Creativity and commerce are natural partners, with the former driving a brand’s sales and overall performance by up to 30%. How then can brands harness the power of creativity to ensure tangible revenue growth and customer acquisition?
Speaking at this year’s Technology for Marketing expo, VMLY&R’s Commerce UK executive creative director, Marco Bezerra, revealed how creativity and commerce can and should be used in conjunction at all times in order to create truly memorable and impactful pieces of work.
The creativity of a campaign can be the all-important differentiator in securing those crucial conversions, with Bezerra adding that “tapping into culture and behaviour” are essential to curating campaigns that truly understand and reflect the customer base’s needs.
Specifically, Bezerra mentions three global brands that have made a splash in the commerce sector this year as prime examples of how acing creativity can help elevate a good commercial campaign, into an ‘iconic’ one.
French home decor retailer La Redoute last year partnered with Ibis Styles hotels to provide all of the furniture across all 240 of its French establishments. Each item came equipped with a scannable QR code enabling customers to purchase the product directly via the retailer’s website. Registering 6.4 million impression, the campaign drove brand performance by 28% and increased customer acquisition by 13%.
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On the American market, one of VMLY&R’s own campaigns saw ‘gamification’ used to great effect in a work for US confectionery giant Oreo – ‘Stuf Scan’. Playing on the so-called ‘Oreo’ colour scheme (black and white trainers), the brand and agency took back control of the term by encouraging customers to scan images of ‘Oreo’ trainers in return for product promotions.
Garnering numerous awards, the campaign drove a 6.4% bump in sales and registered a staggering 85% conversion rate.
Rounding off his presentation, Bezerra also spotlighted one of the big winners at this year’s Cannes Lions – HungerStation’s ‘Subconscious Order’ work by Wunderman Thompson.
This uniquely innovative campaign sees customers’ front-facing camera use in-app eye calibration and vision AI to track their eye movement, before using topic modelling AI to create a curated list of options based on what their eyes lingered on the longest – revealing the customer’s subconscious cravings.
All three campaigns have significantly helped build the respective brands’ equity, and ultimately tie in to Bezerra’s three key takeaways for brands looking to harness the power of creativity to supercharge commerce: infiltrate culture, think connectivity and deploy ‘iconically’.
