1. From top to bottom
Should your entire campaign hinge on one ‘big idea’?
Nick Barthram
Principal Digital Planner
Dan Watt
Performance Marketing Director

2. Top-down planning, or integrating around the ‘big idea’, has been
considered best practice in marketing for decades. But in this fractured
digital age, where waiting just an extra second for a page to load can
cause customers to shop elsewhere, is it still right?
In their New Models of Marketing Effectiveness, the IPA found that
campaigns with no central idea, or which hadn’t been planned ‘top-
down’, performed almost as well as some integrated campaigns and
better than others (see below).
Is it still just about
the big idea?
“We challenge the assertion that
integration is always best; campaigns that
are not integrated, but for which each
channel is planned and executed separately,
can be extremely effective, and since they
may take much less marketing resource to
manage, should be considered a useful
route to pursue.”
So, on average, there is a marginal increase in performance
from integrating your marketing with your brand (e.g. Apple,
Nike), but not from integrating it with an advertising idea
(e.g. the CompareTheMarket meerkat). So if we’re slightly
freed from the shackles of the big idea – how can we
turn planning from the bottom-up to our advantage?100%
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
No
integration
Advertising-led
integrated
Source: IPA, New models of Marketing Effectiveness
Brand idea-led
integrated
Participation-led
integrated
Effectiveness success rate
0.74 0.72
0.79
0.38

3. First, some lessons from the uber-bottom-up
channel – performance marketing.
A performance marketing campaign is only as strong as its weakest link.
Always ensure that you’re clear on what you want to achieve and check
that your tracking set-up is optimal. And then check again. Campaign
decisions from inaccurate data will always undermine.
Segmentation is key
Never, ever, run campaigns without a segmentation strategy in place:
no segments means no option to optimise.
Star performers
Analyse campaign data to establish your star performers, both within
and across channel. Ensure that these elements are always on and,
wherever possible, at saturation point in volume terms.
Embrace failure
Even the best planned strategies will have areas of poor performance.
As long as you learn from them, mistakes can be invaluable.
Context is king
Consumers use numerous devices and expect brands to deliver seamless
experiences across all screen sizes. Always ensure that creative tone and
calls to action are mindful of the device on which the communication
is consumed. Timing is crucial – consider how a user might receive and
act on your invitation at different times of the day, or days of the week.
Augment your approach accordingly.
Learning from
performance marketing

4. Cookies are the new keywords
Take advantage of how personalisation can be delivered across all
performance marketing channels. Consider what determines the
segment in which a given user resides, and allow them to customise the
ads they see by the characteristics they’ve displayed.
Adopt early
Adopt relevant new campaign features as early as possible.
Early adopters learn the fastest, and do so most efficiently.
More competition equals increasing costs.
Act natural
Performance marketing offers data in plentiful supply. But don’t let data
dictate everything – leave room for an overarching campaign idea. Don’t
look for correlations in data that don’t exist, and always force yourself
to question conclusions. Reassuringly, we’re not robots, and neither are
our audience. The data doesn’t always win, but interpreting it effectively
alongside your brand strategy will massively increase your chances
of success.
Learning from
performance marketing

5. How to blend top-down
and bottom-up approaches
Define a clear strategic and creative lead
In an ideal world, multiple departments or agencies could work in a
perfectly democratic way on a single campaign, In reality, it’s usually
a fight for the most budget. If you can’t have democracy, aim for a
(benevolent) dictator; give one group strategic and creative leadership
and the power to enforce it.
Define a clear brand idea and behaviour
Remember that the IPA survey suggested the best integration is
aligned to the brand - not a campaign idea. A lot of brands fail here by
having very weak brand purposes and expressions. Tighten and focus
your brand and then integrate around it.
…but promote and measure collaboration
A global study run by Admap in 2013 found that brands which directly
measured collaboration between their agencies and departments saw
up to a 20% increase in performance on both agency and client side.
…but let the experts do their thing
Once the brand idea is tightly defined, hand this over (rather than
strict creative guidelines) to your experts, and allow them the freedom
to optimise for their channels. The brand idea should be a platform
rather than a ball and chain.

6. How to blend top-down
and bottom-up approaches
How to blend top-down
and bottom-up approaches
Pre-testing doesn’t work
It’s always tempting, but don’t pre-test your big idea. It’s been shown
in The Dangers of Common Sense that, on average, campaigns
without pre-testing outperform those with it.
Devise a holistic channel plan
Although the average customer decision journey has got shorter and
more complex, there will still be several touchpoints in the decision
making process. Make sure your strategic leads have mapped out the
decision ecosystem and specified the objectives of each. Research
says the most effective number of different channels is seven.
…but test-and-learn drives performance
By focusing on testing the various applications of the idea, rather than
the idea itself, your channel experts will be able to greatly improve the
performance of your campaigns.
…but keep the message simple
The IPA found an inverse relationship between the complexity of a
marketing message and its likelihood to change behaviour. A large
decision ecosystem creates the temptation to create a progressive
narrative across your touchpoints, but it’s unlikely that your prospects
will see all these points. Keep each channel optimised to its objective,
but include the whole story – simply.

7. In summary, big ideas are most effective when
they are manifestations of the brand idea itself.
Pass them to your channel experts and allow
them to optimise their campaigns from the
bottom-up, inspired rather than constrained
by the original thinking.
Optimise from
the bottom-up

8. If you have a business challenge, or just fancy
a chat about rowing or gardening, then give
Alan a call:
Alan Thorpe
Digital and Data Director
Email: athorpe@brayleino.co.uk
Twitter: @brayleinoyucca
Phone: +44 (0)7710 404 382
Get in touch