How Office Depot and Poppin Made Back to School Cooler With Content, Community and Deals

If Teen Vogue's Back to School Saturday wasn't proof of how successful a multichannel, multitactic back-to-school campaign can be, I don't know what was. That campaign integrated original Teen Vogue content with offers from leading brands and retailers, and brought it all together with a live, teen-focused event. Videos circulated online for months after the August extravaganza.

Of course you don't need to host a fashion show or hire the iCarly gang to find back-to-school success. You do need to build your campaign on the same principals as Teen Vogue, however, leveraging your own unique content to build community and conversations via live or social channels, then tying in exclusive offers that incentivize consumers to make a purchase.

Office Depot "Gets" Tweens With Exclusive Content
Office Depot has always been a master at the back-to-school game. This year, it made a huge splash by partnering with tween/teen sensation One Direction for an exclusive product line. Much of the content and community building focuses on a cause marketing campaign aimed at creating bully-free schools. The "1D+OD Together Against Bullying" initiative was the centerpiece of the merchandising deal, and a portion of sales of the exclusive, limited-edition product collection went to funding anti-bullying education. Conversations on Office Depot's lively Facebook page focused on the products and their valuable message — and it resonated. A photo-based post on July 5 received 63,000 likes and 2,500 shares.

To enhance the community engagement aspect of the campaign, the images on the One Direction products "come to life" using augmented reality technology embedded in Office Depot's mobile app, which unlocks exclusive video content of the band. (I'm sure this inspired a lot of social sharing and posts that read, "OMG! So cool!")

With respect to deals, Office Depot has been smart about making exclusive, limited-time offers to its Facebook fans, outside of its weekly circulars. It also shares deals with select affiliates (most notably mommy bloggers) and through its long-standing partnership with MyPoints, an online loyalty shopping site, both of which serve to extend the reach and impact of the brand's campaigns.

Emery Skolfield, senior director of marketing at Office Depot, had this advice to offer to other marketers looking for success with seasonal marketing campaigns:

• Be the only one. Develop exclusive, limited-edition product to differentiate from competitors, and ensure that message (you can only get it here!) is clear in all marketing.
• Make it interactive. Use digital to add layers of interactivity to the product you're selling (e.g., access exclusive content with mobile, social activations, etc.).
• Make it mobile. Ensure every piece of campaign content and all shopping experiences are optimized for easy handheld access and use.
• Activate influencers. Who MUST know about your message? Who can help you most effectively share it outward? Identify those people, contact them and keep them involved throughout.
• Spread the word. Link up with a popular rewards program to hit the right audience to get your message out.

Poppin Activates Millennials to Spread the Word
Partnering with the latest and greatest boy band isn't the right option for every brand. While online office supplies retailer Poppin has already snagged major distribution deals with Staples and Canadian retailer Indigo, the startup approached its first back-to-school season with a laser-focused strategy. Poppin leveraged content, community and deals in a completely fresh way to creatively target college students with its originally designed and colorful line of products.

Poppin Chief Marketing Officer Kevin Ranford is testing out student ambassador programs and on-campus pop-up shops that display Poppin's visually appealing products. "We'll geo-target the areas where our on-campus programs are to activate the communities from a social content and digital advertising standpoint," Ranford says.

Furthermore, on-campus shoppers will be incented to generate their own content, sharing images of their Poppin purchases with their social networks to earn a free gift. "Our incentivized sharing program will help Poppin gain viral traction amongst millennials, arguably the most influential community of social networkers," adds Ranford.

"As for deals, a big priority at Poppin is not diluting the brand with heavy discounts. We don't want to be another retailer that comes out with 50 percent off this and 60 percent off that," Ranford explains. When running an offer-driven customer acquisition campaign, Poppin prefers to add value to the shopping experience by offering a gift with purchase. This strategy helps drive repeat purchases as it exposes consumers to new product categories. It's proving effective with both students and savvy moms. "Recently, we did an email campaign with three threshold-triggered offers: free pens, a free notebook or, a pretty cool thing for college kids, a free iPhone amplifier."

In addition to on-campus activations, Poppin has an integrated marketing strategy in play that includes targeted digital display, search engine marketing, PR, email, social media, print advertising and blogger network activations. Ranford has three key suggestions for marketers:

1. Be ready to engage your target customers on an ongoing basis. While we're in peak shopping season — back to school — communicating with these shoppers year-round will drive repeat purchases and make our brand top of mind next year.
2. Encourage customers to express their personal brand preference within social communities.
3. Establish strategic partnerships to reach your target demographic. For example, Poppin has partnered with BookRenter.com to raise brand awareness amongst its 100,000-plus student customers.

Rusty Taragan is the president of MyPoints, an online loyalty shopping program.