Mondelez International’s Cadbury brand recently teamed up with Mac’s Convenience Stores to reward shoppers for logging into the locations’ Wi-Fi, driving a 14 percent increase in coupon redemptions and a 25 percent increase in customer loyalty.

Cadbury sought to fuel penetration among the millennial audience and incite more in-store purchases of its products by collaborating with mobile location marketing platform Turnstyle to send targeted offers to individuals who logged onto the convenience stores’ Wi-Fi. All three of the parties involved were able to glean valuable insights into customers’ purchase behaviors, which consequently helped inform future marketing initiatives.

“In verticals such as convenience, QSR, grocery, etc. where there is an extremely high probability of purchase on a visit, using visit frequency as a proxy for purchase behavior can be quite powerful,” said Ryan Freeman, vice president of partnerships at Turnstyle. “Beyond acting as that proxy, it also allows venues to react based on a customer entering a store, when it is easiest to influence their purchase behavior, rather than having to wait for a purchase to be initiated at the point of sale.”

Sweetening up in-store deals
Cadbury’s overall goal was to unearth unique ways of reaching millennial consumers with its products in moments of purchase for a category that typically sees high numbers of impulse buys, such as candy. The consumer packaged goods marketer also wanted to entice these individuals to come back and make purchases in the future.

Cadbury joined forces with Couche-Tard, the company that owns Mac’s Convenience Stores, and Turnstyle to roll out the Wi-Fi-enabled mobile offers.

Consumers who logged into the Wi-Fi network at any given Mac’s Convenience Store location automatically received a targeted offer for Cadbury products as well as the ability to opt-in to receive future marketing communications from the convenience chain.

Six types of coupons were distributed to in-store shoppers throughout a 30-day period. Consumers were not required to download a separate mobile application to receive the smartphone-only deals.

Additionally, repeat customers who logged onto Mac’s Wi-Fi network received more personalized mobile rewards.

Unwrapping positive results
More than 3,200 consumers opted in to receive additional marketing materials through the program, culminating in an 81 percent uptick in sign-ins over the previous month-long period, which was anchored primarily by in-store signage promoting the campaign.

On average, 14 percent of shoppers who opened a mobile coupon redeemed it – a significant increase from typical email coupon redemption rates of two to three percent.

Moreover, most coupons were redeemed within a three-day period despite the impulse-ridden offer of a complimentary candy bar, suggesting that some consumers made a separate visit to a Mac’s Convenience Store to collect their reward.

Customers returned to their local store 25 percent more frequently after the campaign’s conclusion, showcasing how Wi-Fi-enabled rewards can influence consumer behavior.

Cadbury and Mac’s Convenience Stores are not the only marketers to have leveraged this strategy in a bid to fuel more sales.

Earlier this year, Subway expanded its Wi-Fi-enabled loyalty program to 600 Canadian stores following a successful pilot, highlighting how fast-food chains can leverage mobile to drive in-store traffic, especially among millennials (see story).

“The most significant conclusions from this case study are that location-based messaging and offers can have a profound impact on the in-store behavior of customers,” Mr. Freeman said. “Not only through the specific visit that the offer directly induced, but through the long-term effects that the intimacy conferred through relevant, mobile-first messaging has.

“The right message, personalized based on location and longitudinal data, can change a customer’s store-level behavior for weeks if not months.”