The document provides insights from analyzing the digital marketing campaigns of 20 leading retail brands over a three month period. It finds that: 1) Campaigns deployed on Tuesdays and using photo content received the highest Facebook engagement. Video was also promising but underutilized. Engagement increased when campaigns were accompanied by emails. 2) Twitter engagement peaked on Tuesdays-Thursdays. Early morning and deploying fewer than twice daily maximized engagement. Engagement also increased with accompanying emails. 3) YouTube saw inconsistent adoption but campaigns averaged 3.5 per brand per month. The analysis aims to help marketers optimize their digital campaigns and drive customer engagement across channels using competitive intelligence.

1. Multi-Channel
Engagement: Redefine
and Boost It through
Email
Presented by
Jason Warnock,
VP, Market Intelligence & Measurement
Yesmail Interactive
June 21, 2012

2. “Go in and check your competition. Check
everyone who is your competition. And don’t
look for the bad. Look for the good.
…everyone is doing something right."
Sam Walton / Founder & First CEO
Yesmail Confidential 2

3. Essential Digital Campaign Components
Deployment
Day / Time
Competitive Title & Digital
Content Channel
Intelligence can
optimize all key Competitive
components for
Digital Campaigns
Intelligence
Type Deployment
(specific to
Facebook) Frequency
Definition of
Engagement
Yesmail Confidential 3

4. In Today’s Presentation, We Will:
From a Marketer’s Perspective:
• Learn how to leverage competitive and market intelligence to
improve existing digital campaigns
• Develop insights to optimize your digital campaigns and drive
customer engagement
• Understand how email marketing drives social channel
engagement
Yesmail Confidential 4

5. The Need for Digital
Competitive Intelligence

6. The Need for Digital Competitive Intelligence
Most brands know it is critical to see all of your competitors’
promotions, offers, special deals and events for each digital
channel
Yesmail Confidential 6

7. The Need for Digital Competitive Intelligence
• What were the most engaging (and
alternatively, most utilized) day of
week, time of day, campaign format,
campaign frequency, and content
types
• Learn the frequency of campaign
deployment across all tracked digital
channels
• How to use the positive correlation
between email marketing and social
channel engagement to develop and
execute successful multi-channel
marketing plan
Yesmail Confidential 7

8. Using Digital Market
Intelligence to Drive Multi-
Channel Success

9. Who We Analyzed
The 20 leading retail brands with core demographic ages 18 to 35
Yesmail Confidential 9

10. How is Digital Engagement Measured
Traditionally, engagement was measured by response volume
via the following:
Campaign “Likes” and Comments
Campaign Retweets
Campaign Views, Comments, Ratings
No Relationship Between Email Deployment and Social
Channel Engagement Was Identified
But how do we compare volume-based to actual engagement?
Yesmail Confidential 10

11. Volume-Based Engagement vs. Actual Engagement
• Brand A: 1,000,000 “Likes” (subscribers)
– Digital Campaign generates 25 “likes” and 55 comments
– Volume Based Engagement score is 80
Example
• Brand B: 100,000 “Likes” (subscribers)
– Digital campaign generates 20 “Likes” and 40 comments
– Volume Based Engagement score is 60
Yesmail Interactive developed a way to control for follower base
and thus give each campaign a meaningful engagement score.
Yesmail Confidential 11

12. Average Volume-Based Engagement Over the Three-
Month Period
0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500 4,000
Ralph Lauren 1.
H&M 2.
Aeropostale 3.
Average Facebook
Abercrombie & Fitch 4.
Engagement Over
Guess 5. the Tracked Period
Forever 21 6.
American Eagle 7.
Diesel 8.
Ann Taylor 9.
Urban Outfitters 10.
Old Navy 11.
Express 12.
Banana Republic 13.
Gap 14.
Tommy Hilfiger 15.
Eddie Bauer
The Limited 16. ranks 20th in
J Crew 17. volume-based
American Apparel 18.
Kenneth Cole 19.
engagement
Eddie Bauer 20.
Growing your fan base is essential for expanding your brand’s reach and
popularity. BUT…Volume alone does not translate into true engagement.
Yesmail Confidential 12

