Marketers need to pick the right tools to help them get the job done. And these days, linear TV often isn’t part of the mix.
For Bosch Power Tools’ new “What Hard Workers Deserve” ad campaign, the company had to weigh the best channels to convey its message in the face of changing consumer behavior. And for this campaign, the company decided to steer clear of linear TV.
“There’s still a place for linear in media plans, just not for this campaign at this time,” said Shannon Blakely, Bosch’s VP of brand marketing and digital.
Multi-platform, but no linear TV
Bosch has included linear TV in its past campaigns. But when the company looked at recent data related to how its user base consumes media, “we saw a stronger pull [toward CTV and streaming], and there was more opportunity for us to show up as a brand in those spaces,” Blakely said.
Nielsen data validates this shift. A recent report by Nielsen showed streaming viewership outnumbering cable TV viewership for the first time.
Plus, “Streaming offered advantages in what we could track and optimize,” Blakely said.
Bosch wanted a chance to test and learn, to see how less traditional but increasingly popular channels like CTV and social media drive brand lift and performance, she said.
Bosch opted to place ads on Hulu, Amazon Prime, YouTube TV, LG Channels, DirecTV Stream and Samba TV.
Besides CTV, the campaign also prioritizes social media (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Reddit and Twitch) and digital radio, along with programmatic display ads and direct buys with contextually relevant publisher sites.
Creative testing
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Nick Offerman stars in the ads as the Bosch spokesperson to capitalize on his image as a no-nonsense, self-sufficient craftsman. The campaign depicts everyday workers in extraordinary situations, using Bosch tools to complete tasks while in the woods facing down an angry bear, for example.
In designing the creative, Bosch and its creative agency, Bailey Lauerman, solicited audience feedback through surveys and focus group testing.
“We focused on making sure that, although the messaging may be on the extreme end, it would still reflect the day-to-day of the workers we’re representing,” Blakely said. “So we did some [pre-launch] head-to-head testing of the messaging. And we did one-on-one interviews with tradespeople to get their guidance.”
After testing the creative, Bosch implemented creative sequencing. People see different messaging based on where they are in the purchase funnel and how many times they’ve already been exposed to the campaign.
For users in the upper portion of the funnel, the ads center on brand awareness, Blakely said. But once a user visits Bosch’s website, the messaging changes based on which products that user seems to be most interested in based on their browser behavior, provided they’ve opted into that level of ad personalization.
The campaign is intended to drive both brand awareness and performance, Blakely said.
Bosch plans to measure engagement and clickthrough metrics depending on what part of the marketing funnel each piece of the campaign is serving, Blakely said.
“Overall, we’re looking at return on ad spend and if the message connects with our audience and helps them understand our brand,” she said. Brand lift is measured using surveys, including surveys served alongside display and video ads.
The process of designing the campaign from concept to creation took about six months. The campaign launched on Monday and will carry through the end of this year, although Bosch hopes to build on its messaging going forward.
