When COVID-19 emerged in March 2020, no one was prepared for the impact it would leave. Amidst this global pandemic, people all over the United States have shown the engagement and embodiment of “help thy neighbor.”
JOANN was inspired by customers who were looking to help during this unprecedented crisis. The retailer wanted to contribute to the cause, providing free mask-making supplies and guidance through in-store experience, curbside pickup, and joann.com.
JOANN turned to Tiger Pistol to localize and personalize Facebook and Instagram ads to create community connection, spreading awareness for its mask-making initiative, “Make to Give – Masks for All Americans,” in order to receive as many mask donations as possible.
Goals:
Rapidly onboard local JOANN stores with unique local Facebook Pages and store-specific information such as hours or curbside availability tracked on each location.
Deploy templated Awareness Campaigns based on store status.
Inspire a sense of community and drive participation in the initiative.
Ability to change, update, or pause their localized ads at any time, controlling their messaging based on store closings, and curbside or pickup options.
Link campaigns to foot traffic at open stores.
From the start, Tiger Pistol recognized the importance of social ad localization for the success of JOANN’s mask initiative. Ad localization would be vital for encouraging community participation in the initiative. Through personalized Facebook and Instagram ads, consumers would feel the impact of their donations on their local community and, therefore, feel more inspired to donate because of personal impact. Tiger Pistol created campaign templates that could be dynamically customized. Campaign budget was evenly distributed across 222 store locations with a target audience of an 8-mile radius around the store address.
Tiger Pistol’s platform capabilities made it possible for the retailer to have a wide reach while maintaining brand integrity. Despite differing local lockdown rules and associated purchase paths, it was important that the retailer be able to provide rapid and accurate information in their ads, whether open for business, closed with only online ordering or curbside pickup, or closed for a couple days due to cleaning.
Unlike other advertising platforms, Tiger Pistol can support a quick and responsive local strategy, ensuring that JOANN can more easily account for different scenarios. Lockdown rules and store status can change at any moment, and Tiger Pistol gave the retailer the power to handle these changes efficiently by being able to change, update, or pause their localized ads at any time. With templatized local campaigns, the ability to shift creative and messaging based on store status, and easy tools to turn campaigns on or off based on changing local orders, Tiger Pistol gave JOANN the opportunity to deeply reach communities with both sales-driven and/or purpose-driven content.
Additionally, to measure foot traffic to locations, Tiger Pistol implemented advance attribution using mobile device signals. Campaigns published from Tiger Pistol are linked to a specialized data set that tracks device IDs and other consumer signals passively across the United States. Tiger Pistol’s platform worked with Facebook to match the consumer data set with the retailer’s campaign performance data to surface users who saw the ads and then visited a local store.
With the help of Tiger Pistol’s collaborative, social advertising platform, JOANN was able to reach its initiative’s goals. Tiger Pistol’s unique platform gave the retailer the capability to reach a large, widespread audience while still providing them with personalized and localized information. Just one month after campaign launch, 130 million additional masks were donated, and JOANN recognized nearly 310 million masks donated in total. Tiger Pistol’s social advertising platform helped the retailer achieve its benevolent mission, while contributing to the health of stores and local communities.
Performance Metrics
222 store locations onboarded with campaign ready to launch in less than a month
11M+ Impressions
3M+ Consumers reached
84% of Ads clicked resulted in store visits
36% More cost effective than national campaigns
$.003CPR - Cost per person reached was under a penny
30M+ Number of masks by which goal was exceeded
“Once we saw the platform’s capabilities, particularly the ability to provide accurate information down to each store location, we knew there was an opportunity to inspire more customers and create a much stronger local connection. We’re thankful for the support of our efforts, and the impact this platform and services have made on our initiative.”
- Chief Customer Officer, JOANN Stores
