Yes, the majority of clients that PCG partners with are from automotive–and we do love our dealers–but did you know that our team of digital marketing specialists can work their magic for any industry?
One of my favorite clients happens to be in the furniture industry, with several locations scattered across the country.
When COVID-19 hit the US, there was a lot of uncertainty and companies were scrambling to keep up with an impossibly quick moving target. Business owners now had to deal with stay at home orders, safety protocols, all kinds of hour changes, and pretty much a total shift to virtual shopping.
In the meantime, basically everyone was at home and on the computer.
Make A Plan and Make It Work
One of the main issues we faced was making sure that our shoppers received a consistent message of safety across all of our channels–they could still shop from the comfort and safety of their homes whenever they wanted to. We had to be present every step of that journey.
From Facebook to Google My Business we wanted to be up front and center, keeping customers well informed on all platforms of the steps the team was taking during the early days of the pandemic as well as into the summer months as things moved along.
We knew it would be vital to keep everyone informed about store hours, pick up and delivery, and our in-store safety measures. The client’s website content and messaging was another important area to focus on. Once the shopper clicked through to the online store, we knew it was important for a unique user experience. We had to have a real time voice that reflected the situation at hand.
Teamwork Makes The Dream Work
Together, the entire team mapped out regular virtual meetings to ensure that we all were communicating as much as possible during this timeframe and following a deliberate plan of action. This is what we came up with:
- Since most people were at home and online, we made sure that our marketing message was loud and clear on Social through videos promoting stay at home wellness and safety in our communities while also making them aware of current product listings.
- The team scoured the data from Google analytics when it came to marketing decisions and tracking results.
- We included several departments on our calls to get the best feedback directly from the sales floor as well as IT.
- Being a virtual showroom was paramount to our success, with chat and online checkout functioning correctly and updated inventory.
- We made sure to let people know through Google My Business if pick up was available and what the hours were. Since there were different state orders for each location, we made sure that all Google My Business listings were accurate and up to date for store hours and product information.
- We created custom content blogs for our shoppers with tips for COVID home cleaning.
- Focused on contactless home delivery messaging through all channels.
- We created cloud based shared folders so all teams had access to the latest files for marketing messaging and creatives.
- Advertising spend was managed real time for each location separately to maximize our conversions for paid ads.
The Results
As it turns out, May was a record breaking month for sales for the entire company during a national emergency. Here are just a few of the highlights:
- Overall traffic and organic traffic showed increases of over 100% year-over-year.
- Google My Business had increases in users and actions over 100%.
- Conversions from Google Adwords hit an all time high.
- Social driven campaigns led the way with some of the highest forms of quality traffic delivered to the website.
- All of our geo targeted cities showed jumps in organic traffic as well as new users.
If that doesn’t make you a believer, you should know that June then followed up with another banner month for engaged traffic performance and online sales.
PCG and our client were able to build out and execute a unique, consistent marketing strategy across multiple channels utilizing custom content, video, and on site optimization to bring the message of safety as well as beautiful furniture offerings to the at home customer.
We did all this with passion and caring for our client and their customers. If you are interested as well and would like to work with our team whatever your business is feel free to check out our PCG digital services.