Popeyes is centralizing its media buying in one DSP to minimize wasted impressions and maximize reach of households. Jean Paul Ciaramella, Media Lead, Popeyes NA, Restaurant Brands International, explained the new initiative of Popeyes’ advertising at the last edition of Portada Live on March 31.
Popeyes, the chain of fried chicken fast food restaurants which in 2019 generated major social media buzz with the Popeyes Chicken Sandwich, has been working on simplifying its media buys to tackle audience fragmentation challenges, particularly as it relates to CTV advertising.
“One of the key challenges we are facing from a media perspective is audience and media landscape fragmentation. Pre-COVID 19 we were seeing a clear acceleration of digital media adoption, particularly in CTV, and during COVID that trend was accelerated by a factor of 5 or even 10,” Ciaramella noted.
75% of Streaming Happens on 5 Platforms
According to Ciaramella, a large amount of CTV consumption happens across a multitude of apps, but 75% of streaming time is spent with 5 platforms: YouTube, Hulu, Disney, Amazon and Netflix, with the remaining providers representing the long tail. “We saw a risk of duplicating reach and set out minimize wasted impressions and maximize reach of unique households,” Ciaramella states.
Before there were many fragmented buys and no platforms talking to each other. Now by simplifying the way the campaigns are structured and funneling as much as possible of the media buy through one DSP Popeyes benefits from the three things below:
-Manage frequency across CTV partners
– Measure unique reach across CTV and other platforms.
– Advertise Popeyes to a more qualified audience for both brand and performance campaigns.
Popeyes Advertising: Frequency Caps Increase Household Reach
By channeling the campaign through a single DSP it is now possible to set frequency caps across different households. Therefore, with a finite budget, the reach should be increasing and many more households per campaign should be reached at any given time.
Popeyes started with the new initiative in the fourth quarter of 2021 and, according to Ciaramella is starting to see some promising results. “We have obtained a cost saving of unique household reach of 20%,” he states. . In addition, Popeyes is starting to monitor the campaign overall to understand what the increase of unique reach is.
Social Media Buys
Social Media media buying is not included in Popeyes new DSP plan as these platforms (e.g. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok), are bought through self-service interfaces. How will Popeyes now access audiences in these important social walled gardens? Ciaramella answers that Popeyes uses “social as a channel to drive incremental reach to traditional channels but also to connect with those who are outside of traditional channels.” “On these platforms we look at the audience first,” he concludes.
