Campaign Objectives:

The Economist is considered by many to be the most influential and respected magazine in the world. Despite its international flavor, it has a very selective subscription base of just over 500,000 - a base where over 50% are in senior management and the average personal income is above $150,000. The Economist is also a venerable brand that has been cultivated since the last century and like any publication, relies on advertising as a significant part of its revenue stream.

The goal of the campaign was simple - sign up new subscribers within a certain acquisition cost. In-house handling of The Economist's online initiatives had been unable to meet desired objectives and thus the decision was to bring in an outside firm.

Though the campaign was direct response in nature, there were three major issues that needed to be taken into consideration.

1. Brand Integrity. Given the venerability of The Economist brand, it was imperative that brand integrity needed to be continually maintained.
2. Readership Integrity: Given that a large part of The Economist's revenue is derived from advertising, it was essential not to attract new members at the cost of diluting the quality of the membership base.
3. Education: Most individuals had an erroneous perspective of what the Economist was all about, believing that the title was indicative of the content.

Campaign Description:

The campaign was divided into four main actionable elements:

A. Developing the Message:

Educating: Given the preconceptions associated with The Economist, we needed to educate the audience that the magazine was more than just about finance. Hence, we incorporated the tag line Insight and Analysis on politics, business, science, technology, the arts and more as much as possible. We also incorporated magazine covers that were news focused and not just business focused, modifying the mix between the two depending on the targeted audience.

Selling: Given the nature of our audience and that of the Internet, we knew we had to convey a compelling value proposition within a limited amount of space and viewing time. As a result, we decided on the use of testimonials to help promote the quality and the benefits of the magazine. The testimonials were from both persons and publications whose familiarity and legitimacy would resonate with the audience.

B. Placements:

With the restrictions imposed by brand and readership integrity, we were restricted in our placement options. Naturally we had to forgo many of the common avenues of direct response including both networks and email rental lists.

Our universe was further narrowed by our decision to target the business and news oriented users which played to the greatest strengths of the magazine.

The Finance sites we thus chose were - Thomson Financial, The Street.com, Morning Star, IPO.com, Briefing.com, Red Herring and MBA Jungle. For News we chose - US News, Mother Jones and the Weekly Standard.

C. Creatives:

As a result of the higher-than-average CPMs demanded from these brand name sites and the added educational element required in the messaging, we knew that the creatives would have to do double duty. Also, as the offer was not available through the web site, we had to drive as much immediate response as possible.

We went about procuring the largest sized creatives within each site to satisfy our requirements which also included the incorporation of the soft offer order form so as to do away with an extra step. The dominant unit chose was the pop and when unavailable the skyscraper and rectangle.

D. Tracking & Optimization:

A campaign is only half developed without the tracking and optimization. Weekly data was examined indicating the number of gross orders from which we guestimated at the net acquisition costs. As the campaign developed, this guestimation was continually refined. Information was always shared with the publisher so as to create a working relationship based on trust and continual feedback.

Results:

The campaign exceeded expectations by coming in well below the targeted cost per acquisition. The results were even more startling when compared to previous in-house initiatives, with acquisition costs being lowered by more than 85%.