For the holidays, Montreal-based Bell Canada decided to feature all of its comprehensive offerings – mobility, Internet, satellite TV and bundles – on one Web site, bell.ca/gift.
According to Nicolas Gaudreau, director of site management for Bell, the telco aimed to capitalize on the success of bell.ca, which was the most-visited telco site in Canada during the month of November, as per ComScore Media Metrix data.
‘We also recognized that the e-channel was becoming more pivotal for consumers prior to purchase, so we decided to go big, and do something extraordinary for the online initiative.’
The goal
Bell wanted to maximize the exposure of its different holiday offers, and also wanted to generate more online sales. Another goal was to capture a significant amount of permission-based data for future promotions. Furthermore, the idea was that a single Bell Christmas experience would avoid the duplication of efforts.
The strategy
Gaudreau says the main strategy was to simplify the process for consumers: ‘They wouldn’t have to dig around on several sites, and we knew that we would accelerate the penetration of our units as well, given that customers were going to shop at the same place and at the same time for all our products.’
The Web site was created by Cesart, a division of Bell Canada focused on Web solutions, which developed a profile of the typical end user and determined his/her main objectives when shopping online: to gather information, to make an online purchase and to take advantage of contests and free goodies.
The target was split evenly between males and females and made up of frequent online shoppers, although Bell also addressed those consumers who had only dabbled in e-commerce, recognizing that they could be encouraged to shop on the Internet during the holidays for convenience sake. ‘All this was played into the type of communications and messages we sent out,’ says Mike De Luca, Bell’s account director at Cesart, who adds that the campaign thus focused on convenience-themed offers such as free delivery.
The execution
The Web site, which was live between Nov. 11 and Dec. 31, was created in Flash and gave equal weight to all four of Bell’s business units. Using the offline positioning ‘Give the gift you know they’ll love’ as inspiration, the home page depicted four gift boxes, which opened to reveal a call-to-action.
There was also an e-mail campaign that included three waves. The first wave was sent in mid-November to 400,000 Bell newsletter subscribers and promoted a weekly contest on the site, which ran for six weeks. The point of the e-mail was to increase awareness of the site, and drive traffic.
The ‘gift at your door’ contest featured a different prize weekly, ranging from a Panasonic LCD TV to a Sony mini DVD handicam, with an opportunity to win a grand prize – a plasma TV, complete with home theatre equipment (a value of $15,000), and two secondary prizes. Creatively, the contest mimicked an Advent calendar, with doors opening on the site to show the respective goodies.
Participants entered their names, telephone numbers and e-mail addresses and then waited for instant feedback as to whether they were a winner. At that time the Christmas offers were shown. If they didn’t win, customers were invited back the following week to try their luck again. There was also the opportunity to increase their chances of winning by sending viral messages to five pals informing them about the contest.
A second e-mail was sent in early December that offered more product information, while a third phase, sent in mid-December, communicated a sense of urgency, alerting recipients that the Christmas deadline was approaching and telling them about free delivery. In total, 1.2 million e-mails were sent.
To sweeten the deal, Bell also offered a $15 Amazon rebate for purchases made online, and in return, Amazon customers received a Bell coupon. Freebies were also available on bell.ca/gift, such as holiday-themed screen savers and ringtones.
The site was promoted through paid listings on search engines (at a cost of $0.50 to $0.60 per click) and through media buys on a variety of media sites in Canada, such as Globeandmail.com and Canada.com. The buy included banners and box ads, and on Dec. 7, the entire home page of several English media portals was covered by an ad for Bell.ca/gift. (This also occurred on French sites on Dec. 10.) The promotional Web site was also accessible via a ‘gift window’ that appeared on the main Bell site.
The results
A total of 150,000 people entered the contest, and of those, over 80% (roughly 125,000) opted in to receive permission-based marketing from Bell. Also, over 10,000 people participated in the viral component of the campaign, and sent over 30,000 e-mails to friends.
In total, Bell.ca/gift attracted more than 500,000 unique visitors. Paid listings generated over 85,000 visits, double the initial objectives.
And according to Gaudreau, sales in November and December were up an estimated 30% to 50% versus September and October.
