerce tracking
 We will use a 90 day planning system to set quarterly objectives and activity based on RACE
and then review and adjust performance across these monthly
 We may also explore a genuine insights tool that interrogates our data and enables us to
better respond to customers.

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PARTY CENTRAL RACE DIGITAL MARKETING PLAN

4.3. Longer-term digital investment roadmap

Since it is not possible to complete all the activities and technology investments we want this year
we are also developing a longer-term roadmap of future investments in this format which we will
present in one month following a workshop with the different business units.

Strategic initiative H1 +1 year H2 20XX +1 year

Reach

Act

Convert

Engage

Customer Insight and

targeting

Branding

Governance and resources

inc business Insight

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