13. Average Actual Engagement Over the Three Month Period
By controlling for brand size and number of followers, we get a completely different
ranking that is based on the actual customer engagement achieved by each brand.
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140
Ann Taylor 1.
The Limited 2. Average Facebook
Eddie Bauer 3. EngagementOver
Ralph Lauren 4. the Tracked Period
Banana Republic 5.
Urban Outfitters 6.
Guess 7. Eddie Bauer
DIESEL 8.
Kenneth Cole 9.
ranks 3rd in
J Crew 10. actual
H&M 11. engagement
Express Inc 12.
Abercrombie &…
Aeropostale 14.
American Apparel…
Gap 16.
Old Navy 17.
Forever 21 18.
American Eagle 19.
Tommy Hilfiger 20.
Yesmail Confidential 13

14. Facebook Engagement Trends

15. Facebook Trends Over the Three Month Period
Brand Campaign Volume Average Brand True Engagement
950 42
900 41
850 40
800 39
750 38
700 37
650 36
600 35
550 34
500 33
450 32
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
• In terms of Campaign Volume Brands are increasingly utilizing Facebook for
Digital Marketing
• Most of our top 20 Brands are also seeing a significant spike in Engagement
• Mid to Large Retailers should definitely emphasize Facebook
Note: Chart is for top 20 brands; not for Facebook as a whole
Yesmail Confidential 15

16. Day of the Week Trends Over a Three Month Period
Campaign Deployment Volume Campaign Engagement
450 50
400 45
350 40
35
300
30
250
25
200
20
150
15
100
10
50 5
0 0
Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun Mon Tues Wed Thu Fri Sat
• Over the three month period, the most popular deployment day was Friday
• Campaigns deployed on Tuesday garnered highest engagement even though Tuesday ranked 4th in terms
of number of campaigns deployed over the three month period
• Saturday is an interesting phenomenon, it had the highest engagement rate for campaigns deployed in
January and the second lowest engagement rate for the remainder of the period
Yesmail Confidential 16
.

17. Time of Day Trends Over the Three Month Period
• Campaigns deployed between 10pm and However, based
12am ET were an engagement goldmine on volume, this
is the least
utilized timeslot.
• The most popular time of day to deploy
campaigns is between 11am - 1pm ET Oddly enough, this
timeslot is in the
bottom 30% when it
comes to customer
engagement
Yesmail Confidential 17

18. Campaign Deployment Frequency Trends
• The 5 most engaging brands deployed between 20 and 32
campaigns per month
• While the five least engaging brands averaged 54 campaigns
per month
Yesmail Confidential 18

19. Content Trends Over the Three Month Period
Photo content is the most engaging content type
• This can be attributed to Engagement Based on Content Type
the fact that it’s easy to 70
share, quick to browse 60
through, and entails limited
time investment 50
Link
40
Photo
• It comprises 43% of all Status
deployed Facebook 30
SWF
Video
campaigns 20
10
0
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
Yesmail Confidential 19

20. Content Trends Over a Three Month Period
Engagement Based on Content Type
The most promising 70
Facebook format is
video, as evidenced by 60
its consistent and rapid 50
growth 40
Link
Photo
Status
30
SWF
Curiously, video is the Video
20
preferred format in only
10
6.5% of campaigns
0
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
Yesmail Confidential 20

21. Content Trends Over the Three Month Period
Declining Engagement Content:
Status Updates
Engagement Based on Content Type
Posts Containing Links
70
60
• Vague and uninformative status
50
updates.
• Customers’ growing reluctance to 40
Link
Photo
follow a link leading away from
Status
the site they’re on 30
SWF
• A little disturbing -- link and Video
20
status updates comprise 50% of
all deployed Facebook 10
campaigns in the period
0
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
Yesmail Confidential 21

22. Content Trends Over a Three Month Period
73% of the most engaging
posts, in all three months
we tracked, belong to either
Ann Taylor or The Limited
Yesmail Confidential 22

