Opening of a new Jouets Broze point of sale + a marketing strategy that hits the mark =

Cédric, in a few words, can you tell us about your brand and the context of the approach you took in your collaboration with Freedelity?

With 23 stores across Wallonia and Brussels, our brand specialises in all things toys. Until 2020, the Walloon Brabant region was covered by a store in Waterloo. The location and infrastructure being less than optimal, we decided to close it.

Opening a new store always attracts a degree of risk. So Freedelity carried out an analysis of the local potential. Following their analysis, Nivelles proved to be an area with high potential and no risk of cannibalisation of sales from other stores.[

The store opening has also provided an opportunity to question the best practices for developing local awareness, recruiting new customers, generating footfall and collecting useful data with a view to customer activation.

3 months later, how is the Nivelles store doing?

The Nivelles store is boasting extremely promising results despite the current economic climate. After only 3 months of activity, it has joined the front runners of our most successful locations. We didn’t expect such rapid progress. It’s a real achievement.

What are the key factors for a successful opening in your experience?

There are many factors. But first I would like to highlight the business skills of the local staff. In our business, as in retail in general, the human element remains a determining factor. That said, a good team, even in an adequate infrastructure, will only make an opening a success if other complementary drivers are activated. All the pieces need to be in place!

With regard to the key success factors, I am of course thinking about the key elements which are:

• micro-localisation;
• the potential of the catchment area in connection with our offer;
• visibility;
• parking;
• vehicle (and or pedestrian) traffic;
• the presence of other attractive and footfall-generating brands in the vicinity;
• the level of competitive pressure on the area;
• price positioning and adequacy of the customer base.

Our new store in Nivelles obtains excellent scores on every one of these aspects!

However, three key factors remain in our sector:

• The availability of a sufficient MarCom budget;
• The correct allocation of this budget as opposed to media investment alternatives;
• Good market timing.

And on this last point, the planets have been particularly well aligned. The Easter holiday period is indeed one of the most important in our sector, which we support each year by publishing a catalogue. We wanted to maximise the use of this catalogue - created at a limited marginal cost - as a marketing tool, with the help of Freedelity.

In terms of communication around this new opening, what were your choices of media and budget allocation between the different choices?

Our budget allocation choices were particularly influenced by the availability of the Easter catalogue. This, the direct mail campaign, is where we concentrated a large part of our budget in addition to a local radio budget. We normally send out our catalogues by post to our active customers. We were therefore very curious to be able to assess the potential of direct marketing to generate visits and sales to prospects when opening a new store.

So you chose to use a direct mail campaign. Can you explain the process to us?

The offer and approach proposed by the Freedelity team is as follows:

• The determination of a primary, secondary and tertiary catchment area around the new store.
  Freedelity has been managing our consumer data for more than 10 years. We therefore already have a good view of our market and our ability to capture local potential via the CustoCentrix Customer Data Platform (CDP). The geomarketing module available within the tool has greatly simplified the analysis process.
• The selection of a set of addresses from the Freedelity database grouped on the basis of a 'drive time' distance criterion in relation to our location, and also where the residents of which also include children in the age groups likely to be directly interested in the items in our catalogue.
• Refining the profiles of prospects.
  The selection of a contact person for each address. In line with the profile of our consumers in other points of sale, the selection focused on both women and men (women are over-represented, but men have a clear tendency to spend more).
• Contacting prospects.
  We contacted the prospects through a mailing processed by Symeta Hybrid, the Freedelity partner specialising in digital printing and mailing. Alongside the Freedelity teams, they designed a personalised envelope, which contained our catalogue and a letter sent by Freedelity to each member selected from the database. This letter specified in particular how personal data is collected and processed by Freedelity in compliance with the regulations.

Our direct mail marketing campaign designed by Freedelity

How was the ROI of this strategy measured? Can you share some indicators with us?

This is obviously the most sensitive issue... On the one hand, we are very satisfied with the results obtained but on the other hand, we don’t really want to open our books completely... That said, I’d really like to explain the performance measurement system. It’s rather unique and extremely precise!

Based on our briefing, Freedelity selected profiles from within the extensive Freedelity file. These profiles received a letter. Freedelity can recognise the user names of the 13,000 profiles mailed.

On our side, we use CustoCentrix and an identity card reader connected to our cash register system. At the checkout, our teams in charge of the checkout service request the registration and identification of consumers by reading their identity card. It’s really effective. In 1.5 seconds, you can access complete, reliable and automatically updated data. It is these data and particularly the process of creating unique user names that allow Freedelity to create the link between the fact that a consumer has actually received the direct mail and that they have made a purchase at the Nivelles store.

With regard to indicators, here are some figures relating to the redemption rate of this strategy:

• In the 5 minute drive time zone: 9.1%
• In the 5-10 minute drive time zone: 6.4%
• In the 10-15 minute drive time zone: 3.9%

We were very positively impressed by the results of the strategy, especially since in the local area, 1 euro invested in generating footfall by means of the postal campaign enabled us to generate 6.3 euros in turnover!

So, even from the first purchase, prospecting has definitely paid off. Especially since in 88% of cases, both an email address and an email marketing opt-in were collected by our teams! A great achievement on their part and above all, a considerable guarantee of success for subsequent activation efforts that we carry out to stimulate regular visits to our store.

Catchment area

20 minutes drive time zone