The Children’s Place Shifts Marketing Strategy to Boost Brand Awareness
Partnering with Hollywood Stars to Reach Millennial Moms
The Children’s Place, a popular kids clothing brand, is revamping its marketing strategy to reduce its reliance on in-store window ads and instead invest more in digital marketing. To achieve this, the New Jersey-based company has teamed up with renowned celebrities like Snoop Dogg and the beloved holiday icon, Mariah Carey. The goal is to specifically target millennial moms by leveraging celebrity nostalgia, according to Maegan Markee, the brand president for The Children’s Place family of brands. Previously, the company focused primarily on its physical stores and employed customer retention tactics. However, the pandemic-induced lockdowns disrupted in-store traffic and accelerated the growth of e-commerce, prompting The Children’s Place to adapt its approach.
Shifting Focus to Digital Channels
“Our stores used to serve as important marketing vehicles for us. They were like billboards,” Markee explained. As a result, the children’s brand has closed approximately 40% of its stores and redirected its marketing efforts towards paid social media, influencers, and celebrity partnerships to gain a stronger online presence.
Historically, The Children’s Place primarily focused on bottom-of-the-funnel retention tactics. However, the company has made a deliberate effort to change its media mix and invest in brand awareness and consideration strategies. While the exact amount spent on media channels and celebrity partnerships remains undisclosed, The Children’s Place significantly increased its media spending from January to August this year. According to Vivvix, the company spent $29,849,554 on media during that period, compared to $5,668,819 the previous year.
The Importance of Brand Awareness
In recent times, many marketers have prioritized brand awareness over immediate sales, especially due to Apple’s ATT Privacy crackdown and Google’s changes to third-party cookies, which have impacted targeting and measurement in direct response and performance marketing channels.
“Given the current business and economic context, most brands find themselves in a steal share situation,” said Meredith Nelson, Executive Vice President of Performance Intelligence at Edelman DXI. “To stand out from competitors, you need to get in front of consumers and ensure they choose you.”
However, economic challenges have also led to increased scrutiny of marketing budgets and return on media spend. Advertisers find it challenging to divert from the ROI and measurement offered by performance marketing channels. Despite this, Nelson emphasizes that brand awareness is crucial in today’s crowded digital marketing landscape.
“This is not discovery mode. People are in steal share mode, which is a huge motivator for marketers to say, ‘We want our brand to be front and center,'” Nelson explained. “You can’t convert someone who doesn’t know about you.”
Photo: Rowanlovescars, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
