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2 minute read
Launching a TV campaign is an exciting time for any marketer. Your work and ideas - live on screens in millions of homes! But it can also be scary. How do you choose the concept that will pay off?
The TV Campaign’s Secret Sauce: Pre-testing
Instead of going in blind, brands are 'pre-testing' TV concepts to help pick the best versions before they launch. Recently, truffle-focused sauce brand Truff tested ad concepts on the Swayable platform to determine which ad to launch in their first national TV campaign.
We spoke with Truff’s SVP of eCommerce Calvin Lammers about the launch of Truff’s first-ever national TV campaign, and how Swayable impact metrics were behind making it successful. The brand has grown tremendously online (the company owns the enviable Instagram handle @sauce), and recently got a nod from Oprah’s favorite things list. With TV, the brand is poised to scale.
How did you know you wanted to enter TV?
I have been in the emerging CPG space for a while and I have seen TV play an important role around this stage. Whether you're a DTC/digitally native brand or traditional retail brand, there's a certain point where you need to drive massive reach and exposure, and TV is still the best way to do so.
How did you use pre-testing?
We used pre-testing in two ways, actually.
First, deciding on which creative to run. We used Swayable to decide what version of the creative we should run. I didn't want to spend 4 weeks and thousands of dollars to find out it wasn't working.
And second, TV audience targeting. Audience targeting for TV can be tough to measure. With streaming TV you can get some targeting insights, but linear TV you don't; it's a bit of a black box. In Swayable’s test we saw that our ads performed well with certain markets. So, we used the data to target which networks to run the ads on and reach those audiences.
What did you look to test with Swayable?
We measured a combination of direct response and brand linkage (sales and brand perception), but also product-specific attributes to get closer to how someone might use Truff: Does Truff sauce sound appealing? Does it pair well with food? Would you try it?
How are the results so far?
Early leading indicators are very positive! We have seen an immediate increase in Google brand search, and lift in Amazon traffic.
Did anything about the tests surprise you?
It was great to see how much ‘taste’ came through the creative. I didn't think that would be the case given that there is no actual eating in the ad! But those learnings helped our confidence in going with this concept.
Overall, the level of detail and how far you can dig down into the Swayable results impressed me. I had an idea about the platform, but the overall sentiment analysis, getting a look at 5 different audiences, seeing what worked, what didn't - there are a lot of great insights applicable for future creative.
Interested in seeing how Pre-testing can generate insights for your next TV campaign? Book your quick demo here. Concepts, ideas, storyboards and final creative can all be tested in Swayable.
Takeaways
- Advertisers are increasingly adopting RCT pre-testing to select which TV concepts to launch
- Digital native brand Truff pre-tested their TV concepts with Swayable to choose the top performer for their first TV campaign
- Truff used Swayable impact metrics to identify which audiences would be most swayed by the campaign, then placed ads on corresponding networks