When Bayer Consumer Health was ready to explore marketing strategies beyond traditional TV and non-skippable YouTube ads, the brand found that TrueView for reach campaigns were just what the doctor ordered.
Bayer Consumer Health in Australia and New Zealand is a pharmaceutical subsidiary of Bayer AG, headquartered in Germany. It employs more than 1,000 people and generates over $1 billion annually. A traditional advertiser focused on mass reach and measuring impressions, Bayer Consumer Health historically had placed most of its advertising investment in television.
Finding the cure for traditional marketing
In late 2016, Bayer Consumer Health began looking for ways to extend its advertising reach beyond its usual TV and non-skippable YouTube reservation campaigns. The brand wanted to be able to deploy additional ad formats, while ensuring it still met overall campaign goals. The company searched for a stepping stone to understand how to leverage and measure skippable advertising within their overall media plan.
Bayer Consumer Health decided to trial YouTube’s TrueView for reach, which combines Google’s in-stream format built on user choice with the simplicity of CPM buying. From December 2016 to June 2017, the team ran several TrueView for reach campaigns for three brands — Iberogast, Nasonex, and Elevit — and leveraged additional 20-second video spots created by Google’s in-house video creative support team. Bayer measured its campaign activity using Brand Lift Studies.
“We’ve improved the sophistication of our targeting, our creative, and our buying to ensure we’re effectively reaching our audience.” —Keira Parry, head of digital and media, Bayer Consumer Health
The right prescription for increased reach and efficiency
TrueView for reach was effective at driving efficiencies in both CPM and reach across all campaigns for Bayer Consumer Health. The CPM for the Iberogast TrueView for reach campaign was 59% more efficient than the CPM for standard 30-second, non-skippable YouTube Reservation ads. In addition to cost-effective reach, the TrueView for reach campaigns also drove a 45% lift in overall ad recall and a 14% rise in overall brand awareness for Iberogast.* The economical results from the TrueView for reach campaign for Iberogast were nearly identical to the results from the TrueView for reach campaigns for both Elevit Core and Nasonex as well. “We’ve improved the sophistication of our targeting, our creative, and our buying to ensure we’re effectively reaching our audience,” said Keira Parry, Bayer Consumer Health’s head of digital and media. “TrueView for reach played a big role in that improvement. Without TrueView for reach, we would still very much be operating in a reservation-led world, with non-optimised creative.”
TrueView for reach now plays a regular role in Bayer Consumer Health’s media plan, allowing it to build awareness efficiently and cost-effectively. The brand also now has a set of internal benchmarks to help it consistently improve the ways it reaches Australian audiences.
