Delivering the definition of performance marketing efficiency for Sophie Allport

Efficiency with a generous sprinkling of experimentation cuts ROAS and sharpens customer insight for Sophie Allport

Activity period: 2024

Challenge

It’s a position many CMOs will be familiar with: pressure to deliver better marketing results without any associated budget increase. This is the dilemma homeware and lifestyle brand Sophie Allport sought Launch’s help with.

As the client tried to wrestle free of discount codes, customers weren’t as willing to let go, leading to a drop in sales. Launch’s job was to attract customers willing to pay full price, but with a dwindling performance marketing budget – in certain months £60k less than it had been previously.

-45%

decrease in spend

+41%

above target ROAS

Our approach

We initially focused on refining our relationship with Sophie Allport’s team as our experience is always that effective collaboration is the essence of great results.

Having established that trust, they were open to working with us on creative experimentation to see what resonated best with their audience. Testing across Paid Social taught us that the highest engagement came from natural, organic styles over polished content. Sophie Allport’s team was responsive to this feedback and ensured we had access to the assets we needed to craft the right style of campaign. Our teams also collaborated internally to ensure these learnings were applied across platforms.

As efficiency was key for this client, ROAS was a central KPI. We restructured Google campaigns towards a focus on high and low ROAS campaigns to optimise for this.

Results

Results weren’t just about smashing ROAS targets – although we did. Our experimental approach added extra value for the client, returning customer insight which has transformed their creative approach. We also enriched their customer base with those who love the product, not the discount prices, and are therefore more likely to repurchase.

Exceeding ROAS targets bought us time to take on additional campaigns – e.g. increasing in-store footfall in select stores. Using Performance Max and Paid Social we significantly boosted store visits. Event ads on Meta alone drove attendance at one in-store event from just 15 to 200.

Other numbers:

73% year-on-year increase in ROAS on Google, with a 45% decrease in spend
The team achieved +41% above target ROAS on Google across 2024
On Paid Social a 60% reduction in spend during November resulted in only a 13% drop in purchases, highlighting the effectiveness of our strategy

So – with no additional budget we drove long term, sustainable changes to creative and customer strategy, increased in-store footfall and drove up ROAS by more than 70%. If that doesn’t say efficiency, we’re not sure what does.

Testimonials

“

Working with Rhianna, Lauren, Harriet and Becky has been a true partnership. Their strategic thinking, creative experimentation and constant drive for efficiency helped us unlock stronger results than we thought possible, even with a reduced budget. We’ve seen real, sustainable change in how we approach performance marketing and our customers. The results speak for themselves, but it’s the people who made it happen.

LOUISE MAHON, HEAD OF MARKETING, SOPHIE ALLPORT

”