23. Content Trends Over a Three Month Period
• Campaigns actually identifying
a desired customer behavior
• Campaigns provide an
incentive for performing an
action
• Campaigns empower the
customer by explicitly putting
them in charge
Yesmail Confidential 23

24. Content Continues To Be King!
• Put the Customer in Charge • Put the Customer in Charge
• Identify Desired Behavior • Identify Desired Behavior
• Incentivize
Yesmail Confidential 24

25. Impact of Email on Facebook
Engagement

26. Boosting Facebook Campaign Engagement Through
Email Marketing
How a Corresponding Email Campaigns Can Boost Facebook
Facebook campaign Campaign
engagement grows 70
roughly by 50% when one 60
email is deployed in the
50
same timeframe and by
roughly 100% when two 40
emails are deployed.
30
20
10
Average Facebook
Engagement
0
0 emails 1 email 2 emails
Yesmail Confidential 26

27. Facebook Competitive Insights Summary
• Ensure my brand is actively using Facebook as it’s seeing rapid
growth and adoption from my competitors.
• Save my best Facebook content for Tuesday and it will see the
highest engagement.
• Try deploying campaigns between 10pm – 12am as it’s least utilized
by my competition and generates the highest level of engagement.
• Deploy no more than 1 campaign per day for maximum
engagement.
Yesmail Confidential 27

28. Facebook Competitive Insights Summary
• Ensure a healthy portion of my content includes a photo as it
receives the highest engagement from consumers. Also
experiment with video as it’s a strong content performer.
• Ensure my content conveys clear purpose, desired customer
behavior, and reward for best engagement. Try experimenting
with Photo / Link variations.
• Facebook campaign engagement grows when an email
campaign is previously deployed
Yesmail Confidential 28

29. Twitter

30. Twitter Trends Over the Three Month Period
Twitter Campaign Volume Over the Tracked Twitter Campaign Engagement Over the
Period Tracked Period
1,800 12
1,700 11
1,600
10
1,500
9
1,400
8
1,300
1,200 7
1,100 6
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
• Month 2 = Twitter Bonanza: Our 20 brands had about 1700 campaigns in Month 2 revolving
around special events such as Oscars, Grammys, Valentine’s Day, Super Bowl, etc. These
campaigns did very well in terms of Engagement, but not as well as in March.
• Month 3 = Less is More: Though there was a drastic dip in campaign volume (1700 versus
1150), the actual engagement score was higher in March.
• As with Facebook, brands should definitely focus on Twitter as a viable marketing channel
Yesmail Confidential 30

31. Day of the Week Trends Over the Three Month Period
Twitter Campaign Volume Twitter Campaign Engagement
900 14
800
12
700
10
600
500 8
400 6
300
4
200
2
100
0 0
Sunday Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
• 20% of all Twitter campaigns are deployed on Fridays
• However, Friday garners the absolute lowest engagement
• In terms of engagement, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are consistently
performing at the top level
Yesmail Confidential 31

32. Time of Day Trends Over the Three Month Period
Over each month in this three month period, Twitter campaigns were deployed
almost exclusively during traditional work hours: 9am – 7pm ET.
Month 1
• Only 30% of the timeslots (hours) that
receive the most engagement are
between 9am – 7pm
Month 2 • In fact, 5am – 6am ET and 7am – 8am ET
are the most engaging times over this
three month period
• The trends specified above leave a clearly
defined opportunity for brands to try out
Month 3
new tactics, hours of deployment and
frequency of deployment in order to better
engage their audience
Yesmail Confidential 32

33. Campaign Deployment Frequency
• The five most engaging brands deployed between
45 and 70 campaigns per month
• While the five least engaging brands averaged
between 95 and 115 campaigns per month
Yesmail Confidential 33

34. Content Trends Over the Three Month Period
Trends for the top 10% of the most engaging brand
campaigns over the three month period:
• Campaigns communicate purpose by identifying
desired customer behavior
• Campaigns provide an incentive
• Campaigns empower the customer by explicitly
putting them in charge It’s interesting to
• Add a celebrity mention to the campaign note there are
overlapping trends
• Insert a famous or a celebrity quote across multiple
social channels
Yesmail Confidential 34

35. Content Trends Over the Three Month Period
Put the Customer in Charge
Incentivize
Identify Desired Behavior
Quote
Celebrity
Put the Customer in Charge
Incentivize
Identify Desired Behavior
Yesmail Confidential 35

36. Impact of Email on Twitter
Engagement

37. Boosting Campaign Engagement Through Email
Marketing
How a Corresponding Email Campaign Can Boost
Average Twitter Campaign Engagement
14
• Engagement is over 25% 12
higher when one email is sent
out on the same day as a 10
Twitter campaign
8
• Engagement is over 40%
higher when two emails are 6 Average Twitter
Campaign
sent out on the same day as a Engagement
4
Twitter campaign
2
0
0 emails 1 email 2 emails
Yesmail Confidential 37

38. Twitter Competitive Insights Summary
• Ensure my brand is actively using Twitter as it’s seeing rapid
growth and adoption from my competitors and consumers.
• Save my best Twitter content for Tuesday, Wednesday, and
Thursday it will see the highest engagement.
• Deploy my tweets between 5-6am and 7-8am for maximum
engagement.
• Tweet no more than twice a day for maximum engagement.
• Twitter campaign engagement grows when an email campaign is
previously deployed.
Yesmail Confidential 38

39. YouTube

40. YouTube Trends Over the Three Month Period
YouTube Campaign Volume Over the YouTube Campaign Engagement Over the
Tracked Period
80 Tracked Period
1.8
75
1.6
70
1.4
65
1.2
60
1.0
55
50 0.8
45 0.6
40 0.4
35 0.2
30 0.0
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
YouTube is, by far, the most interesting channel because of its seemingly inconsistent
adoption by brands:
• 15% of tracked brands do not have a YouTube channel
• Only 35% of the brands that do have a YouTube channel deployed campaigns each month
• 20% only deployed campaigns in 1 of the 3 months tracked
• The average number of campaigns per month per marketer is 3.5 and roughly 1 per week.
Yesmail Confidential 40

41. Day of the Week Trends Over the Three Month Period
YouTube Campaign Volume YouTube Campaign Engagement
45
1.4
40
1.2
35
30 1.0
25 0.8
20 0.6
15
0.4
10
0.2
5
0 0.0
• Monday is the most engaging day for YouTube, however Monday is lagging in the bottom
three of least utilized deployment days
• In terms of most utilized deployment days, Friday and Thursday are the favorites
• As with the other social channels, the weekend continues to be the least utilized time of the
week for campaign deployment with barely 8% of campaigns going out on Saturday and
Sunday combined
Yesmail Confidential 41

42. Time of Day Trends Over the Three Month Period
• 68% of YouTube campaigns were deployed
between 11am – 7pm ET
• Only 10 out of the 24 timeslots were utilized for
campaign deployment in each of the 3 tracked
months YouTube has the potential
to drive incredible customer
• Least popular deployment timeslot across the engagement due to its viral
three month period was 8pm – 2am ET nature, but it has to be
supported by other
• Interestingly, the 2am – 3am ET timeslot channels in order for it to
achieved the highest engagement reach its potential with the
marketing industry
• The 6am – 7am ET timeslot comes in 2nd in
terms of engagement, although it ranks last for
campaign deployment
Yesmail Confidential 42

43. Video Duration Trends Over the Three Month Period
Based on the 10% most engaging YouTube campaigns over the
three month tracked period, we came to the following findings:
• 33% of the top performing campaigns Video Length Distribution Based on
are between 16-31 seconds Campaign Count
• 28% are between 60-90 seconds 15% 11%
• 17% are between 120-180 seconds 16% 24%
• 11% are over 180 seconds
• Interestingly, the 90-120 second 13%
segment is not represented in the 21%
10% most engaging campaigns
1-30 secs 30-60 secs
60-90 secs 90-120 secs
120-180 secs over 180 secs
Yesmail Confidential 43

