OgilvyOne Worldwide, which handles direct and digital marketing for such powerful b2b companies as Cisco Systems, DuPont, IBM Corp., SAP and United Parcel Service of America, is realizing success for its clients by taking database marketing and targeted communications to the next level.
“Direct marketing has been evolving over the past couple of years, and very specifically over the last 18 months,” said Gunther Schumacher, COO at OgilvyOne Worldwide, New York.
“Traditional direct marketing was all about transactions. Then came an era of cross-sell and up-sell, then lifetime value and creating loyalty around lifetime value [of the customer],” he said. “Then advocacy came about, which has become more and more important in the context of social media. The next step is making your customers part of your enterprise, down to the co-creation of content and the development of products.”
OgilvyOne has been using this approach to win new clients, including the enterprise business for Motorola Mobility, and integrated marketing for Parexel International Corp., a pharmaceutical services company. It has also greatly expanded its direct and digital business with existing clients.
“Our core focus is we have a wonderful client base, and it has been a terrific way for us to grow and unlock customer value and help them grow their business. It has been a rich ground for us,” Schumacher said.
For longtime client IBM, which celebrated its centennial anniversary this year, OgilvyOne worked on direct and digital marketing for Watson, a supercomputer that competed on the game show “Jeopardy!” (and won, beating two human contestants).
“Watson was a very targeted strategy to market the dry topic of data and analytics, and bring it to life through personification of the technology,” Schumacher said. “We wanted to bring to life what data really means and how powerful data is. We also wanted to weave it into something that is intimately connected to sales and help the sales force leverage the content.”
To do this, OgilvyOne created an integrated campaign to showcase Watson's success and communicate what the technology could mean to businesses.
One component was a video documentary series of Watson's “journey” through the eyes of IBM researchers, explaining the technology and its implications for businesses. The videos were posted on a website and on YouTube, and promoted through Facebook and Twitter.
The agency also used white papers targeted at business execs, an email lead-nurture campaign, social media and events. The campaign resulted in a significant number of qualified leads and additional revenue for IBM, although Schumacher declined to say how much.
For DuPont, OgilvyOne helped develop an integrated campaign, called “Welcome to the Global Collaboratory,” that was designed to reshape DuPont's image from that of a science company to a “collaborative science brand” by taking on global challenges such as feeding a growing population, developing alternative energy sources and keeping the world's population safe and protected.
The campaign used a content-driven approach to engage a highly targeted audience of thought leaders in industry, government and academia to foster conversations around these global problems and come up with solutions.
As part of the campaign, the agency developed a microsite as well as a YouTube channel. It also included media partnerships with BBC World News and National Geographic.
Next year, “Global Collaboratory” will be ex- tended through more customized content partnerships around the world and additional targeted communications programs, Schumacher said.MILES MILLIONAIRE CONTEST
For client British Airways, OgilvyOne created a Miles Millionaire contest to help the airline build or expand relationships with business travelers. The program was a joint promotion between Oneworld alliance members British Airways and American Airlines, targeting frequent fliers of both airlines.
The campaign included email, a microsite and social media to encourage frequent-flier members to register for a sweepstakes offering 1 million miles each to two American Airlines AAdvantage members and two British Airways Executive Club members.
“As an email and digital campaign, it's not tremendously expensive; there's not a lot of paid media and no paid events,” Schumacher said. “One million miles is a lot of real value to the airlines, and it's a great incentive to give customers. It drove real value for a relatively reasonable investment.”
Also this year, OgilvyOne opened an advanced video practice, which uses SEO and social media listening to optimize video content distribution. So far, it has used the service with IBM and DuPont.
