Precision-targeting digital ads to boost sales

Present Aid is the charity gift shop from Christian Aid. When people purchase an ethical gift from Present Aid they are helping fund the organisation’s vital work to end poverty around the world. Each gift comes with a card that can be posted, emailed, or printed at home.

Christian Aid wanted to retain its position as reputable charity gift supplier over the festive season in 2017, despite being in the process of redeveloping their website. Their goals were to boost brand awareness, drive traffic to the website and increase online sales and conversions.

Their secondary objective was to increase the average sales value from Christmas 2016.

What we did

Manifesto used tightly-targeted digital advertising to drive traffic to the Present Aid website and boost sales.

Though we used multiple Facebook ad formats, video and carousel ads were the most successful. Video proved to be the perfect way to introduce the brand and its premise quickly and succinctly, while carousel ads—which displayed up to 10 different product images in one place—showcased Present Aid’s wide range of charitable gifts.

To reach as many people as possible, we used Facebook’s precise targeting tools, as well as Custom Audiences and Lookalike Audiences.

By also adding remarketing ads to the mix—which displayed additional items to users based on the price ranges they’d viewed—we helped to drive conversions, reinforce repeat purchases, and upsell within price brackets.

PPC Search marketing was used to capture audiences in-market for charitable or ethical Christmas gifts.

By defensively targeting brand keywords, as well as targeting competitor searches and intelligently segmented sub-groups of people looking for similar gifts, we were able to serve relevant text ads that converted at over 13.7%

With the demographics of most Bing searchers closely matching Present Aid’s highly converting audiences, we tested using this channel alongside Google AdWords. Whilst volumes were lower, Bing produced the highest average conversion value of any channel, 23% higher than the campaign average.

How it went

By combining attention-grabbing visual adverts on Facebook with well-segmented, monitored search campaigns on Google AdWords and Bing, with robust audience-building and dynamic retargeting, we managed to drive over 30,000 web visits and 3,000 sales, generating a return on ad spend (ROAS) of 374%.

Between October and December 2017, the campaign achieved a conversion rate from ad traffic of over 10% and an average order value 1.74 times higher than our targets. In the last week of the campaign, ROAS figures were almost 1,000%.

How this helps us on your project

We can help you harness the latest tools and techniques in digital advertising, combining them with audience insight to deliver your message in the most efficient manner and generate the greatest possible value from your ad spend – whether in the form of brand awareness, sign ups or sales.