NorthSouth Advertising co-founder James Gilchrist analyses search traffic in the early days of the pandemic - and what it means for shopping behaviour.
It’s fair to say COVID-19 has had a digital impact on every business in Australia.
Some are seeing significant declines in intent and volume, while others seeing incredible surges in online sales and revenue.
In uncertain times like these there’s only one currency that counts - data.
The good news is that most businesses are sitting on a mountain of data but in most cases may struggle to leverage it to the maximum value.
The big differentiator of success or failure will be those who are able to analyse where their revenue opportunities are and take swift action to capitalise on them through digital media.
March Digital Landscape Analysis
There are several product categories that saw an uplift over March/April, as lockdowns started to phase into Australian life.
‘Loungewear’ clocked 10 times the search volume of last year for April.
‘Activewear’ is also seeing a spike as people look to stay fit while working from home.
Department Store Analysis
Search traffic can often be a good early warning indicator for organisations during times like these.
We typically look at brand search volume over time to understand the broader context of intent.
While bricks-and-mortar stores have been hit by declines in store traffic, department stores have been significant winners in the eCommerce space.
‘Myer Online’ searches spiked heavily in the last week of March, nearly double that of December.
‘David Jones Online’ also saw a similar March peak.
‘Target’ saw more online volume than Christmas 2019.
‘Kmart’ also showed great performance in late March.
In summary, it looks as though the major department stores have seen growth from the digital side of the business at the tail end of March into April.
Myer and David Jones particularly have seen an uplift in online traffic, one that looks to be rivalling Christmas 2019.
Tips For Maximising Digital Ad Strategy During COVID-19
Clear Attribution Model - The foundation is always ensuring that you have a clear and accurate media attribution approach.
Media Touch Point Analysis - Brands need to know how their entire media mix interacts to pull users through the acquisition funnel. Turning off a low ROI channel may seem like the right approach but will that impact other channels later in the purchase funnel?
Google Analytics Enhanced Ecommerce - is a crucial element when integrated with CRM revenue and sales. Google Analytics is the most powerful tool for any size business to understand in granular detail how their ecommerce business is performing. Utilising return on ad spend or ROAS as the metric of success makes decision making much more empirical.
Data Visualisation - Making that data available automatically and in a visualised way so that quick decisions on optimisation of media is essential. Search volume and intent is moving extremely fast at the moment. You can’t wait for a month end report to make a decision.
The temptation is to pull media spend as the first reaction to tough times but as we see from the data, some brands are seeing strong uplift in late March into early April. The crucial decision is to be as precise and agile as possible in the approach to media to capitalise on what is an extremely changeable market.