Homebase to combine SkyIQ and Nectar card data to boost sales

Homebase expects to increase sales revenues by five per cent by combining TV viewing data from SkyIQ with information from loyalty firm Nectar, the retailer's head of marketing, Becky Brock, told Media360 last week.

Brock revealed Homebase's findings come from cross-referencing purchase data from its Nectar card customers – who numbered seven million last year – with information from Sky's customer intelligence service SkyIQ, which records which ads a household watches.

Combining this data allowed Homebase to see which individuals had seen a TV ad for a bank holiday weekend promotion, and then followed up with a purchase in a Homebase shop that weekend.

Homebase estimates that it can use the combined information to increase sales revenues by five per cent for promotions that are supported by TV advertising.

Brock said the data helped her to access "the black box that is ROI" and that before using SkyIQ, "our understanding of the TV viewer and their subsequent purchase behaviour was anything but forensic."

She said: "With this granular level of data, we started to prove the direct impact of TV. We saw who saw our ad, and then bought something."

Around 39 per cent of Homebase customers were Sky subscribers, she told the audience, and 3.3 million of those were Nectar card users.

She added that SkyIQ data showed the bank holiday ads had an even greater reach than figures from Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB) had suggested.

"BARB showed we reached 56% of ABC1 households 3.1 times, but Sky IQ data suggested we reached 74 per cent of them 3.4 times," Brock said.

When asked whether the accuracy of SkyIQ meant Homebase no longer needed BARB research, Brock said: "You need both, because otherwise [with SkyIQ] you get down to such a minute level of detail that you can't make big business decisions.

"The two together give you a good marco and micro way of working. We can use Nectar and Sky data to assess short-term sales impact, but BARB data shows us the role of an ad in changing behaviour over time."

Tony Mooney, managing director of SkyIQ, agreed that its data was a "complement" to BARB.

He said: "Barb does a fabulous job of painting a picture."

Source : Louise Ridley – Media Week
http://mediaweek.co.uk/channel/Digital/article/1185573/MEDIA360-SkyIQ-data-increase-sales-5-says-Homebase-marketer/