Will digital promotions make Target's Christmas?
Will Target's recent rebound continue or will a rough holiday season negate the chain's recent gains? That's what many Target watchers are wondering as the chain kicks off a new holiday marketing program that may play a major role in answering that question.
According to Advertising Age, Target is dedicating 61 percent of its holiday media spending to digital, a 10 percent increase from last year's 51 percent. The company is spending less on outdoor advertising and print.
"That's where our consumer is," Jeff Jones, CMO of Target, said in an interview with Advertising Age, explaining the increased holiday focus on mobile and social media.
The crux of the holiday marketing campaign seems to be a "digital storybook" titled "The Holiday Odyssey" narrated by Neil Patrick Harris. The animated story went live yesterday on target.com/adventure and will begin a season-long narrative arc that the company indicates will include other digital and social elements alongside television commercials.
Source: target.com/adventure
The campaign will also involve crossovers between popular entertainment properties like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, LEGOs and Barbie. Target has also created a commercial featuring Storm Troopers from the Star Wars franchise that is set to run in theaters on December 18th for the premiere of the hotly-anticipated movie, Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Target has used Star Wars as a cross-platform marketing peg before. In August, in the ramp up to the Star Wars promotional holiday known as "Force Friday" and the launch of a new line of Star Wars action figures and memorabilia, Target released an online commercial featuring children in old home videos expressing their reactions to the franchise. The nostalgia-fest was tied to Target's #ShareTheForce Twitter campaign, and pushed curious users to a standalone interactive website to publicly share Star Wars-related memories.
In light of all the branded properties, Target's focus on digital media for the holidays seems explicitly geared towards collectors, gamers, toy customers and the parents thereof — presumably a sound move for the holiday season. But how it fits into Target's overall customer strategy remains to be seen.
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