In a recent presentation at ad:tech San Francisco, I shared results from a client pilot project that Empower MediaMarketing conducted with Mederma®, a leading U.S. scar management brand, and ShareThis®, the world’s largest sharing network.

To help launch a new product on a limited budget, Empower tapped into an analytics tool called ShareThis Influence, a segmentation methodology which helps identify and reach social influencers.  ShareThis ran influence-segmented creative against identical creative, as a control.  Results were then analyzed across multiple segments, based on various types of influence signals.

Outstanding Results:
The redemption and conversion rates of the influence-segmented pilot were even higher than anticipated:

• Mederma’s redemption rates increased by as much as 50 percent with target influencers when compared to recent search and display campaigns.
• 50 percent of influencers converted to a coupon compared to 25 percent in search and 10 percent for contextual display
• Share Responders, an integral part of the sharing experience and value, were 1.6 times more likely to redeem than a contextual display campaign

Targeting Influencers and Affected Friends
Empower and Mederma selected targeted social topics that would appeal to women with scars and stretch marks.  By reaching 400+ million consumers and analyzing millions of social topics a month, ShareThis understands how to find the “Influencers” (the people who share), as well as their “Affected” friends (the people who respond to shared information).  This ensured the audience would share and respond more favorably than in traditional campaigns. 

Reinventing the Impression
Empower, Mederma and ShareThis are continuing to apply this case study to help answer bigger questions such as, “How can we continue to tap into sharing, one of the most widespread, social behaviors on the web?” and “What is sharing worth?”  The companies are eager to continue testing and validating the value of sharing and social media, especially as it is applied to premium display advertising.

By:  Jim Price, Empower MediaMarketing President