Hot or Cold ?

During winter 2020, UNIQLO released in Australia a very successful campaign that caught a lot of attention which got many people to participate in their campaign. This IMC campaign not just helps attract more consumers to their brand but also there are other benefits that they gained through this integrated marketing communication. This post will discuss why their most recent IMC campaign was so effective for their brand.

UNIQLO is one of the three biggest retailers around the world with the other top three being ZARA and H&M. UNIQLO is a Japanese company owned by Fast Retailing Co., Ltd producing casual wear, first came to Australia in 2014 and currently has 22 stores around Australia (Wikipedia, 2020). UNIQLO knows their consumer quite well that they deliver a wide range of clothing to their customer that fit different age groups and criteria. Beside a lot of collections that they deliver each season, one of their unique selling points that they are very proud of and also remarkable for UNIQLO that help them attract more customers during cold season is their unique Heattech technique.

UNIQLO rolled out a digital campaign that applies promotion mix methods on sale promotions which are giving free items for consumers that are playing their game (Business Jargon, 2017). The campaign went on for five days and gave 10,000 free vouchers for consumers to redeem their Heattech products with each value $19.90 when they play the game called “Hot or Cold” https://uniqlo-heattech.com.au. Their message of this IMC is “Stay warm with HEATTECH”, when playing the game, consumers will

get the knowledge of different Heattech features that UNIQLO is offering. Customers have to enter their information before playing the games to receive the prize (UNIQLO, 2020).

Connecting and communicating to the brand’s target audiences is very important (Lumen, 2019)and UNIQLO was very effective to use digitals marketing as their main channel to communicate to their audience in this IMC campaign. It helps them communicate in two ways including produce and then share (Chaffey, 2019). With the increasing number of internet users everyday, UNIQLO knows very well where their target audience frequently are especially during the COVID 19 period that helps to attract more people to participate into the campaign online than in store (Schiff, 2014).

To most brands, raising awareness, increasing sales and reinforcing repeat purchase are the key outcomes that they want to achieve when implementing any IMC campaign (Lumen, 2019) which UNIQLO strategy was successful to achieve those goals. With the purpose of raising awareness in the audience about UNIQLO’s unique features, they influenced audiences to play the game, then learned the features of their unique selling point and finally consumers have a chance to experience the product that they win.

The idea of sale promotion helps UNIQLO build excitement in their audience (Edwardlowe Foundation, 2020). For new customers, the brands were convincing their audiences to know the features of HEATTECH that the company was offering by playing the game and gaining more information from them. For existing customers, the brand renews their interest by re-convince consumers when playing the game which reminds them of the unique benefits of the products that the brand offers.

Beside increasing consumer’s awareness of the brand's unique selling point and its product category, this IMC campaign also led UNIQLO to increase demand in higher product sales and potentially in other product lines when consumers know about the brands after the “Hot or Cold” game. Moreover, UNIQLO will have a chance to approach customers with their point of purchase in other product categories that they offer when those winners come to the retail store and redeem the voucher which helps to enhance purchase action.

Lastly, another reason this strategy is a key to compelling is that through the “Hot or Cold” campaign, UNIQLO can collect an amount of data from new consumers when they sign up to the game. This information is very important to UNIQLO when they can use it to send information on new campaigns, products, promotions, etc. to their consumers through email and mobile marketing. Moreover, for date driven, UNIQLO can have insightful information for the R & D department to easier measure price sensitivity and determine the consumer purchase behavior for the future products that they are going to produce (Boundless Marketing, 2020).

Reference:

Boundless Marketing. (2020). Integrated Marketing Communications . Retrieved from https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-marketing/chapter/integrated-marketing-communications/

Business Jargon. (2017). Promotion Mix . Retrieved from https://businessjargons.com/promotion-mix.html

Chaffey, D. (2019). Our review showing examples of the latest innovations in digital media, technology, and data to support digital transformation. Retrieved from https://www.smartinsights.com/managing-digital-marketing/marketing-innovation/business-critical-digital-marketing-trends/

Edwardlowe Foundation. (2020). How to Establish a Promotional Mix. Retrieved from https://edwardlowe.org/how-to-establish-a-promotional-mix/

Lumen. (2019). Promotion: Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC). Retrieved from https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wmopen-introbusiness/chapter/promotion-integrated-marketing-communication-imc/

Schiff, J. L. (2014). 7 ways to create a successful integrated marketing campaign. Retrieved from https://www.cio.com/article/2377257/online-marketing-7-ways-to-create-a-successful-integrated-marketing-campaign.html

UNIQLO. (2020). HEATTECH Hot or Cold Promotion. Retrieved from https://faq-au.uniqlo.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/HEATTECH-Hot-or-Cold-Promotion

Wikipedia. (2020). UNIQLO. Retrieved from https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNIQLO