Imagine your display campaigns aren’t showing a positive return on investment. For many hoteliers and their marketing teams, this isn't a scenario too far-fetched. Without a doubt, you’ve probably started to wonder if it’s even worth the investment any longer.Marketing across the digital space, anyone would tell you that there’s an inherent value in running display campaigns and, especially, display remarketing campaigns. It's just that proving the return on investment where it counts - revenue and transactions - is sometimes difficult.Here at Screen Pilot, we don’t rely on what we think, we test it. Running a similar test to what we published in January, we set out to find out exactly what kind of effect display remarketing campaigns have on overall revenue.This is how we did it.
Who:
We decided to test our hypothesis for our client The Grove Resort & Spa Orlando, an all-suite family-friendly resort located five miles from Disney World. A true destination resort that attracts families from the world over; it made an excellent candidate for a test that could span the United States.
What:
The first step to determine the effect display remarketing campaigns have on direct bookings: find a way to separate a control audience from our test audience.We separated the U.S. population into two groups that had an equal likelihood to book (based off of our historical data) and tested the audiences against each other.Test Audience:this audience received ads on both the Google Display Network and via Google SearchControl Audience:this group only saw ads on Google Search
How:
For four months, we evenly rotated whether or not the test audience received display ads. This segmentation allowed us to accurately determine the lift that display ads provided to our search campaigns without changing our overall search strategy.We developed a cohesive initiative across both display and search advertising by promoting the client’s best offer and by using consistent messaging and imagery across all platforms. This allowed us to develop highly targeted audiences that would be familiar with our client’s brand and the promoted offers.
Results:
During the four-month period, we saw that the audience that received display ads did, in fact, have a higher conversion rate, overall transactions, and revenue.
- 20% increase in conversion rate
- 18% increase in conversions
- 19% increase in overall revenue
Key Takeaways:
The increase in direct bookings supported our theory that running display ads has more of an effect on revenue than traditional conversion metrics (like "last click display bookings" and "revenue") have shown. Here are a few takeaways you can use moving forward that we believe also contributed to the overall lift.
- The Grove Resort & Spa Orlando has clear calls-to-action in their ads that offer anywhere from 40-50% off that entices the user to go back to the website and book direct.
- This property also has a healthy enough budget for display that we are able to target all of the most qualified users.
- Their audience is large enough to allow us to break out users based off of site behavior, which helps to identify which users are most likely to respond to different offers.
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Imagine your display campaigns aren’t showing a positive return on investment. For many hoteliers and their marketing teams, this isn't a scenario too far-fetched. Without a doubt, you’ve probably started to wonder if it’s even worth the investment any longer.Marketing across the digital space, anyone would tell you that there’s an inherent value in running display campaigns and, especially, display remarketing campaigns. It's just that proving the return on investment where it counts - revenue and transactions - is sometimes difficult.Here at Screen Pilot, we don’t rely on what we think, we test it. Running a similar test to what we published in January, we set out to find out exactly what kind of effect display remarketing campaigns have on overall revenue.This is how we did it.
Who:
We decided to test our hypothesis for our client The Grove Resort & Spa Orlando, an all-suite family-friendly resort located five miles from Disney World. A true destination resort that attracts families from the world over; it made an excellent candidate for a test that could span the United States.
What:
The first step to determine the effect display remarketing campaigns have on direct bookings: find a way to separate a control audience from our test audience.We separated the U.S. population into two groups that had an equal likelihood to book (based off of our historical data) and tested the audiences against each other.Test Audience:this audience received ads on both the Google Display Network and via Google SearchControl Audience:this group only saw ads on Google Search
How:
For four months, we evenly rotated whether or not the test audience received display ads. This segmentation allowed us to accurately determine the lift that display ads provided to our search campaigns without changing our overall search strategy.We developed a cohesive initiative across both display and search advertising by promoting the client’s best offer and by using consistent messaging and imagery across all platforms. This allowed us to develop highly targeted audiences that would be familiar with our client’s brand and the promoted offers.
Results:
During the four-month period, we saw that the audience that received display ads did, in fact, have a higher conversion rate, overall transactions, and revenue.
- 20% increase in conversion rate
- 18% increase in conversions
- 19% increase in overall revenue
Key Takeaways:
The increase in direct bookings supported our theory that running display ads has more of an effect on revenue than traditional conversion metrics (like "last click display bookings" and "revenue") have shown. Here are a few takeaways you can use moving forward that we believe also contributed to the overall lift.
- The Grove Resort & Spa Orlando has clear calls-to-action in their ads that offer anywhere from 40-50% off that entices the user to go back to the website and book direct.
- This property also has a healthy enough budget for display that we are able to target all of the most qualified users.
- Their audience is large enough to allow us to break out users based off of site behavior, which helps to identify which users are most likely to respond to different offers.
Did you enjoy the read?
Get original hospitality industry insights delivered to your inbox. Sign up to receive Screen Pilot’s #TrendingNow Newsletter.
