Tesco: Where Does Mobile Fit in the Christmas Marketing Mix?

Tesco Mark CodyThe annual battle between UK retailers for the best Christmas TV ad is by now as much a part of the festive ritual as putting up the tree, preparing the turkey or digging out the Mariah Carey CD.

Weve all heard plenty about the emotive response people have had to the John Lewis Hare and Bear TV campaign – earlier this week, trialling Sensums neuromarketing technology, our very own Kirsty Styles discovered that even she wasnt immune to the £7m ads charms.

But it often seems like other channels get lost in the rush.

So we asked Mark Cody, senior mobile marketing manager at Tesco – which hasnt shied away from tugging on consumers heartstrings with its own Christmas TV ad – what place mobile has in the festive marketing plans of retailers.

Christmas TV ads are obviously a major focus for big retailers at this time of year. But how does that trickle down to mobile?

Mobile plays a key supporting role to the big TV campaigns in terms of helping to underpin the message. The key for Tesco is that we provide a range of simple tools to help our customers to make their Christmas easier and provide inspiration along the way.

Alongside this years Christmas TV campaign, is Tesco doing anything equivalent with its mobile advertising?

We have launched a crossplatform Christmas hub which allows customers to get easy access to useful practical information and inspiring gift ideas from any device. Christmas is a very busy time for our customers so putting all of the useful information into one place made perfect sense. We are continually looking for new and engaging ways to make shopping with us easy.

We have also been promoting our Click & Collect service which can make buying your Christmas gifts a little easier with a range of interactive windows across the country. This is a simple way for our customers with smartphones to make the most of our Click & Collect service whilst they are out and about. We are trialling two ways of doing this with QR Codes and Augmented Reality to understand what works and we will use that learning to help us build a smarter multichannel Tesco for everyone.

Do you think that mobile can match the impact of TV, or is its role entirely as support to these big TV ads?

Right now, mobile does play a supporting role, but it’s a key one. If you look at what is happening across social media at Christmas there is so much great discussion being shared by customers and a significant proportion of that activity comes from mobile.

The balance is shifting slowly and we will start to see more integrated campaigns over the coming years that really take advantage of the personalisation that’s available from using mobile, with location, context and great content playing a bigger role.

And finally, on a slightly different note – any prediction for what percentage of your Christmas revenues will come from mobile this year?

If you look at the huge increase in spend globally over Black Friday and Cyber Monday on mobile, there is no doubt the number will increase from last year. As to what that number is, I’m afraid my lips are sealed.