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Digital channels are becoming more and more an integral part of many consumer promotion plans. Both mobile and internet are increasingly playing an important part. Online advertising is moving towards actioning the advertisement rather than only informing the consumer. In many cases, especially Financial Services providers are making consumers complete the lead form etc on the same page without making them go to another page/site. Also more and more down loadable coupons and deals are being used as a hook. Some of the interesting ideas currently gaining ground are-

• Online Loyalty clubs- Most of the pizza chains have put their loyalty clubs online and have been spending significant budgets on driving traffic to their loyalty pages. Dominos, Pizza Hut, Pizza corner all have created their online clubs and they have used innovative schemes to drive memberships. Members are regulary sent offers and coupons which can be used both as print-outs and as mobile downloads.

• Facebook pages- Facebook has been a big destination for many marketing managers, some of the well populated pages are for coffee day, pizza hut etc. This is gaining momentum and is likely to be a big channel for consumer engagement. The fact that users dont have to leave their Facebook page while interacting with the brand is a big plus.

• Twitter- Mallika Sherwat made twitter famous in India and this is becoming a good channel to communicate the promotions and engage with the consumers. This is also a great place to gather your consumer feedback.

• Mobile Loyalty programs- With more and more companies joining loyalty bandwagon, it is increasingly difficult for consumers to carry so many loyalty cards in their wallet. A simplified loyalty program with an easy execution is very critical. How you get your loyal members to walk into your stores and engage with you repeatedly is an important question. Using mobile to create the program, rewarding members based on usage with extra mobile vouchers/discounts are some of the interesting ideas which are gaining ground. Companies like Starbucks, IKEA are piloting mobile coupons in a big way.

While usage of digital channels is an important emerging trend, many companies are not leveraging this channel to the best possible results. This channel makes the Marketing budget very measurable and that is not fully captured. Also companies have to look at using this as a complete engagement tool with a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) approach rather than campaign by campaign basis.

We will discuss the best practices and how digital channels can be used for effective consumer promotions in the next article.