Performance Marketing: How Brands Leverage Purchase Insights for Real-Time Digital Ad Execution

What is Performance Marketing?

You may have been introduced to Performance Marketing for the first time in your Internet Marketing college elective course in the mid 90’s. Originating from the rise of digital marketing and dot-com boom, it is a term associated with advertising paid by ‘clicks’ instead of impressions (i.e., pay-per-click [PPC] ads). Performance Marketing quickly became all the rage – after all, what marketer wants to pay for advertising that does not perform?!

With the popularity of social media and Google changing the advertising landscape, the definition of Performance Marketing has also evolved to encompass any marketing approach tied to a specific action. However, isn’t the most important action a purchase? An online purchase is easy to track, but CPG brands want to understand the purchases in store, where 84% of consumers still prefer to buy their packaged food & beverages and other fast-moving consumer goods like OTC healthcare, beauty, and household products.

Interestingly, based on the most recent definition, Catalina has been doing Performance Marketing for 40 years. Our founders created an efficient electronic, data-driven alternative to wasteful mass-reach coupons by using store scanners to track an action – a purchase – and distribute targeted coupons accordingly.

How Our Performance Marketing Tools Help You Succeed

Today, our data-driven digital solutions help CPG Brand and Retail marketers optimize at every stage of campaign planning, media execution, and measurement. Being at the point of sale means our 1:1 purchase insights are available in real time, which helps us understand changing consumer behavior and deliver the most timely, precise targeting. And it affords us the ability to measure campaigns inflight, attributing what aspects are working most efficiently for conversion and optimizing accordingly.

What you may not have realized about Catalina is that our personalized marketing extends well beyond the register. Through innovation and partnership, we have linked our purchase insights with other digital media channels – like display ads, mobile ads, OOH and TV. For example, through our partnership with Cadent TV, we are making CTV advertising more accountable by helping marketers understand to what degree their awareness campaign ties to an actual purchase or how many new buyers of the brand redeemed their trial offer by scanning the QR code on their TV or OOH ad. Performance Marketing is no longer reserved for PPC ads. The final days of spray and pray broadcast marketing are on the horizon.

The New Era of Responsive Marketing

Since Performance Marketing is ubiquitous with digital marketing, there is a more critical definition marketers should know. Responsive Marketing is used to accelerate growth and drive stronger ROAS by intelligently delivering the right message with the right media in response to desired shopping behaviors. Taking “if this, then that” to a whole new level, Responsive Marketing requires true omni-channel integration personalized to each shopper for a multiplier effect that increases engagement and helps orchestrate the path from awareness to purchase.

How it works is our in-lane technology scans for designated products and consumer targets to dynamically serve the appropriate digital media based on the specific brand objectives. For example, brands can sequence their messaging along the shopper’s purchase journey, withhold incentives if the shopper has already purchased, and/or deliver different incentives on future visits to incite loyalty. This highly orchestrated approach accelerates growth and delivers outstanding Return on Ad Spend (ROAS).

No one implements Responsive Marketing as well or as completely as Catalina, thanks to our extensive media partnerships and ability to optimize with in-flight measurement. Our Applegate Case Study demonstrates how our responsive marketing solution delivered the CPG Brand’s goal to EFFICIENTLY incite trial with new buyers to the brand. Catalina served CTV ads to its precise targets and then served a trial offer only if they viewed the ad 3 times and did not already purchase.

Let’s Discuss Your Next Personalized Marketing Campaign

No matter your marketing strategy, we have a data-driven solution. Let’s discuss how Catalina can be your one-stop-shop to efficiently target, activate, and measure your omni-channel campaign.