Five ways to determine your World Cup campaign has been a success

The 2014 World Cup has been an undoubted success so far: the most goals scored since 1970, dazzling goals and displays of attacking and counter-attacking football as well as a handful of controversial incidents that are so often par for the course in a tournament of this size. Barring the biting incident, it has been so successful that pundits and punters alike are calling it the best World Cup since the tournament began 84 years ago, writes Andrew Simpson of Income Access. Over the course of the last three months we have offered Gaming Intelligence readers our expert advice on how best to set up and maintain effective online marketing campaigns. We look forward to doing more of this following the launch of our new digital marketing agency, Access Digital Marketing. With the tournament now comfortably into the knockout stages, it’s fitting to end this series by examining five ways to determine whether or not your World Cup campaign has been a success. 1.    First things first - compare the 2014 World Cup with your previous World Cup campaign performance(s). If that data is unavailable, then compare to other large sporting events over the past few years (Euro 2012, Summer and Winter Olympics, etc.) and look at your average four-week (or monthly) figures throughout the year. Drill down further by examining particular days to see if spikes can be attributed to specific marketing efforts and/or games. Key stats that you should review include Net Gaming Revenue (NGR), new registrations/depositors, clicks, impressions and active accounts. 2.    Measure the engagement level and actions (click-through ratio) generated by your content. For points 2-5, ask yourself the following and for this point in particular, consider whether you can create similar content in the future:

• Did you take advantage of the buzz surrounding the World Cup and engage community/prospective players?
• Did you see increased engagement across blogs and social media?
• Did any particular custom marketing materials convert well, such as landing pages and banners for key affiliates/media buyers? Also evaluate newsletter templates and written copy for partner sites.
• Were you able to spark any conversations or excitement through your outreach?
• Where did you see the highest impressions, click-through and time spent on page?

3.    Did you enhance your strategic approach through World Cup activity?

• Assess different ways that SEO, PPC, design and other marketing resources were leveraged during your campaign
• Evaluate the mobile element of your campaign and how you can expand that area moving forward
• Determine whether you made the most of experimenting with targeted marketing for different audiences
• Ask yourself whether your World Cup experience will change the way you approach A/B and multivariate testing

4.    Did you learn anything new about affiliate relationships?

• Re-evaluate both pre and post-World Cup affiliate relationships and their long-term potential as a result of working together during event
• Check your reporting to see where, when and by how much you increased the number of affiliates in your programme
• Follow-up with affiliates that emerged as potential ambassadors for your brand based on their activity across forums, blogs, etc.
• Judge whether special World Cup commission offers to affiliates were well received
• Review how successful you were at encouraging affiliates to use updated creative and how effective those materials were
• Were you able to provide affiliates guidance or leadership when and where it was needed?
• Did any new or mid-tier affiliates emerge as top performers during the World Cup? Now would be a good time to grow those relationships.

5.    Wait.Remember, while you can begin your World Cup audit whenever you like, the tournament isn’t over just yet.You’ll need to wait until Monday July 14th, when the Fan Fests are being dismantled and thousands of happy, but hungover fans, head back to their day jobs, before doing a full campaign evaluation. The post-tournament process will involve incorporating the many lessons learned and continuing to evaluate affiliate activity on a week-by-week and month-by-month basis. You can’t expect sustained World Cup figures but you can see if there is a visible and sustained bump. And finally, well done for making it this far. You can now rest for a few days, or at least until the opening day of the Premier League on Saturday August 16th.About the author: Andrew Simpson is affiliate marketing team leader at Income Access