44. Content Trends Over the Three Month Period
Interestingly, even with the entirely different nature of
YouTube, we found some striking similarities between
content strategy for Twitter and Facebook, and content
strategy for YouTube.
• Celebrity guest stars rack up impressive engagement
• Professionally shot commercials promote high number of views
• Incentivized and identified behavior, like posting user-generated
content for a prize, is still a great engagement factor
• Like with Twitter, sometimes it pays off being a little vague to pique the
interest of your audience
Yesmail Confidential 44

45. Content Trends Over the Three Month Period
Celebrity
Official Commercial
Yesmail Confidential 45

46. Content Trends Over the Three Month Period
Celebrity
Official Commercial
Incentivize
Put the Customer in Charge
Identify Desired Behavior
Yesmail Confidential 46

47. Email / Multi-Channel

48. Email is Still Very Relevant
In the Interactive Marketing Forecast for 2011-2016,
Forrester dubbed email marketing “the workhorse of
[the] interactive mix.”
Email is the glue that holds multi-channel
marketing together while providing measurable
campaign ROI.
Yesmail Confidential 48

49. Email is Still Very Relevant
• Real Time
• One to One
• Can be tracked in multiple ways
• ROI is tremendous
• Oh yeah…and we JUST
identified a positive correlation
between email and social
channel engagement
Yesmail Confidential 49

50. Email Trends Over the Three Month Period
Email is holding a steady position with deployments having a minimal
fluctuation of 1% to 3% over the three month tracked period.
Email Campaign Volume Jan-March 2012 As we showed in the individual
360
channel break-down, we can
340 now link email to customers’
320 social engagement with your
300 brand. If brands want to
increase social engagement,
280
they need to develop a multi-
260
channel marketing strategy
240 that incorporates coordinated
220 email and social campaign
200 deployments that transcend
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 digital channels.
Yesmail Confidential 50

51. Deployment Trends Over the Three Month Period
Number of Email Campaigns Deployed per
Weekday
• 35% of all email campaigns are
200 deployed on Monday or Friday with
180 those being the top 2 deployment
160 days over the three month period.
140
120 • Only 20% of campaigns are sent
100 over the weekend, which can be
80 perceived as an area of opportunity
60 for brands
40
• Monday is the most consistently
20
used day for email deployments
0
Yesmail Confidential 51

52. Deployment Trends Over the Three Month Period
Number of Email Campaigns Deployed per
Weekday An interesting opportunity for
200
brands would be deploying email in
180
the early morning hours on
160 weekends so their message is at
140 the top of the inbox when
120 customers wake up on the
100
weekend.
80
60
40
Since this is when most shopping
20 is typically done, this approach
0 may prove successful in promoting
weekend shopping.
Yesmail Confidential 52

53. Time of Day Trends Over the Three Month Period
In contrast to the social channels, the preferred times for email deployment
favor early mornings:
• The 6am – 10am ET timeslot is most popular for email, with 43% of
campaigns being deployed during that interval
• Another interesting contrast is the least popular timeslot for email
deployment 6pm – 10pm. While this time is generally popular with social
campaign deployment, it comprises a mere 3% of email deployment
• Recalling our earlier analysis regarding Social Campaigns having better
Engagement when tied to email, Marketers should look at using time of day
to cross promote over the email and social channels
Yesmail Confidential 53

54. Conclusion
Competitive intelligence is essential for developing
engaging digital campaigns in the following ways:
• It provides a complete picture of the competitive and industry landscape
and allows marketers to gauge competitive campaign effectiveness on
multiple levels and across multiple channels
• Marketers can adjust their deployment and content strategy based on
insights drawn from their competitors’ lucrative campaigns
• Measure engagement for each social media channel alongside email to
evaluate how your email marketing efforts drive your social channel
engagement
Yesmail Confidential 54

55. Download the full Request a demo of
report & get all Yesmail Market
insights HERE! Intelligence HERE!
Jason Warnock
VP, Market Intelligence & Measurement
Yesmail Interactive
jason.warnock@yesmail.com
www.yesmail.com
1-877-YESMAIL

56. THANK YOU!