Aldi, a Danish supermarket, used geo-location targeting to strategically identify where its shoppers lived. It then used that data to determine if its printed retail flyer campaign was reaching the right consumers. By utilizing geo-location technologies, Aldi was able to achieve greater targeting efficiency and generate savings.
Objective and Context:
Aldi relied heavily on printed flyers to generate in-store traffic. It habitually engaged in "carpet flyering" (i.e., dropping a flyer in every household in a neighborhood) in every city with an Aldi.
When the primary distributor of printed flyers in Denmark announced plans to increase prices by 40 percent, Aldi knew it needed to find a more intelligent way to distribute flyers, as well as modernize its tactics by developing an online flyer.
Target Audience:
This campaign targeted all residents of cities with an Aldi.
Creative Strategy:
Aldi believed that it could use geo-targeting to carefully reduce the distribution of flyers in areas with fewer potential customers, thereby optimizing its print distribution model.
Overall Campaign Execution:
Aldi used mobile geo-tagging data to map the consumers who shopped at each of Aldi's 189 stores. The data was granular enough that Aldi could see how close consumers lived to a particular Aldi location. It then used that information to strategically reduce the number of flyers distributed while monitoring the revenue of individual stores.
Aldi used the savings generated from reducing paper flyers to create an online flyer, giving the store an online presence.
Mobile Execution:
Aldi used mobile GPS technologies to determine where shoppers lived and if they actually shopped at Aldi. Nearly 80 percent of the campaign budget was devoted to mobile.
The number of flyers distributed was reduced by 33 percent, generating more than €2 million in savings for Aldi. The number of consumers reading the paper flyers increased by 4.9 percent. Aldi was also able to reach a younger, more urban audience with its online flyers.
